Alpe d'Huez: piste guide

Alpe d’Huez lies in a sunny plateau, with varied slopes reaching to the far corners of this extensive ski area in all directions to the slopes of the linked villages of Auris, Villard Reculas, Oz en Oisans and Vaujany. The resort sits in the shadows of the dominant Pic Blanc, though the 3,330m summit itself is not visible from the village. As a result, the sheer range and severity of the higher slopes comes as a stomach-churning surprise.

Main access to the Pic Blanc summit is via the two-stage DMC jumbo gondola from resort, also known as the Télépherique des Grandes Rousses, followed by a cable car. The peak is the starting point of the Sarenne run. At 16km, it is the longest black run in the Alps, but there are no particularly butterfly-inducing pitches and half of its grand length is a gentle run down a riverside path through the gorge of the same name. However, it’s a long way down – hence the Sarenne is renowned more for endurance than difficulty.

Far scarier is Le Tunnel, a much more direct black run from the summit. After emerging from a corridor in the rock that gives the run its name comes the beginning of one of the most forbidding black runs in the Alps – an often icy mogul field where a fall can result in a 100m slide or worse. As well these black pistes from the peak of the Pic Blanc, a short climb from the top of the cable car gives access to some truly superb off-piste.

At the other end of the scale, Alpe d’Huez is home to some of the most extensive nursery slopes in the Alps. The two main beginner areas, at the Bergers end of the village and on the slopes served by the first stage of the DMC, are accessed by a choice of drag-lifts, chairlifts and a chondola – a hybrid gondola/chair – as well as the DMC gondola. The two areas are linked by easy piste, and dozen green runs offer a variety of beginner terrain to progress to that few other resorts can match.

In between these two extremes, the ski area is also ideally suited to strong intermediates who enjoy the feeling of going somewhere each day, well beyond the central and often crowded runs just above the resort. The linked resorts of Oz and Vaujany on one side of Alpe d'Huez, and Auris on the other, have substantial ski areas, and when snow conditions allow the runs down to the farming hamlet of Villard Reculas are some of the most enjoyable in the region.

Alpe d’Huez also has a giant terrain park suitable for all standards with a full range of jumps and obstacles as well as a ski cross course. Vaujany’s ski area also has a smaller park better suited to beginners and intermediates.