Change any of these and the price updates straight away. Nothing is booked until you talk to us.
This is a beautiful, brand new seven-bedroom chalet in a perfect position, just seconds from the pistes. Chalet Lucaval already existed, but over summer 2019 it was entirely rebuilt. Almost nothing remains of the old chalet, which was already very comfortable. The new chalet is bigger and smarter. The people who did the work are the company responsible for most of Val d’Isère’s high-end developments in recent years, such as our chalets Ptarmigan, Perdrix and Pic Noir, and it is very special indeed. All that hasn’t changed is its position. Part of the very exclusive La Légettaz area above the Club Med, Lucaval is precisely 20 seconds’ walk from the edge of the skiing (we timed it). At the start of the day you make the easy glide across the M piste to the Solaise or Olympique bubbles, the Rogoney charlift or the Légettaz poma, or our favourite, the Bellevarde Express chair. And at the end of the day, you ski from Solaise to 50m from the chalet. If it doesn’t suit you to finish up on Solaise, the Rogoney chair is always the last lift to close, making it possible to traverse home from every direction, the free Train Bleu bus stops just by the chalet, and from 17.30 until 20.00 our own Land Rover shuttle runs from the Tourist Office to the door. For après-skiers, Lucaval is six minutes’ walk from the very smart Étincelle restaurant, or ten from the slightly less smart Cocorico après-ski club. (We never trust these “just a few seconds…” sales pitches, but it certainly won’t take you longer. It was paced out by a pensioner in heavy snowboots. OK, he wasn’t pushing a double buggy through a foot of powder with a leg in plaster, but he’s not Usain Bolt either…) Lucaval has five gorgeous bedrooms in the main part of the chalet, each with its own bath or shower and separate wc, except Bedroom 4, which has a really nice free-standing bath and separate loo. Bedroom 4 and 5 each have an extra single child’s bed available at 75% of the normal price (with a minimum of £450). Bedrooms 6 and 7 are in an annex attached to the back of the main building and a minute’s walk around it from the front door. It has two bedrooms and a single shower room with loo. Bedroom 6 has a double bed, bedroom 7 a single, and these rooms can accommodate a maximum of two people using the rooms either as two singles, or one double room (when used as a double, the single room is then just a convenient dressing room). We love the annex. And the option of two single beds or one double bed is perfect for people who sleep together and people who don’t, people who think they might or swear they won’t… Room 7 has a discount of £150 when rooms 6 and 7 are booked individually. Chalet Lucaval can be booked for 12 people and the organiser will receive 50% off one holiday. However the chalet can be booked for 10 people with no empty bed supplement and the annex will be excluded.
This is a beautiful, brand new seven-bedroom chalet in a perfect position, just seconds from the pistes.
Chalet Lucaval already existed, but over summer 2019 it was entirely rebuilt. Almost nothing remains of the old chalet, which was already very comfortable. The new chalet is bigger and smarter. The people who did the work are the company responsible for most of Val d’Isère’s high-end developments in recent years, such as our chalets Ptarmigan, Perdrix and Pic Noir, and it is very special indeed.
All that hasn’t changed is its position. Part of the very exclusive La Légettaz area above the Club Med, Lucaval is precisely 20 seconds’ walk from the edge of the skiing (we timed it). At the start of the day you make the easy glide across the M piste to the Solaise or Olympique bubbles, the Rogoney charlift or the Légettaz poma, or our favourite, the Bellevarde Express chair. And at the end of the day, you ski from Solaise to 50m from the chalet. If it doesn’t suit you to finish up on Solaise, the Rogoney chair is always the last lift to close, making it possible to traverse home from every direction, the free Train Bleu bus stops just by the chalet, and from 17.30 until 20.00 our own Land Rover shuttle runs from the Tourist Office to the door.
For après-skiers, Lucaval is six minutes’ walk from the very smart Étincelle restaurant, or ten from the slightly less smart Cocorico après-ski club. (We never trust these “just a few seconds…” sales pitches, but it certainly won’t take you longer. It was paced out by a pensioner in heavy snowboots. OK, he wasn’t pushing a double buggy through a foot of powder with a leg in plaster, but he’s not Usain Bolt either…)
Lucaval has five gorgeous bedrooms in the main part of the chalet, each with its own bath or shower and separate wc, except Bedroom 4, which has a really nice free-standing bath and separate loo. Bedroom 4 and 5 each have an extra single child’s bed available at 75% of the normal price (with a minimum of £450).
