Sierra Nevada, Spain

Kim from UNITED KINGDOM writes:

Living in Granada and skiing in Sierra Nevada.
I skied most of the 07-08 season. In general I was pretty disappointed as an advanced skier. I was told by some of the instructors that it was a bad year for snow so there was no off-piste areas available, which potentially could provide some good skiing. The in bounds areas don´t really provide much of a challenge. There´s one long black run that was closed for about half the season but needs two slowish chairlifts to access and is over pretty quickly. The ´Laguna´ area was closed pretty much all season for lack of snow. A massive array of snow canons ensure that the beginners runs are kept open all season.
Granada is a good place to live, if you can find somewhere. The estate agents won´t rent you anything for less than a year so you have to try your luck with the various fly posted advertisements which is pretty tricky if you don´t time it right or speak much Spanish. Getting from Granada to SN can be done on the bus but there is really only one option at 10am from the out of town bus stop unless you get the really early bus. I got fed up with this and drove a car down from the UK at Xmas. Granada to SN takes about 45mins.

Positives:
Very suitable slopes for intermediates/novices who want to improve.
Food very reasonably priced (esp at Tia Maria, by the cable car).
Sunny nearly all the time which makes for some pleasant intermediate skiing.
Lifts work reasonably well.
Decent vertical drop (about 1300m).
Granada.

Negatives:
Very little snow.
Little or no off-piste or challenging slopes for advanced skiers.
Relatively expensive lift pass - 1000 Euros for the season when I was there.

2008-04-30