Best pistes in Avoriaz

The Fornet is a great area, especially after a fresh snowfall where the natural terrain creates a freeride playground with bumps, berms and drops. The area also has some good pistes with steep, open sections that are great for fast carving turns.

From the top of the Choucas lift on the skiers right of the bowl, the Bleue de Chavanette has a steep top section that is fast and open and some great moguls and bumps to the left. The middle section of the piste mellows out and is good for carving before the last, short steep section.

The other side of the bowl, served by the Fornet chairlift, has another blue piste the imaginatively named Bleue du Fornet. Like it's neighbor it undulates between steep and mellow sections and is a great place for fast carves and bumps off the edges of the groomed section.

Les Lindarets is the best area in Avoriaz when the snow is falling as the tree lined pistes make visibility, even in flat light, a possibility.

A popular and playful run here is Combe a Floret. It runs from the top of the Prolays Chairlift and winds through the trees back to the base of the Lindarets bowl and, if you want to, carries down to the base of the Ardent Bubble. The upper section is quite narrow and winding and is locally known as Star Wars as riding it fast is like riding a speeder through the forests of Endor with an Ewok... apparently.

The Prolays Piste is another great run. Although it has some steep sections they are usually well pisted and free of bumps so it's great for big, fast GS turns and snowboarders will enjoy the edges of the piste which are full of side-hits and jumps, so many that it's locally known as the “jib run”.

The Arare Sector of the Avoriaz ski are is one of the easiest to reach the two lifts Express du Stade and Express Inerets can be seen from the Prodains bubble and both head up Arare.

Take the Express Interets as it climbs higher and offers more options and better views. From the top of the Arare you can drop into some of the longest runs in the Portes du Soleil and some of the steepest in Avoriaz.

We like the mixture of routes that run from the very summit to the bottom of the Avoriaz cliffs in the Prodains valley. In days of old this run could mean an hour long wait for the Prodains Cable Car but since 2013 the high-speed bubble has meant that it's just two lifts from bottom to top and only in the very busy weeks will you need to queue.

From the top of Arare, follow either the Black Combe de Machon and Coupe de Monde or the Blue Lac d'Arare and Stade d'Arare into the Crot piste. These runs have a bit of everything and you can mix and match sections to make the run suit your style of skiing.