I was going to send this last night but I decided to sleep on it as my fresh memories may have clouded my judgement so this is a slightly edited report.
@Tony Crocker i acknowledge your previous advice to stay at Lech/Zurs. Sometimes I take your advice (for which I’m thankful) and sometimes I don’t. We wanted to check out multiple ski areas for research purposes for future trips so we picked the unglamorous but central and totally comfortable base of Landeck. The half board deal we’re on is probably one third of the price of the same deal at Lech. I get that my sensitivity with spending is contradictory considering the amount of world wide ski travel we do.![Smile :) :)](https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png)
We took the 22 minute train ride to St Anton and purchased our 80 euro day tickets. I didn’t take too many photos sadly. The light was flat (for most of the day) so we didn’t get any wow experience from what I’m sure would usually be fantastic vistas. I was mindful of the southerly orientation of St Anton so we skied over the back toward St Christoff and Stuben. From opening chair it was clear the ski area was extremely crowded. Definitely the most crowded I’ve ever experienced.
I spotted the relatively quiet ski routes under the St Christoff chair so did a lap while Kylie took a groomer. There were no crowds on the ski route. I quickly found out why. Once committed I descended and almost immediately experience sticky gluggy (that’s a word in Oz) snow. It was a long way down and it tired my legs badly. (I thought more than once about Tony’s comments on Jackson’s orientation).
Soon after we had our best runs of the day off the Albona 2 gondola above Stuben. It hadn’t been as sun affected and there were far less crowds. I wanted to see more of the area so took the dubious decision of moving back over the other side of Stuben. The crazy skiers on crowded pistes rattled Kylie badly so we decided for a lunch stop. We went to a sit down joint and had an eye wateringly expensive average lunch. We had far better at Serre Chevalier for less than half the price. I have since discovered the vast majority of the restaurants are owned by the lift company.
After lunch Kylie was knocked over by some dickhead skiing uncontrollably on a super crowded piste. You can see where this is going…… Kylie took a breather while I kept skiing despite not enjoying it. I’ve never felt unsafe on a ski hill before…..Does this resort attract out of control yobbos? For the first time this trip I heard plenty of English being spoken and yelled.
The intention was to check out the famed apres at the Mooserwirt or Krazy Kangaroo but when I skied past on perhaps the worst snow I have ever skied on I could hear doof doof music and yahooing from clearly already drunk patrons so given my mood I ditched that idea. I decided to meet Kylie so she could check out the retail shops for a souvenir. (You know of our lame logo sticker on the ski helmet thing. She is still doing that but has run out of room so is doing pinned badges. She has quite the collection). Down in the town we were rained on by a passing shower.
I had the rare want for an ice cream or gelato. I discovered there are no gelato shops. What a business opportunity! Can you imagine how many gelatos one could offload in a monopoly situation? I guess the resort is catering to the drinking crowd - not the family crowd.
^^
Aforementioned badges.
Looking down toward St Christoff (I think).
The clouds briefly parted to a degree.
^^
I can’t even remember where this was taken.
This was just before Kylie was knocked over I think.
I think I posted this photo of the skier numbers in the other thread.
The Krazy Kangaroo on our way down to the town before catching the required lift up to our chosen lunch spot.
^^ These very recent posts on Snowheads from people that spend multiple months per season in the Arlberg confirmed to me that we just got unlucky. Obviously Europe’s best snow record couldn’t overcome the recent warmth. It doesn’t excuse the crazy skiing and crowding though.
I can’t help but feel that one of North America’s ‘jewel in the crown’ ski resorts like Aspen or Whistler could deliver a bad experience for a 50 something year old relatively experienced if not terribly skillful skier and his timid skier wife.
We’ll have to give it another go at some time and try the other side of the domain I guess.
Flame suit on!![Smile :) :)](https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png)
@Tony Crocker i acknowledge your previous advice to stay at Lech/Zurs. Sometimes I take your advice (for which I’m thankful) and sometimes I don’t. We wanted to check out multiple ski areas for research purposes for future trips so we picked the unglamorous but central and totally comfortable base of Landeck. The half board deal we’re on is probably one third of the price of the same deal at Lech. I get that my sensitivity with spending is contradictory considering the amount of world wide ski travel we do.
![Smile :) :)](https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png)
We took the 22 minute train ride to St Anton and purchased our 80 euro day tickets. I didn’t take too many photos sadly. The light was flat (for most of the day) so we didn’t get any wow experience from what I’m sure would usually be fantastic vistas. I was mindful of the southerly orientation of St Anton so we skied over the back toward St Christoff and Stuben. From opening chair it was clear the ski area was extremely crowded. Definitely the most crowded I’ve ever experienced.
I spotted the relatively quiet ski routes under the St Christoff chair so did a lap while Kylie took a groomer. There were no crowds on the ski route. I quickly found out why. Once committed I descended and almost immediately experience sticky gluggy (that’s a word in Oz) snow. It was a long way down and it tired my legs badly. (I thought more than once about Tony’s comments on Jackson’s orientation).
Soon after we had our best runs of the day off the Albona 2 gondola above Stuben. It hadn’t been as sun affected and there were far less crowds. I wanted to see more of the area so took the dubious decision of moving back over the other side of Stuben. The crazy skiers on crowded pistes rattled Kylie badly so we decided for a lunch stop. We went to a sit down joint and had an eye wateringly expensive average lunch. We had far better at Serre Chevalier for less than half the price. I have since discovered the vast majority of the restaurants are owned by the lift company.
After lunch Kylie was knocked over by some dickhead skiing uncontrollably on a super crowded piste. You can see where this is going…… Kylie took a breather while I kept skiing despite not enjoying it. I’ve never felt unsafe on a ski hill before…..Does this resort attract out of control yobbos? For the first time this trip I heard plenty of English being spoken and yelled.
The intention was to check out the famed apres at the Mooserwirt or Krazy Kangaroo but when I skied past on perhaps the worst snow I have ever skied on I could hear doof doof music and yahooing from clearly already drunk patrons so given my mood I ditched that idea. I decided to meet Kylie so she could check out the retail shops for a souvenir. (You know of our lame logo sticker on the ski helmet thing. She is still doing that but has run out of room so is doing pinned badges. She has quite the collection). Down in the town we were rained on by a passing shower.
I had the rare want for an ice cream or gelato. I discovered there are no gelato shops. What a business opportunity! Can you imagine how many gelatos one could offload in a monopoly situation? I guess the resort is catering to the drinking crowd - not the family crowd.
^^
Aforementioned badges.
Looking down toward St Christoff (I think).
The clouds briefly parted to a degree.
^^
I can’t even remember where this was taken.
This was just before Kylie was knocked over I think.
I think I posted this photo of the skier numbers in the other thread.
The Krazy Kangaroo on our way down to the town before catching the required lift up to our chosen lunch spot.
^^ These very recent posts on Snowheads from people that spend multiple months per season in the Arlberg confirmed to me that we just got unlucky. Obviously Europe’s best snow record couldn’t overcome the recent warmth. It doesn’t excuse the crazy skiing and crowding though.
I can’t help but feel that one of North America’s ‘jewel in the crown’ ski resorts like Aspen or Whistler could deliver a bad experience for a 50 something year old relatively experienced if not terribly skillful skier and his timid skier wife.
We’ll have to give it another go at some time and try the other side of the domain I guess.
Flame suit on!
![Smile :) :)](https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png)