ncjones

Off to Avoriaz with wife and children for New Year. Can't wait!

My wife's just driven through... snowing at top of Haldon but not settling yet. Gritters out in a major way on the hill .

Yep. They grit it to death these days, but obviously will get overwhelmed if really intense.

Leaving Paddington now.. will reach Haldon Hill about 445pm, had thought little chance of snow settling by then. Confidence waning!

Thanks. I know the route you mean....I've gone that way in the summer, but not tried it in winter. I'll see what the traffic is like, I wouldn't be getting to Lyon until quite late so may keep on the big road...but I'll bear that way in mind as it's certainly more scenic. Conditions look fantastic. Fingers crossed for a cold Easter!

Looks/sounds fantastic. We're heading out to Aussois on Good Friday for a week. Please don't use up all the snow! By the motorway through the Jura mountains do you mean when you when you fork left (east) after Dijon, past Dole towards Lyon??....or is it a different route. I was planning to head straight down from Calais - Reims - Dijon - Lyon....but would be interested to hear alternatives. Have a fantastic holiday.

10 hours is good rule of thumb. That's assuming travelling at the French limit and only relatively quick comfort breaks. The snowheads forums are a really useful resource. I'm driving out at Easter. Will leave Devon as soon as school finishes on Maundy Thursday. Eurotunnel that night and overnight stop near Calais. Then straight down to the Alps ready for skiing Saturday morning.

This. Most ski resorts stats show better conditions at Easter than Christmas, yet people are generally more concerned about going late than early. I'm going to a lowish small resort at Easter (Aussois). If you travel independently worst case you may have to drive to a nearby higher resort (in my case Val Thorens).

Chamonix is nearly unbeatable. If the conditions are excellent and you are a competent off piste skier. Otherwise it's just pretty good. The downsides are that it does not consist of linked ski areas like many other resorts and hence you tend to ski a different area each day and queuing for a bus at the beginning and end of the day can be a pain. That said it is my favourite short break destination and is very quick an easy to get to from Geneva airport. I'd recommend hiring a car....and if you do so make sure you hire one from the Swiss side of the airport. This way you automatically get a car with winter tyres and snow chains.....rather than having to pay extra for chains and risk summer tyres if you use a company on the French side. The Swiss Motorway vignette (Toll sticker) is also included on Swiss cars and this enables the quick easy route to and from the airport. You regularly need winter tyres, even in March, on the road up to Argentiere. We usually fly Easyjet and stay at Gite Le Belvedere in Argentiere Last year when we were there, a lot of new snow was forecast one night, but it didn't arrive. However we heard at breakfast it had dumped it down in Courmayeur......so we jumped in the car and 40 minutes later we had the most amazing skiing in Italy!

Just driven over Dartmoor, past Princestown. 3.0C and sleeting.

Snowing.....first flakes for 2 years. If we're getting snow from this, more optimistic about Sun onwards.

Fingers crossed for S Devon. We've pretty much missed out so far this year. Snowing earlier on the top of Haldon, still raining in Chudleigh.