Bedrooms 6 and 7 are in an annex attached to the back of the main building and a minute’s walk around it from the front door. It has two bedrooms and a single shower room with loo. Bedroom 6 has a double bed, bedroom 7 a single, and these rooms can accommodate a maximum of two people using the rooms either as two singles, or one double room (when used as a double, the single room is then just a convenient dressing room). We love the annex. And the option of two single beds or one double bed is perfect for people who sleep together and people who don’t, people who think they might or swear they won’t… Room 7 has a discount of £150 when rooms 6 and 7 are booked individually.
Chalet Lucaval can be booked for 12 people and the organiser will receive 50% off one holiday. However the chalet can be booked for 10 people with no empty bed supplement and the annex will be excluded.
• WiFi
• Virtually ski-in and ski-out (only 25m walk)
• Excellent detached chalet
• Ski down to main Solaise ski-lifts
• All bedrooms with en suite facilities except bedrooms 6 & 7 which share a shower & wc
• Half price places available (please call for details)
• Smart TV with internet access to Netflix
• Evening Land Rover shuttle from village centre
• Ski room with boot warmers
• Comfortable living area with fireplace and balcony
• Single room
• Childcare (please call for details)
• Chalet can be booked for 12 using rooms 6 & 7 (& receiving 50% off one holiday) or for 10 excluding rooms 6 & 7
Bedroom 1 - Twin / double (14’9″ x 9’6″) on ground floor. Shower and separate wc.
Bedroom 2 - Twin / double (13’10” x 9’6″) on ground floor with shower and separate wc.
Bedroom 3 - Twin / double (14′ x 9’4″) on ground floor with shower and separate wc.
Bedroom 4 - Double (20′ x 10′ in the widest part of the room) L-shaped room on ground floor with a double bed and an extra single bed suitable only for a child. Large bathroom with bath and separate wc.
Bedroom 5 - Twin / double (16′ x 9’10”) on ground floor with an extra single bed suitable only for a child. Shower and wc.
Bedrooms 6 & 7 - These rooms are in the first floor annex (with separate outside entrance). Bedroom 6 is a double (10’6″ x 9′) and Bedroom 7 is a single (13′ x 8’6″), and they share a shower and wc. Together they can be used by a maximum of two people – ie. as two singles or one double (room 6 with room 7 empty). When booked individually, room 7 has a £150 discount.
Sitting / Dining Room:
(21′ x 28′ excluding open-plan kitchen) on first floor. Huge picture windows onto west-facing balcony. Log fire. WiFi.
Extra Beds:
Extra beds are available when one party books the whole chalet. There is a single bed in each of Bedrooms 4 and 5 suitable for one or two children, The cost for these extra beds is 75% of the quoted Lucaval price – subject to a minimum price of £450.
Please Note - Chef and an assistant who live out
Please Note - There is a damage deposit for this chalet (please call for details).
Eating and drinking may not be the most important things on your ski holiday. Good snow, fine weather, comfy boots – these are what will make or break the trip.
But food is an obsession with us. It is the one thing we control totally. Most guests wouldn’t blame us if it snowed every day, they got sunburn or their spouse eloped with a ski instructor, but if dinner wasn’t the perfect end to a good day, or antidote to a bad one, they wouldn’t come again.
Breakfast :
We start with a proper breakfast. Fruit juice, porridge, cereals from Rude Health, bacon, eggs, baguettes straight from the famous local bakery, yoghurt, tea and fresh coffee from Nespresso machines (with instant or infusions for those who prefer them). If that’s not what you consider a proper breakfast, please see our Serious Breakfast Optional Extra. On one morning breakfast will be self-service with fresh croissants and pains au chocolat delivered to your chalet.
Afternoon Tea:
You return from the slopes to find bread and jam, a freshly-baked cake (except on staff days off), tea and coffee left out for you. If you would like hot chocolate, please inform your chalet staff (and tell them how you like it!).
Evening Meal:
Dinner is where we pull out all the stops on five nights of your holiday. Our policy on food is straightforward. We start with the best cuts of meat and the best fresh fruit and vegetables, not really counting the cost. Everything we need is available in Val d’Isère. Most people are very happy with our normal formula of canapés followed by a three-course, fixed-menu, dinner-party-style meal. The cuisine is largely French, though with a fusion of other influences – what Londoners call Modern British. (Foreign, in other words.)
But if there is a consensus in the chalet that lighter food, smaller portions or simpler meals would go down well, we’re very happy to adapt. If you want more or less, or hotter or colder, or earlier or later, just tell us.
