Looking at going skiing around 17th December, kids 3 and 6 never skied before so don’t need a massive resort. Are there high up smaller resorts which have reasonable priced lift passes?

Probably Italy or Austria. Austria will likely have better snow but the Italians seem better at making average conditions work and it tends to be cheaper. Both are way cheaper than France.

It’s a bit early to tell who will have snow. I’d be tempted to book some cheap flights to either Milan, Turin or Innsbruck and see what the snow is like a couple of weeks before. You might get lucky, might end up with a slightly longer drive. Shouldn’t be too tricky to fast last minute accomodation at that time of year.

yes Austria, I don’t know much about Italy. zell am see, lots of options for accommodation, Kaprun has a glacier. awesome stodgy food

http://bamyanskiclub.com

http://www.almaty-kazakhstan.net/attractions/skiing/shymbulak-ski-resort/

😉

The Austrian resorts will do lift passes based on usage, which is great for learning kid’s as they’ll realistically be using 1 drag lift most of the week and maybe a few runs with you in the afternoon.
Zell is a good suggestion with plenty to do and 20 mins to the Kitsteinhorn if the snow isn’t great.

Here’s my lad and my friend last week there

Also, check out Maria Alm, beautiful village, quiet pistes.
I’ll probably be there that week.

Have a look at SkiFix