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Questions about planning a ski trip to Austria

Questions about planning a ski trip to Austria

Old Aug 8, 2022, 1:13 pm
  #1  
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Join Date: Feb 2003
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Questions about planning a ski trip to Austria

I am planning my first ever Alps ski vacation for my wife and I, which has been on my bucket list for some time. We are targeting Austria. I have a number of questions that hopefully folks with more experience planning this type of trip can answer:

1) We are planning on a week long trip. We are in our mid-50s so it's not like we'll be going clubbing or anything, but a fun but laid-back apres-ski environment would be nice. We prefer to ski black and red (using European color codes) level of terrain. I was thinking Lech might be a good choice - should I consider others? We are flying into Innsbruck where we plan to stay a couple nights to recover from jet-lag and then take a train to a resort. After the ski week we will take a train into Germany where we will stay further and visit family and friends.

2) We are looking at the first week in March 2023 - I hope the snow will still be good then but I realize that's next to impossible to predict. Any thoughts/comments would be appreciated however.

3) For booking accommodations, is a site like Booking.com recommended? Or are there other agencies that I should know about that can find us a better price or have better availability? We are targeting a Fri-Fri 7 night stay. Would a Sat-Sat stay potentially result in better choices?

4) Is it worth it bringing our own equipment? We are flying SFO-FRA-VIE-INN in Business on LH and OS so I think we'll be able to check the equipment for free (and hope it doesn't get lost). What are typical equipment rental rates (I'd guess we'd rent for the entire week even though we may only ski 5 of the 7 days - TBD).

5) I took a quick look at accommodations in Lech on booking.com. A number of places claim "ski in-ski out" yet appear to be a few hundred meters from the nearest lift. Any comments on getting to/from the lifts would be appreciated. We don't want to have to walk hundreds of meters lugging all our gear to get to the lifts.

thanks!
mangoMan is offline  
Old Aug 22, 2022, 10:52 am
  #2  
 
Join Date: May 2006
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I've been to a number of Austrian and Swiss ski places so I have some direct experience.

1) Lech is great and you can get to St. Anton for some skiing also. Fantastic downhill and cross country. Plenty of red and black and off piste. We stayed in St. Anton once and in Lech once and had a great time in both places. Also consider Galtur / Ischgl which is really (really!!) extensive and great (quieter to stay in Galtur). A train will get you to St. Anton but you'll need to take the bus or a taxi to get to Lech. We got a car service from INN to Lech and once to Galtur - much easier if a bit more costly. For your follow on trip you could take the bus from Lech to St Anton and then by train wherever.

I'd say you can get to Lech from Innsbruck the day you arrive and rest there unless you have some reason to stay in Innsbruck (nice but not much and a bit touristy for my taste). I prefer to get where I'm going and 'recover' there, but don't go by me: I flew to ZRH, took the train to Davos and skied half a day that same day!

2) Early or mid march is a good time to go, based on my experience..

3) Booking.com has worked well for me - I scored a single in a barely-three-star-but-fine-for-me place last March in Davos that was <$50/night with breakfast. Lots of availability but worth checking the town website/tourist info eg for https://www.lechzuers.com/en

4) I always bring helmet and boots and nothing else. I rented skis and poles in Davos from the place right at the lift and it was $180 for 5 days for the middle-tier package. Austria will be less and it's great not lugging skis around on trains.

5) Just MHO but get used to the idea of walking a couple hundred meters in ski boots or have some lightweight packable snow boots. Also there's almost always a bus that will get you close to where you are going.
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