I am looking for some advice on mountain biking holidays in the alps, 1st of will be driving there so will be taking the bikes in the car, my Girl friends bike is a ht with 160 forks, will it do the job or would it be better to hire when we get there, also I will be 47 next year and not really wanting to hang out with young racer types, I am no down hill god,
I don’t know weather just to book accommodation and try and find the trails when we get there or book a specific bike company, I haven’t been before and don’t know nothing about the area, looking for nice accommodation and food as well as good riding, hot tub or pool would be nice if it could be had, Its been 9 years since I last had a holiday and would like it to be relaxing when not on the bike,
had a quick look at a company called single track safari, but I know a lot of you have been and done it on here, so I thought id ask, looking to book for next year, is there any times that are best avoided

thanks
Craig

Kind of depends what kind of riding you want to do and where you want to go.

Loads of ways of doing it. Packaged trips will package it all up but will cost a fair bit more than DIY. If you DIY you can easily book accommodation and then either get maps for trails or hire a local guide anyway.

Maybe consider an event like the Passportes du Soleil which acts as an introduction to the Alps and gives you a well marked route across the French / Swiss border, lift pass and food stops. It’s sort of XC riding with uplifts, though compared to the UK it’s more All Mountain terrain. If you stick to the official route anyone can do it really. You can drift off the route along the way and take some more downhill options or hit the bike parks. Busy weekend however. You could go at other times when it’s quiet and pick up the same route.

last time i looked to get acc. & flights left you with a budget of ~£100 for the week to make it cheaper than an organised trip.

Been with bike village & white room chalet. both great. can’t recommend enough.

bike village
white room chalet

Is there an Ideal place to start from, town wise, so if I booked some accom in the town it shouldn’t be to hard to find the trails, looking to gut up lifts up to the top and ride down, I don’t fancy spending most of my time pedalling up to the top, I am no where near fit enough

We always DIY it. There’s a few of us so we book a chalet but there are plenty of hotels in most alpine resorts. They are well under capacity in the summer compared to winter. Lots of hotels have sauna/spa facilities as they are popular with skiers. Having looked at and been to quite a few places, Morzine is the one we keep going back to. Good range of riding, massive area, decent lifts and a nice town with lots of other stuff to do (great pool, tennis, ice skating, +++). Its also one of the shortest drives. Its pretty easy to follow the waymarked trails and easy to explore as you generally end up somewhere with a lift back (as long as you don’t leave it too late). The main runs near the towns can get a bit busy with downhillers but once you get a little bit further out you pretty much have the place to yourself. Hardtail would be fine but it is much more fun on a full suss. Continually riding down hill at high speed you can really take a bit of a pounding. The descents are long. Some good bikes available to rent but it isn’t super cheap (Around 70 euro a day).

The alps is huge, bit like saying you are going to the UK what tyres 🙂

Having always done DIY last trip was white room and as a couple it was great, riding was more trail than DH, groups were good and the lack of stress about routes, cooking and who had more beer was sublime 🙂

Found the stuff around Les Arcs great, uncrowded natural riding with great trails and none of the motorways that you find in other areas.

As has been said, it depends what you are looking to do.

I’ve been to Saalabach-Hinterglemm in Austria the last couple of years and am not a downhill fan (watching yes, riding no!)

We drive there (non-stop this year) and just book accommodation in one of the villages (Saalbach or Hinterglemm), making sure the hotel/apartment has the Joker card which gives free lift access, plus discounts etc elsewhere.

The bikepark runs range from blues to blacks and there are lots of longer XC type routes as well, including some great singletrack over the mountains, although a large number of them are fireroads.

I’ve seen people running hardtails there okay, I used a 120mm travel bike previously and moved to a 150/130 travel bike this year which was a bit better but my riding isn’t good enough to exploit it. The trails never feel that busy to me so if your not confident it’s easy to get clean runs without having to move over and it’s generally easy to see the downhill stormtroopers catching up.

The saalbach website has maps of the main routes so it’s easy to sort out a days riding.

White Room are very good for trails accomodation etc
Food was rubbish this year though

DIY = Chatel maybe?
http://info.chatel.com/mountain-biking-for-all-bike-park-circuits.html

2 lifts and one free bus to lift station. Nice quiet village compared to others, been once. One of our group rode a hardtail. You van ride XC or do some of the easy DH gondola trails.

Chatel has a lot of varied trails. The greens and blues are good fun and easily doable on a hardtail although some of the braking bumps can be a bit savage. Lots of XC type stuff as well but you’d probably need a guide to find the best bits.

For our first Alps trip we drove to Les Gets. We booked a nice chalet through Owners Direct. There are lots of marked trails both downhill and XC. The easy downhill tracks are great fun. It’s quite a nice resort. Not too hard core. The PDS route is avaliable from there as well. It was quite cheap and we had a fantastic time. We have been to a number of other resorts but Les Gets is the only one we have been back to (we might go for a third time next year).
I would look to get a full sus. The easy downhills are too much fun to ignore but she will be knackered after the first day on a hard tail.

Try Jamie at ridethealps.com. He’s similar age, got huge amounts of knowledge of the Samoens and surrounding area. Smashing bloke and no I’m not related. Just a happy customer. He’ll tailor stuff and accommodation to suit.

As an FYI. Of the places listed above chatel, les gets and morzine are all within the same lift area and you can stay in any of them to ride the whole area. We tend to stay in morzine as it is in the middle, has the most other stuff and is downhill from most places so easy to ride home at the end of the day.

also I will be 47 next year and not really wanting to hang out with young racer types, I am no down hill god,

That’s why I suggested Chatel. Mid 50s when I went ❗
MrsT came with me and as a non biker she found plenty to do wandering around the town, sampling coffee and cake at various establishments 😆
A few photos here…..

What? No one’s mentioned bike verbier yet?

Well, Bike Verbier then.

of the places listed above chatel, les gets and morzine are all within the same lift area and you can stay in any of them to ride the whole area. We tend to stay in morzine as it is in the middle

we’ve been to all three. We prefer Les Gets as it is quieter and more laid back than Morzine and but is more lively than Chatel. It is also the nearest and knocking two hours off the round trip is not to be sniffed at.
Also I think it has the best easy down hill of the three and unlike Chatel the lifts are in the centre of the town.
Also has the best views.

Another white room fan here. Been the last 2 years and already provisionally booked for next year.

We drove this year. Had a couple of extra days as a result.

Superb guiding on superb trails. Enough variation to cater to every skill level. I personally wouldnt like to do it on a hardtail though.

@Marin – no issues with the food this year from our group 🙂