Dietary Requirements:
A small proportion of our guests now needs or wishes to eat different food from the rest of their party. If you request a different diet, we will be able to offer one alternative meal so that the normal meal or this alternative will be suitable for vegetarians, dairy free, no red meat or no onions / no garlic (see the Different Diets page to see the full list). Please note that we can supply a vegan diet but charge a supplement of £50 for this.
Or you could tailor-make a menu for your party for the week and ask us to cook, say, two fish meals, one chicken, one red meat (when vegetarians can simply not have the meat) and one vegetarian meal – or whatever combination suits your group. This way everyone enjoys the same meals all together and, dare we say it, eats a little more healthily.
If a diet is more complicated than those mentioned above, we may have to make a charge for special ingredients but we will let you know in advance. If you want us to buy in special non-dairy milks and yogurts there will be a charge in the resort, much the same way as the alternative wines mentioned below.
There are some diets we cannot cater for. We regret that we do not have the separate fridges, etc., required for Kosher diets, we do not have access to Halal meats, and we cannot guarantee that our chalets will be nut-free.
Staff training:
Our pre-season in situ training course gives the cooks three to four weeks of hands-on cooking practice – more than they’d do in a year at cooking school. This is indispensable even for experienced chefs at 6,000 feet, where nothing cooks the same as at sea level.
Wine:
With dinner, we serve free unlimited quantities of a selection of very drinkable French AOC wine and vin de pays. This is, unfortunately, only with dinner, not breakfast, and we stop serving the wine when the coffee appears.
We also have a wine list from which you can buy everything from slightly smarter wine to Châteaux Lafite-Rothschild or d’Yquem. We sell these wines at less than they cost because you are not drinking the house wine. The more you consume the more you save. Drink enough and you’ll pay for the holiday!
And if you prefer Krug Grande Cuvée to Dom Pérignon, just give the girls the dosh. They’ll be happy to get some in for you.
• If you would like a sample menus please give us a call
At a resort height of 1850m, Val d'Isere is part of the Espace Killy region alongside the resort of Tignes. As a whole, the Espace Killy has a total piste distance of more than 300km and two glaciers.
Val d'Isere's early and late snow records are among the best in Europe, making up a huge part of the resort's appeal to skiers across the continent and beyond. It's little wonder this French mountain village has won the hearts of so many.
One of the other things that draws skiers and others to Val d'Isere is the beauty of the traditional village around which the resort has grown up. It's rare to find a French resort of any size with that old-fashioned feel, and perhaps one of the reasons Val d'Isere manages is that its position as host of the FIS Alpine Ski World Cup, making the slopes here very prestigious. If it’s the resort feel you’re looking for, though, don't worry – ski-in ski-out accommodation is available throughout, in chalet, hotel, and apartment form.
The resort itself is made up of three main areas; La Daille, the resort's unnamed centre (which in itself is made up of smaller, named neighbourhoods), and Le Fornet. La Daille is located at the entrance to the resort, near the end of the Olympic downhill runs. After passing through La Daille you will enter into Val d'Isere's central areas, including the picturesque neighbourhoods of Le Cret, Le Legettaz, Le Josery, Le Chatelard, and the exclusive Bellevarde Cliffs (or Millionaires' Row as the locals call it) and then, beyond the church, is the beautiful Le Fornet.
La Daille is chiefly made up of self-catered apartments with one or two catered chalets & hotels mixed in, where Le Fornet is nigh-exclusively comprised of beautiful traditional chalets. More variety is found in the central area which contains a good mix of apartments, chalets and hotels.
Many resorts don't differentiate between sections so strongly, but Val d'Isere's areas are a fascinating and beguiling mix of styles and slopes. It's also worth bearing in mind the number of clubs and bars in the centre of town as well as the relaxing and convenient ski down to La Daille that caps off an afternoon at the Folie Douce, Val d'Isere's top apres bar. Le Fornet, by contrast, has an unbeatable advantage for dedicated skiers – immediate cable car access.
Don't be too concerned about getting from point to point, though; the bus service in town runs well into the night and will never leave you waiting for long. There really isn't a bad part of town to stay in.
Tap a section above to read more.
Chalet Lucaval
Tell us roughly when you want to go and who is coming, and we will price it with the operators for you.
No obligation. One of the team will come back to you the same day where we can.
