Ski chalet in the Pyrenees
| country: | France |
| location: | French Pyrenees, Bareges |
| price: | From £315 - £425 per week based on 2 people sharing. £50 supplement single occupancy. Price includes en-suite room, breakfast, afternoon tea, 3 course eve meal with wine & coffee |
the amazing things you'll be doing
Stay in this newly-renovated 300 yr old house in the heart of the high mountain village of Bareges.
The house has just achieved a "Gites de France" 3-star rating (the highest standard in the village). We offer a high standard of meals with our B&B and half-board options. A typical continental breakfast would include fresh bread and croissants with butter and jams, a selection of cereals, yoghurts, fruit, orange juice, tea and coffee. Our half-board option includes breakfast, and also a delicious three-course evening meal with wine and coffee. We have an additional bar and coffee-bar in our lounge area.
We specialise in French-style cuisine using, wherever possible, only the best local ingredients. Packed lunches are available on request. Room-only guests will be spoiled by the choice of excellent restaurants in the village, and we can also recommend several nearby mountain auberges specialising in local French cuisine, if you have your own transport. Half-board guests will have chance to sample the local dishes on our free night, when we can make reservations for you at a restaurant of your choice.
Skiing Ski mountaineering/ski touring Snow shoeing Ice climbing Thermal spa treatments 
We have five well appointed large bedrooms, each with an en-suite shower room, and can offer twin or family (4 to 8 people sharing) accommodation for up to 14 people.
As well your room, all our guests have access to the spacious lounge and games room, with a lovely wood-burning stove, well-stocked bar, coffee bar and a computer with internet access. We also have a big dining room, heated equipment room (for coats, boots and skis), and a patio with mountain views, for enjoying the warm evenings (with a gas heated parasol in winter).
Guests are also welcome to make use of our sauna after a hard day in the mountains! Accommodation is available on a room-only basis, B&B and as half-board options. Tucked just a few metres behind the main street of Bareges, our house is close to the local bakery, grocery, ski shops and lively bars and restaurants. In winter the free ski bus stop is less than 100m from the house, and you can ski right home to the village most weeks of the season.
By air: From England low cost flights are available from London Stansted into Pau airport (about 1 ½ hours drive) or from Gatwick and Bristol airports to Toulouse airport (about 2 ½ hours drive). Reasonably priced car hire is available at both airports.
By rail: There are good rail links to Lourdes from Bordeaux, Pau and Tarbes or from Toulouse.
By car: The most direct route by car from Calais or other ferry ports is via Bordeaux, and then the national route to Pau and Lourdes. Alternatively, the Spanish ports at Bilbao and Santander are only a few hours drive from our house in Bareges.
The house has just achieved a "Gites de France" 3-star rating (the highest standard in the village). We offer a high standard of meals with our B&B and half-board options. A typical continental breakfast would include fresh bread and croissants with butter and jams, a selection of cereals, yoghurts, fruit, orange juice, tea and coffee. Our half-board option includes breakfast, and also a delicious three-course evening meal with wine and coffee. We have an additional bar and coffee-bar in our lounge area.
We specialise in French-style cuisine using, wherever possible, only the best local ingredients. Packed lunches are available on request. Room-only guests will be spoiled by the choice of excellent restaurants in the village, and we can also recommend several nearby mountain auberges specialising in local French cuisine, if you have your own transport. Half-board guests will have chance to sample the local dishes on our free night, when we can make reservations for you at a restaurant of your choice.
activities
Skiing facilities
We have five well appointed large bedrooms, each with an en-suite shower room, and can offer twin or family (4 to 8 people sharing) accommodation for up to 14 people. As well your room, all our guests have access to the spacious lounge and games room, with a lovely wood-burning stove, well-stocked bar, coffee bar and a computer with internet access. We also have a big dining room, heated equipment room (for coats, boots and skis), and a patio with mountain views, for enjoying the warm evenings (with a gas heated parasol in winter).
Guests are also welcome to make use of our sauna after a hard day in the mountains! Accommodation is available on a room-only basis, B&B and as half-board options. Tucked just a few metres behind the main street of Bareges, our house is close to the local bakery, grocery, ski shops and lively bars and restaurants. In winter the free ski bus stop is less than 100m from the house, and you can ski right home to the village most weeks of the season.
how to find us
We are based in the High Pyrenees of Southern France, situated South of the cities of Pau and Tarbes, and sharing our valley with the pilgrimage town of Lourdes. By air: From England low cost flights are available from London Stansted into Pau airport (about 1 ½ hours drive) or from Gatwick and Bristol airports to Toulouse airport (about 2 ½ hours drive). Reasonably priced car hire is available at both airports.
By rail: There are good rail links to Lourdes from Bordeaux, Pau and Tarbes or from Toulouse.
By car: The most direct route by car from Calais or other ferry ports is via Bordeaux, and then the national route to Pau and Lourdes. Alternatively, the Spanish ports at Bilbao and Santander are only a few hours drive from our house in Bareges.
how this holiday makes a difference
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Our aim is to provide active holidays and promote awareness of the mountain environment, mountain people and their traditional way of life. We believe in supporting the local community and allowing other people to discover the beauty of the Pyrenees without upsetting their delicate natural balance. Our holidays are mainly about enjoyment and having fun, but they are also a learning experience and our guests take home with them a wealth of knowledge – about the environment, geology and geography, flora and fauna, history, culture, language and way of life in the Pyrenees and of mountains in general.
We live and work in the Pyrenees year round. We are a French company paying local taxes and are dedicated to supporting our village community. We use local guides and instructors, local craftsmen and tradesmen. We encourage our guests to shop in the village and support the small traders. We serve locally-produced meats purchased from our village butcher. This includes the Bareges-Gavarnie AOC lamb which never leaves our valley. We introduce our guests to local honey, mountain sheeps' cheeses, cured mountain sausages and hams, confit duck and Tarbais beans produced in the SW of France. We promote local wines and spirits on our house bar. Our guests are encouraged to try local dishes at a mountain restaurant on our night off. Wherever possible we walk directly from the house or within our valley. We have a single company minibus and offer transfers to reduce the need for guests to hire multiple vehicles at the airport. We also encourage the use of public transport for travellers. Our publicity is internet based. We do not have a paper brochure and do not send out an information pack to our clients, as all of our information can be found in detail on our website. We recycle glass, paper & cardboard, metal cans and plastic bottles. Our holidays are based from our own traditional house in a high mountain village. We spent two years restoring the house to its former glory, maintaining the original features and using local craftsmen whilst taking steps to improve the energy-efficiency of the house. Our work has encouraged a general "facelift" of the village. Our house is gas centrally heated, by a very efficient, modern, on-demand boiler. Heating is supplemented with a wood-stove burning wood from managed, sustainable forest (with zero carbon debt). We encourage our guests to close their shutters at night to conserve heating energy. Our roof and all of our walls are fully-insulated. Our washrooms are fitted with showers rather than baths, and our toilets have an eco-flush option to reduce water consumption. We use eco-friendly A-rated appliances, wash our own bedding and line-dry our linen outside in the mountain air whenever possible. |
Tourism can be good and bad for destinations & local people. We carefully screen every holiday against our criteria for responsible travel. 'Look behind the brochure' to find how each holiday makes a difference (see left). We don't claim to be perfect - there is no global accreditation - but we've led the way since 2001 and screened 1000's of holidays. We invite every traveller to write a review about their experiences and responsible tourism. This valuable feedback is sent to the people who run the holidays. We keep a very close eye on it and take off holidays that don't live up to our standards. |