I was at the Slope Side Ski Tour operators business launch yesterday in the Odeon here in Dublin.
They offer tailor made packages to the world’s largest linked ski resort, Portes du Soleil [more specifically Morzine where their chalets are], in the heart of the French and Swiss Alps. You get picked up from the airport, which is only a two hour drive from the resort so you don’t have too much of your trip wasted on travelling and you even get a live-in Chef for the duration of your stay so you can be sure the meals are spot-on delicious and to your own liking!
The guys gave such an ebullient, professional and energetic presentation that I can’t but believe they’ll do well in their new business.
It’s also nice to spot they’re using OpenSource for their website 
(small disclaimer/note of interest: one of the business partners is my Fiancée’s brother).
A couple of years ago I spent a week in Morzine (in the Portes du Soleil) with a few friends. Flying into Geneva meant Duty-Free for leaving the EU (in fact you can ski from Morzine into Switzereland and back in a day though I don’t think they have a duty free shop on the border). Food in the resort was generally very good (though last year in Livigno will take some beating on that count as all 20+ people I knew there that week agreed, except typically for the one restaurant we all chose to visit together).
The BIG thing about Portes du Soleil is the size of the ski-area. Whatever you want I’m sure you will find it. We spent a fair amount of our time ski-ing around the Avoriaz area (traffic/road less town at about 1800m) though the run from the lift from Morzine into Avoriaz is not too snoweboarder friendly (thankfully my ski-ing friends or some friendly ski-er were usually around to shove/drag me past the pushing point).
All in all, I would find a hard time justifying returning to any other resort I have visited over Morzine/Avoriaz/PdS and that includes Meribel(3 Valleys), Les Arcs, Risoul and Livigno. In fact of those Risoul is the other one I’d be most temped to go back to as it’s on the Italian border (I love Italian food) and when I was there the snow was so absolutely amazing so I will always remember it with fondness.
Since browsing brochures on my first ever ski holiday in Andorra Morzine/Avoriaz was where I wanted to go. Despite that anticipation over many years and ski holidays before I actually made it over there, it lived up to the anticipation and I look forward to getting back over there again sooner rather then later.
Get thee hence to SlopeSide so – their chalets are in Morzine
I have become very interested in Slopeside since their lauch was covered in the news, mainly become I’d like to work for them. I am very familiar with Morzine (and surround area) having lived (and worked) in Les Gets (just 5kms from Morzine) for a total of 11 months, over two winter seasons and a summer. I was last there on the 20th of April and miss the place dearly. I would recommend the place highly, it may not be a place that springs to mind when one thinks of ski resorts, but it has alot to offer (the Slopeside website proclaims it to be ‘the best resort in the world’, bigging it up a bit too much i think!). If, anyone has any idea when or if Slopeside are recruiting staff id very much like to know.