Italy's ideal family ski resort

Fun and friendly, the South Tyrol is the perfect place to step up to the big slope, says Chloë Bryan-Brown

Chloë Bryan-Brown

Ever since having children I’ve been on a mission to find the ideal ski holiday. Is it really so difficult to find a family-friendly resort with plenty to do on nonskiing days, good accommodation, and real, live foreigners so that it doesn’t feel like Alpshire?

This year, we decided to try Kinderhotels, a collection of independently owned family hotels in the Alps that came across our radar during another trip to Switzerland. I decided on the Kinderhotel Cavallino-Bianco in the Italian South Tyrol. It was described in one newspaper as having “the best childcare facilities of any world-class ski resort”, which sounded pretty good to me, especially since we had 14-month old Digby to consider as well as Peggy, 6.

My only concern was the weather. We were booked in for Easter by which time, I worried, the snow might be zuppa. At 1,236m (4,050ft), Ortisei, where the Cavallino-Bianco is based, is the lowest village in the Val Gardena ski area. What I didn’t know until we arrived there is that the South Tyrol knows a thing or two about snowmaking, so the only problem with late-season skiing is slush on sunny afternoons.

We couldn’t wait to get stuck in. In theory, we could have done so with little fuss since facilities at the hotel allow you to organise your ski pass, ski hire and lessons on the spot. In reality, however, there was still a certain amount of faffing about, with me rushing between floors trying to find out where to sign Peggy up for lessons at the same time as getting her up, fed and dressed in ski gear for the children’s ski bus at 9am. Finally, she was off. My partner, David, had teamed up with the hotel ski guide and a bunch of “middle-aged Germans”, which just left me with Digby, who needed to be settled into the children’s club.

At last I was away, shooshing along a narrow path to the top of the Alpe di Suisi, a huge sunny bowl with a rim of dramatic peaks. Here there were plenty of easy blues and reds that were ideal for getting my ski legs back after two seasons off.

Back at the hotel that evening, the children were too excited for bed. So we took them to dinner. This being Italy, nobody blinked an eye. The children even managed to stay up for the evening’s entertainment involving a lot of Italian slapstick.

It looked as though we might have found our ideal ski holiday. But before we could book ourselves in again, disaster struck – a tummy bug. Time to see if there were enough off-snow activities to keep us from going stir crazy. Digby was too miserable to swim in the hotel pool, so, bundling him up in a blanket, we went to explore Ortisei, with its old-fashioned museum, where an exhibition of wooden toys made him chuckle for the first time in days. Even better were the two beautiful churches, with their gilding, intricately carved wood and plaster saints to whom I lit a candle offering to help to make us better.

One must have been listening because the next day David and I felt well enough to go skiing together. We even managed to squeeze in a day with Peggy, bashing about on the nursery slopes before taking her to the Alpe di Suisi for her first ski on a proper piste. It was the perfect ending to our ideal holiday.

Need to know

Getting there: Chloë Bryan-Brown and family travelled on Ryanair (0871 2460000, www.ryanair.com), which offers flights to Verona Valerio Catullo from £11.98 return. They transferred to Ortisei by coach (00 39 0471 999999, www.suedtirol.info/lowfare) for £20pp, under5s free. Where to stay: The Hotel Cavallino-Bianco (0471 783333, www.cavallino-bianco.com) has an all-inclusive price for a family of four with one child under 3 and one aged 6-12 of about £1,600 for departures between December 1 and December 18.
Further information: South Tyrol Tourism (www.suedtirol.info).

Ski alternatives for families

Baby Hotel (00 43 5673 2151, www.hotel-bellevue.at) in Lermoos, near Innsbruck, has a supervised kindergarten plus nanny service for babies from one month. Doubles (up to three people) from £73 a night, including meals.
Familien Hotels (www.familienhotels.com): A group of 24 hotels in the South Tyrol, which range from Alpine farms to five-stars with spas.
Löwe & Bär (00 43 5476 6058, www.loewebaer.com): Another Kinderhotel in Serfaus, also near Innsbruck, with children’s facilities and a short hop by a children’s train to Kinderschneealm, a children’s snowgarden with eight magic carpets (conveyor lifts) to save tired legs. Family rooms (two adults and one child) from £60pp with meals.

• Print
• Email
• Post to del.icio.us
• Post to newsvine
• Post to Yahoo!
• Post to Digg

Wintersports gallery Nov 2007 -

It's been the best start to a ski season in Europe for years

Slide Show

ski news headlines

• Acrobatics on snow lead to rise in deaths and injuries
• Snow falls to lift any downhill racer
• Want a ski bargain? Go to Italy
• 13 ski deals before Christmas
• The ski season starts early

Live snow reports

Winter sports 

Austria's record snow

Watch Ginny McGrath's footage of Zell am See's best opening weekend for 20 years

Reviews of spa hotels

• Whitepod, Villars, Switzerland
• Hotel Byblos, Courchevel, France
• St Moritz Spa, Kempinski Grand Hotel des Bains, Switzerland
• Four Seasons Spa, Whistler, Canada

from the archive

Wintersports archive

Read more than 180 features from previous ski seasons

Winter sports   

On the mountain when I was young, food was just the fuel I needed to keep on charging down

More...

Tom Aikens

• Post a comment

Slideshow: Wintersports gallery Feb-May 2007

Remember the hot spring of 2007? View your smugshot images here

Slide Show