I have just spent 3 hours at Friedrichshafen airport (the transfer airport that Mark Warner uses for winter holidays in St Anton, Austria) for a flight to Gatwick.

One thing that is still odd though is that I have flown out of the airport around 5 times now (all with Mark Warner), and not once has the flight been on time. And this, brings us to what I think this is Mark Warner’s Dirty Little St Anton Secret….

On the plus side Friedrichshafen airport has greatly improved in the 8 years I have been using it. I first came to the airport with Mark Warner Holidays around 2002. On that trip our plane was so delayed that we landed at the airport at the same time as another charter flight. The net result was total pandemonium as the airport only had one baggage claim carrousel, and they could not cope with 400+ passengers. It took over 2 hours to claim bags and clear immigration. These days Friedrichshafen is greatly expanded with a number of baggage claim carrousels and a good number of checkin desks.

The charter airline company Mark Warner uses for the winter season is Viking Airlines (despite their name they are Greek and spend the summer flying holiday makers to Greek Islands). On transfer days the St Anton ‘out’ and ‘return’ flights are at the end of a chain. For example, the plane that leaves the UK around noon for St Anton, and is therefore the mid-afternoon return plane, will have already done early morning flights to and from other Mark Warner winter holiday locations. This means that if there is a slight delay on any of the flights in the early part of the chain then you are not getting home on time from St Anton.

Over the years I have been caught twice by this problem and ended up stranded in London with no hope of a train home.

I guess the bottom line is, if you ski with Mark Warner in St Anton, you may enjoy a leisurely start to your holiday (i.e. no 4 am at the airport dash), but you may pay the price of a severely delayed return and a lost day of work.

In St Anton Mark Warner has a couple of hotels/chaltes. We stayed in the Rosanna, which is centrally located in the town and is handy for the slopes, shops and bars.The hotel is very comfortable (usually too warm) with a guest-only bar and dining area. The bedrooms are of a good size with ‘Austrian Twin’ beds (two single beds pushed together). Bathrooms are nice, with shower and underfloor heating.

The hotel consists of six floors. The basements house the kitchens, the ground floor the guest bar, dining room, reception, a boot and ski room (the boot driers don’t work) and Scotty’s Bar and Pizzeria.

There are then three floors of guest rooms (served by stairs and a lift), and the top floor is lived in by the hotel owners. In total the hotel takes around 60 – 70 guests.

We stayed the week before Christmas so were the second set of guests of the season. Despite it being early season the hotel was already running along nicely. However, there are some problems with the hotel….

If you are a light sleeper and are on guest floors 1 or 2 then forget trying to get to sleep before 12:30 am as the noise from Scotty’s bar is so loud it will almost bounce you out of bed.

If you are an ‘internet junky’ be prepared to go cold turkey as even though Mark Warner offers 5 hours connection for 10 Euros the connection is so poor as to almost be unusable (hence no thesnowsite.com updates during the trip. In fact, you will spend more time trying to connect to the Internet, than actually connected (and you get billed for when trying to connect).

I keep returning to St Anton in Austria to ski…. why?

Well, the town is stunning, the slopes are challenging, and the night life is extraordinary.

St Anton has some truly great skiing, both on and off piste. I would certainly describe the resort as being for ‘intermediate/advanced’ skiers, and not for the beginner.

The resort can be split broadly in to two areas: Rendl and the rest.

Rendl

The Rendl ski area is served by its own lift from the town (a cable car) and consists of an area of 4 lifts and one drag. The area needs a lot of snow and is not usually open before Christmas. The terrain is mixed (and has a snowboard park) and mountain facilities are limited (two cafes and a shop at the top).

The ski back from the Rendl area is via a long road that winds it way back to St Anton. The entrance to this run (R1) can be difficult to spot as it is hidden over a lip behind the main high speed lift next to the mountain top gondola station.

The ski back to St Anton is worth doing if only for the Apple Strudel served at a small mountain restaurant on the right-hand side of the piste about three-quarters of the way down.

St Anton

Fantastic ski area with lots to do, both on and off piste.

