Mottaret, France

Visitor reviews for Mottaret

• March 16, 2007
  Paterson family from UNITED KINGDOM
  

  In case you have been put off this resort by the previous reviewer we thought we'd add our comments. We also travelled with Crystal and stayed in the same apartments.The apartment was basic and very compact but clean and comfortable. We cannot comment on the bar as we did not use it. This does seem to be a resort frequented mostly by French people but we found them friendly and helpful. This part of Mottaret is quieter than the main village but has a very well-stocked supermarket, a few shops and a reasonable range of good places to eat. The ski hire shop is two minutes walk from the apartment. For us the chief advantage was the ability to ski in - ski out with such ease. The apartment block is at the foot of a chairlift which gives you ready access to the vast 3 valley ski area and there was no queue even at peak times. The mountain restaurants were all lovely and family friendly. The snow conditions were good. All in all we had a lovely week and would definitely return.

• February 12, 2007
  Phil Yates from UNITED KINGDOM
  

  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!

• February 02, 2007
  Big George from UNITED STATES
  

  Try Niederau, Arraba or Poland ............they are much better places and a lot more affordable.

  Hello to Gary and Sandra from England,

• January 18, 2006
  Tom Mayes from GERMANY
  

  Mottaret is a fairly well thought out "purpose-built" resort. It has more ski-in/ski-out accommodations than any other resort I've visited. It's also less crowded than its lower sister, Meribel--except at lunch, and at 3:30 pm when all the skiers start cueing up at the Pas Du Lac and Plattiers bubbles to return to the other valleys.

  I truly enjoyed the location, and the wonderful skiing in Meribel. We stayed the Christmas week, and the early season snow was patchy, but they did a pretty good job of keeping the runs covered with snowmaking and grooming--it was fortunate this year that the temperatures were cold enough every night to make snow. We had easy access and were able to link over to Courchevel, Val Thorens, and Les Menuires--there was plenty of diverse terrain to cover. The man-made snow was only icy in the shade.

  Eskiador/Sport2000 in Le Hameau took very good care of us, and even let us swap out our skis/boards for "mini-skis" the last day. AMS Rentals were very helpful, and we had a wonderful apartment for the week.

  There are some oversights, though. There is very limited ‘beginner’ ski instruction in this area. If you have a beginner skier in your group, you'll spend a lot of time getting them sent on a bus down to Meribel for lessons. (If the skier wanting lessons is a bit above ‘beginner’ they can likely navigate the long green run down to Meribel—just allow plenty of time before the lesson in Meribel starts!) The buses are also typical city buses--no ski racks on the outside of the vehicle--so each hairpin turn is an exciting exercise in shoulder-to-shoulder balancing, while holding a heavy board, or skis & poles. They don’t stop at every stop, either. Twice, we had quite a hike from the center of Meribel back to the Castors Restaurant bus stop (near the ski school meeting point), because the bus driver ignored our request to stop before the tunnel.

  Restaurants are limited in the Mottaret resort, as well. They all play an orchestrated game each evening where all the sandwich shops close at 5PM and all the menus switch to an assortment of overpriced omelets and local dishes that only the most adventuresome would otherwise try--the food is ok, but none of it's worth $25 a plate. It's impossible to find a burger anywhere for dinner. If you want to eat on the cheap, plan to cook a lot in your apartment. There are a few carry-out pizza places that are more reasonable, and the local grocery store has whole roasted chicken if you get there early.

  You should try to stay high on either side of the valley. The ski-in/ski-out feature doesn't work well if you stay halfway up in the entrance of Mottaret (1), or at the back of the valley (2). See the www.meribel.net/welcome-h.htm and go to the resort map of Meribel-Mottaret--areas (1) are D2 & E2, and area (2) is A1. I saw many skiers hiking a fair distance, skis on shoulder, to the nearest lift from these areas

  Also, snowboarders should avoid the long run "Ours" at all costs--If you pass the "Plan Des Mains" chairlift, you've gone too far, and you're in for a painfully long "scoot" back to Mottaret--probably easier to pick up your board and walk.

  All told, it was a very enjoyable week. Pricier than most, but if you want to ski-in/ski-out from the central most point of Les 3 Vallees during the holidays, a premium should be expected.

• January 01, 2006
  Tom Travis from UNITED STATES
  

  Les Trois Vallees has the best interlinked valley skiing I have ever experienced. Mottaret is the best place to stay to have easy access to all the valleys since it is in the middle and has a number of good hotels. It is also higher than Courchevel and Meribel and thus the snow is more plentiful and conditions better. If you want night life and a variety of restaurants do NOT stay there. I loved skiing back and forth among the valleys, with each valley having a wide variety of interesting runs. The runs are mostly intermediate, cruisers; I did not find many challenging black runs. The views are gorgeous, particularly from Val Thorens and Le Masse.