Mottaret, France

Phil Yates from UNITED KINGDOM writes:

Feb 3rd - Feb 10th 2007
Phil Yates from England
If you are thinking of staying here.....forget it......If you have already booked it then try and change your booking.
We went with Crystal and stayed at Le Hameau which is isolated at the top of Motteret.
I will start with the only two positive things I can say about the resort and the accommodation.
It is a good location to the slopes and there is an endless supply of hot water after a hard day on the piste!
From there it is "DOWNHILL" all the way !
You will be made about as welcome as "a pork chop in a synagogue"
In my opinion this is a French resort, run by the French for the French......If this is the sort of reception foreigners get in France when they arrive then it's no wonder so many of them end up in the UK.
If you arrive at reception speaking English you will be treated like a second class citizen.
The apartments need a good make over........It seems to me that the place has been invaded with vandals........In ours the electrics did not work, the toilet and the basin were cracked.....the blankets covered in various bodily fluids.....the oven was a disgrace.....we had a 7 bed apartment which were all bunk beds and not suitable for adults over 8 stone or 5 foot 6 inches tall.
We had to pay a 250 Euro deposit and do an inventory within 24 hours for crockery, cutlery and equipment which would fail to be even given away at a boot fair.
The bar area which is located near the "friendly" reception area contains pool tables that are about as level as a black run, pinball machines that didn't work all week, and bar staff with attitude.
If you do have a drink and eventually need to use the toilet located under the bar area...forget it and go back to you room....you will have less chance of slipping on the snow and ice than on the toilet floor.
The doors have been kicked in, the lights didn't work, there was no toilet roll and on one evening there were torrents of water streaming out of the toilets down the hallway.
There is a sign saying no ski boots...it should state that you need to wear wellies in the toilet area!
We went on the snow train and arrived in resort at about 9am expecting to go skiing as mentioned in the brochure.
We asked where the baggage room was and were told that 600 French people were vacating the apartments that day and that the baggage room was not available to us.
We asked what time our room would be ready and were told that it would not be ready until 5.30pm due to the French evacuation.
Our choice was to leave our unattended baggage all day or not go skiing.
After threatening the rep with legal action they put our luggage in their minibus for the day.
To summarise I would not go to Mottaret again even if it was the last ski resort available after the polar ice caps have melted.
I will never travel with Crystal again due to the fact that their brochure is misleading....they employ young people with very little local knowledge and it seems the only training they get is how to avoid answering a questions!
I will be going back to Austria in future for some decent food and drink and a far more authentic atmosphere!

2007-02-12