Grand Massif

The Grand Massif links five resorts above the Arve valley in the Haute-Savoie, an hour or so up from Geneva. Flaine is the odd one out — a high, purpose-built resort sitting in a wide bowl at around 1600 m, its concrete Bauhaus architecture built for ski-in ski-out convenience rather than looks. The other four — Les Carroz, Morillon, Samoëns and Sixt-Fer-à-Cheval — are proper lived-in villages down in the valley, reached from the top by long runs and fed back up by gondolas. The marketed figure is around 265 km of piste on one lift pass, which makes it one of the larger linked areas within easy reach of an airport. Where you base changes the trip: up in the bowl for snow and doorstep skiing, or down in a village for character and a gondola commute.

The mix. Few areas this size pair genuinely snow-sure high skiing with real valley villages, and fewer still sit an hour from a major airport. Flaine's bowl holds snow and suits nervous skiers and families; the tree-lined runs down to the villages give the shelter and atmosphere the bowl lacks. And the Cascades — a rambling blue that drops 14 km from the top of Flaine to Sixt — is the kind of run people come back for on its own.

Two moods on one pass. Up top, Flaine's bowl is open, bright and high, a shady amphitheatre built for reliable snow and gentle progression. Drop over the edge towards the valley and the runs thread down through forest to the villages, sheltered and atmospheric when the weather closes in up top. It skis as an intermediate's playground first, with enough gentle terrain for beginners in the bowl and a handful of serious steeps and off-piste for those who go looking.