Generally split over 3 or 4 mountains with interconnecting runs and lifts. Mountain facilities are good with a lot of high-speed lifts with ‘bubbles’ for cold days, and a number of mountain restaurants.

For lunch it is definitely worth trying the restaurant just off the piste in St Christoph (the lower one of the two), if only to use the slide to the toilets. The food can be a little pricey.

Another fun trip is to take the run down to Stubben (but don’t go to Stubben) and the catch the free bus to Lech (bus number 3). You can either go all the way to Lech (the standard St Anton pass covers Lech), or get off at Zurs and ski that area, or ski from Zurs to Lech on the ‘white ring’. From Lech (or Zurs) you can catch the bus back to the bottom of a drag lift near Stubben for the ski back to St Anton.

Lech

Lech is a really pretty Austrian village that was a favourite of Princess Diana.

The ski area is not particularly challenging and there is a great selection of ‘cruiser’ trails available which are easy to ski and really compliment your skiing ability.

Good piece in the Guardian on top 10 Austrian ski areas – Top 10 Austrian village ski resorts | Travel | guardian.co.uk

There top ten are:

1. For beginners – Westendorf

2. For mixed-age families – Filzmoos

3. For silver skiers – Oberau

4. For groups – St Anton

5. For lovers – Alpbach

6. For experienced skiers – Galtur

7. For partygoers – Mayrhofen

8. For young families – Ellmau

9. For Glam – Lech

10. For non-skiers – Igls

Now, interestingly, or worryingly, Westendorf, Filzmoos, Oberau, and Ellmau don’t appear on theSnowSite? Why? No idea.

From the list I have personally only skied two: St Anton and Lech (Lech is a chort taxi ride from St Anton), and yes, Lech is for Glam (also has some great cruiser ski runs), however, if St Anton is listed for ‘groups’ and Mayrhofen is the ‘party’ resort, then Mayrhofen must be a really good party place, and I must check it out.

For the full-story, and breakdown of why which resort was picked for what, have a look at: Top 10 Austrian villages in The Guardian.

On the first day of skiing at St Anton I used the Galzig lift. As I stood there I thought ‘this is new’, and I was wondering what was wrong.

A day or two later I realised (remembered).

First, the lift mechanism is new (I subsequently found out it was renewed a few years ago) and the long zig-zag walk up to the lift had gone.

Second, the lift now runs the wrong way, that is, away from the mountain….

The way this all works is by an ingenious mechanism by which the cable car is lifted from a lower level, where you board, on to the main lift cable to run up the mountain. This means that you don’t have to walk back and forwards up to the cable level, and the lift appears to run in the wrong direction, that is, it is moving away from the mountain when you board. Anyway, this is all easier to see in a video:

Six days of skiing in St Anton….

Skiing: Conditions were great. Bit of ice, but a great job of piste bashing (grooming) was being done. Most runs were open. Skiing at St Anton is challenging, and not necessarily for the beginner. One thing that was great to see was all the investment in lifts that has happened in the last few years. The new lift up to Rendl is great (although they do need to replace the two seaters up at Rendl), and the new Galzig lift is most impressive. Also a number of the other lifts in the area have been replaced.

Lunchtime: There are a number of on-mountain cafe and restaurants. Food was generally good and service quick (Mooserwirt and Crazy Kanguruh), the exception would be the more traditional Austrian mountain hotels and restaurants where lunch could be ‘leisurely’. If you want a quick lunch, and to concentrate on skiing then go for the more touristy type places, long leisurely lunch, go local.

Apres Ski: Great. A lot going on. Mooserwirts and Crazy Kanguruh were ‘happening’ (although a bit quite compared to previous years). The town was lively with a lot going on.

Christmas Eve in St Anton: Not a lot going on. This was a big surprise. All the bars shit around 7 pm and become ‘ticket only’. Be warned.