While the home of an Alpine World Cup is – deservedly – considered more in terms of intermediate and advanced slopes, Val d'Isere has a number of green and blue runs – and, better, the lifts for the nursery slopes are free of charge, so no beginner needs to buy a full week's lift pass just to find out whether they have the makings of a better skier. It's completely possible for a dedicated visitor to return year on year, improving their abilities on the slopes, and enjoying a new skiing experience every time.
The ski schools of Val d'Isere are very welcoming and are up for almost any challenge. However, fledgling skiers should be aware that while the nursery slopes are easy to access, many of the runs that you will progress onto are some height above the resort itself. Some of the runs which would return you to the town center are substantially more difficult – most notably “the Face”, one of the resort's justly-feared black runs.
We therefore often recommend that beginners either ski to La Daille before boarding a bus into town or head to Le Fornet or Laisinant, which are serviced by easy winding runs that will soon bring you back to town via a convenient bus stop.
Intermediate skiers will delight in great numbers of both blue and red runs, enough that a week's determined skiing won't even require many repetitions of routes. Particularly recommended for experienced intermediates are the Germain Mattis and the OK/Orange, which form a nice bridge between intermediate and advanced skiing.
If those seem more of a challenge than you're ready for, however, the Diebold run and Piste 'L', both blue, are excellent, enjoyable to traverse, and sure to raise your confidence in your own skills. Beyond those specific recommendations, an intermediate skier in Val d'Isere is encouraged to explore, swap recommendations with others in the various apres bars and lodges, and generally test themselves as appropriate.
As well as countless opportunities to enjoy the powdery slopes off-piste, Val d'Isere offers several black runs suited to the very best. La Face or, to give it its full name, La Face de Bellevarde is the queen of these, however, and it should be – it's also the Olympic run, and as it takes you right into the heart of town, it makes a wonderful capstone to a day's skiing for any advanced practitioner.
Still, it's far from the only available black run, and one thing's for sure – you will not be bored while you're here!
Both Val d'Isere and the other major resort in the Espace Killy, Tignes, have modern and highly respected snow parks. For the snowboarder who wants more, however, the off-piste is some of the best in Europe much loved by snowboard aficionados and there are even several areas perfect for honing your jibbing skills if you're one of those who doesn't so much have a board as a jib stick.
Fun is assured for all skill levels of snowboarder; the resort has a reputation for hooking visitors and seeing one of the highest rates of return among the snowboarding community.
Given its fantastic snow record, a trip to Val d'Isere gives you every chance of getting a week's worth of powder skiing. With good conditions, the off-piste skiing in Val d'Isere is phenomenal! Le Fornet is the best base of operations for those who like it steep and deep between the trees. There is also a lot of easily accessible off-piste to be had, so you can get your powder fix without having to hike.
There really is everything here a ski lover could want.
The resort can't be said to fall down on apres-ski. This picturesque traditional French village has some sublime gourmet restaurants and wonderful shops to browse, to say nothing of the clubs and bars out on the piste.
Whatever your tastes, budget, or the size of your group, Val d'Isere has somewhere that will cater to you, from the students spending the last of their year's loan for a holiday blowout to the captains of the industry looking for a celebration to remember after signing the deal of their lives.
Queen of the apres-ski scene in Val d'Isere is La Folie Douce, a mountain bar and restaurant that is part of an amazing chain with outlets only in the greatest ski resorts worldwide. Their website will keep you up to date on the chef's recommendations and any special events they're hosting, but don't make the mistake of thinking that a chef's recommendations, openly posted, mean this is anything less than a party joint – because this is partying in the approved French fashion, and the best food is matched by the best champagne and the best atmosphere, with dancers on hand to keep the party going.
You can challenge yourself to return to the resort on ski or ride down in comfort in the lift.
It doesn't stop there, though; there's always a party in full swing, and not much less famous than La Folie Douce is Dick's Tea Bar, a standout for the English skier and rightly infamous – for all the best reasons. Ski all day, party all night – whatever you prefer, Val d'Isere has you covered.
The Health Spa and well-equipped sports center give plenty of options to those who want to enjoy themselves while their partner's taking to the slopes & luxuriate in the hammam (Turkish steam bath). Alternatively, enjoy taking a skidoo trip or spend your time exploring the mountain at a more sedate pace by snowshoe.
Or you can get a completely different perspective on the resort from the air, taking an aerofoil to see the mountain from a seeing-is-believing perspective above it. Whatever you like to spend your leisure hours doing, you're almost guaranteed the chance in this beautiful resort setting.
Part of the Espace Killy ski area