Mark Warner: For this trip I was travelling with Mark Warner. Generally we were well looked after. The real exceptions to this would be the flights and the transfers. Transfers were fine, but the flight out was delayed by 1 hour, and the return flight was delayed by over 4 hours. The reason for these delays is because of the charter airline, Viking, used by Mark Warner. The plane we were on flies from Gatwick to Chambery, France, and back in the morning, and then from Gatwick to Friedrichshafen (Germany) for St Anton, and back in the afternoon. If there is a problem on the Chambery, France legs then there is a knock-on to the St Anton flights, which is what we experienced.

Food: Food in the hotel was good. The porridge did have a slight ‘wallpaper paste’ quality, and the dumplings should be avoided. Service was slow at the evening dinner and I very rarely got away from the table before 10:30 pm.

Rosanna Hotel, St Anton: The hotel is very nice, and has also been improved (bathrooms) in the last couple of years. A new sound system has been installed in Scotty’s (the bar in the hotel that is open to the general public), so hotel rooms are now quite noisy until 12:30 am – 1 am. My room also was uncomfortably hot at night (even with all the in-room heating turned off), and with the window open the temperature could be regulated, by this made the noise from the bar worse.

Find of the trip: The new lift up to Rendl and the restaurant ‘Speisen and Getranke’ on Route 1 down from Rendl. Best cappuccino of the week, and a great Applestrudel….

Overall: St Anton is a great ski resort. Lots of great and challenging runs, great apres ski scene.

Final day of skiing.

Yesterday the weather was awful, but the forecast for today was good. So, up early and first lift up to Rendl.

First run was dreamy. Groomed base with a light dusting of powder. The second run, down to the lowest lift (Maass) was icy and horrible. Runs off Riffel I back to the base of the lift were great. Runs uber Gampberg were also icy.

Rendl doesn’t get much early sun so runs took some time to soften up. Rendl is great though as it remains quiet.

Around 11 I decided to head over to St Christoph for lunch. Route 1 out of Rendl was icy, but got better further down.

Find of the trip: a small bar/restaurant towards the bottom of Route 1 called Speisen and Getranke. Best cappuccino in Rendl, and a great Applestrudel… Why do you always find the best places on the last day?

Christmas Day, St Anton, Austria….

The forecast was for snow on Christmas day. However, in St Anton it is driving rain. Lovely.

9:45 – Rendl Restaurant – got soaked walking through town. Caught the main cable car up to the ski area, at 5000 ft the rain turned to snow. In the cable car it was impossible to see anything. The mountain is shrouded in fog and driving snow, plus all the rain had frozen on the exterior of the car.

Not many skiers out.

11 am. Coffee break. Why can’t they do hot coffee here?

Weather is really grim, and snow conditions not great. Yesterday was warm and the ‘melt’ froze overnight, and then fresh snow added. Where there is a good covering of snow it is fine, but there is a lot of ice about. Visibility is very poor, I have had to buy new goggles.

Plan now is to head back fiends to St Anton and then over to St Christoph to meet some fellow skiers for lunch.

Very warm this afternoon, temperature around 5°C. Spring skiing conditions.

3:30 pm, time to stop for s drink on the way back to St Anton.

First stop, Krazy Kanguruh (Crazy Kangaroo). Good happy hour prices, but not a lot going on. May be a bit to early.

3:45 pm – place seems to be filling up – lot of ski instructors here.

4:30 pm Mooserwirt – the place is dead. Nothing go on. Almost empty. Doesn’t anything happen in St Anton on Christmas Eve?

Apparently the reason Mooserwirts was so quiet is because the only night of the season the DJ gets off is Christmas eve. I have also heard that all the bars in town are shut tonight and the only bar that will be open is Scotty’s Bar in this hotel (Rosanna).

Time for lunch…..

Today it is the Krazy Kanguruh (Crazy Kangaroo).

The place is surprisingly quiet. Hardly anyone here. Menu is not very extensive, salads, soups, pasta and burgers Lunch today will be the skiers favourite – spaghetti bolognese (spag bog).

Service was speedy (there are nearly as many staff as customers), the spag bog was hot, very tasty (a bit too salty), and the portion was large. All for around € 10.

Met a bunch of Aussie in the KK. What a surprise. Two had come from Australia for the trip, and the other two were ‘traveling’.