I travelled here with a large group towards the end of the season but none the less had a great stay.

The hotel itself was built in the 1930's and i'm not sure it has a fresh refurbishment since the 70's. The rooms are very small but are adequate to get a decent nights sleep which, realistically is all you need after a good day on the snow and plenty of Apres ski!

The owners spoke limited English (although considerably better than my Italian!) but the maitrede Adam was excellent and couldn't do enough for you.

The food was excellent and was served by jolly staff who made meal times a pleasure. The wine was very good and the LARGE bottles being extremely good value for money.

The hotel is 2 minutes from the lift or a short bus ride to the Sportina lift which is where the hub of the piste is situated along with the the Ski/Boarding. It is also ideally situated to several bars and eateries but not too close as to cause a disturbance.

All in all i was happy with this hotel and enjoyed my trip thoroughly.

My husband and I travelled to Sauze D'oulx for the third time this March, having previously stayed at the Grad Baita and then the New Miravalle. I chose this hotel due to its close proximity to the Clotes chair. I'll start from the beginning...

We knew about the luggage travelling up in a van and us walking up from the coach drop off point, but it took aproximately an hour and a half to get our luggage delivered and when we did get it, it was covered in snow and very damp. This didn't matter however, as we couldn't check in until 2.30pm - there was a sign on the empty reception desk when we arrived. Considering that most flights arrived in the morning, we thought this was poor. We have got in an extra half days skiing on previous occasions.

On a positive note, when we were finally allowed to check-in, the room was lovely. It was large and the bathroom stunning (but no bath). The bedspreads were a little dated but this was by far the nicest room we have stayed in. However, you could have the heating on or off. It was boiling when it was on & freezing when it was off. We would have opened the window and kept the heating on, but the noise from outside at Paddy MaGynties till all hours (4am most nights) prevented us from sleeping with the window open.

The evening meals were fine (if a little repetative - pork was on the menu virtually everyday) although there were also some strange choises such as tripe or rabbit. Compared to the other hotels in Sauze, the salad buffet was very disappointing, as were the desserts. Both the Grand Baita and the Miravalle were far superior.

On that note, we have never had such a dismal breakfast. There were 3 choises of cheap, tasteless cereal, 1 type of cheese, 1 type of ham and some croissants and hard boiled eggs. THAT WAS IT! There was no fruit, pastries, cake, breads etc. Even for a continental breakfast (you get both hot and cold buffet at the Miravalle and a huge selection of cold foods at the Grand Baita) we found it to be a really poor selection. The drinks at breakfast were tea/coffee and orange cordial or water.

The staff were friendly and helpfull enough. However, don't fall for the line about the tap water not being drinkable. We drank it everyday and on previous occasions and have been absolutely fine. It's just a ploy to flog you mineral water.

Overall, we had an excellent holiday because we love skiing and we love Sauze. We would not return to this hotel though. The spa was 20euros per person per day (free at Miravalle and 5 euros at Gran Baita) and wifi 10 euros for the week. Across at Mira bar there is free WiFi. It just seems that everything at this hotel is done on the cheap and they are money grabbing. They must be relying on the location to the lift, which I must say, is excellent.

Our bedroom was adequate - clean but did smell of drains unless the plugs in the bidet and washbasin were left in place with a water seal. The Reception Area smelt the same on at least one occasion.
Street noise was a significant problem until about 0100.
The restaurant is like an aircraft hangar and although the service was fair , the standard of the food was only sufficiently good as to sustain life.
The lounge is similarly barn-like with a games area which dominates and tends to make ordinary conversation difficult .There is no draught beer !!
Overall, the hotel decor is tired and requires upgrading from the mid 1960's.
The only positive I can think of is the closeness to the lifts .

Sauze D'Oulx was a lovely resort. Nice, quaint little town with amazing views. Friendly people in all the bars and most people’s English was OK.

Hotel – The rooms were nice, basic but did for us as we skied most of the day and went out at night. Very dated hotel in general but it classic Italian style building. It has a gym which is free and a spa which you have to pay £20 a day for (or there abouts) with treatments available. There is also Wi-Fi (10 Euros a day). Don’t panic when they keep your passports as they do that with every guest. We needed to get our passport back as we went to a Football match which we also needed a copy of. The manager copied mine and my partners but said no to our other friend when she asked him a couple of hours later. There is a place to put your skies and boots too so you don’t have to pay £20 to leave your equipment up the mountain.

Staff – There was an English guy who was working there who was very nice and knowledgeable. The Manager spoke some English but his wife didn’t speak much at all. She was a little unpredictable as sometimes she’d be nice and other times she’d be a little rude. Looking back maybe it was a bit of lost in translation. The English and German waiters were really lovely guys but the short dark haired female, who we think was the daughter of the owners, was a different kettle of fish. She was definitely rude and grunted a lot as she was a cleaner and a waitress on the evening. A word of advice, the cleaners knock then enter virtually straight away and get funny with you if you’re still in the room at 9:00am and don’t want to be disturbed. We had an odd incident, when two girls knocked, came into our room and looked at the bunk bed we weren’t using, talked for 5 mins then went out without explaining themselves. 10 mins later the lady owner and one of the girls came back in whilst my partner was in the toilet and shut me in between the room and bedroom door and started ranting in Italian, then left without a word. We think the bed hadn’t been put up right but we hadn’t touched it since we got there. Oh well, weird!!
Oh be warned, if you mess about late at night, the Manager will come into your room unannounced. There were a group of lads stopping on our floor and the Manager always seemed to have been in their room the previous night telling them to be quiet. To be honest, I never heard anything but I suppose if someone in a room below or above you complains then watch out, you could be thrown out of the hotel.

Food - We went half board so had breakfast and dinner in the hotel. Breakfast had lots of choice, croissant, bread, ham, cheese, cereal, juice, tea/coffee, jams etc... Chocolate spread on the croissant is a must bytheway! All of it was freshly made at the bakery down the road. When you go down to breakfast, you choose your dinner by marking what you want at the side of the dish. It changes every day and dessert is a choice of allsorts which also changes. There is a lot of choice to be fair but if you want a starter for your main meal, just ask and generally they will be fine with it. The grumpy girl that I mentioned earlier had a fit with us on the last night when we wanted to have a starter as a main course and she slammed about. Shame really as we’d been having starters for mains and visa versa all week, the other waiters were really good.

Rep – Crystal Rep called Ricky was brilliant. Funny, helpful, lovely guy and knew what he was talking about. We did a lot of activities through our Rep like Quiz night, Bar Crawl, went to see Unventus and Inter Milan play, Skidoos and had a fab time at all.

Après Ski - The Hotel has a night porter, so if you do want to stay out late, don’t worry you won’t be locked out. Lots of bars, two night clubs and sort of cheap drinks. There the Queen’s Head which is good and an Irish bar right by the hotel. You’ll have a good night out even though it is such a small town. There are some wonderful little local bars tucked away which are cheaper and have a lovely atmosphere.

Ski – Well I must say that the slopes were amazing. Not many Beginners slopes, lots of Intermediate and Advanced runs. Piste maps are ok but follow the colour coordinated signs on the slopes or you could end up on a red run when you don’t want to be. We did it a couple of times but we had a laugh getting down.
Sportina is a lovely place with lots of bars & restaurants to choose from.
There were 50/50 Snow boarders and Skiers so the runs are great for either. We had a ski instructor for 3 days called Widow who was really nice and took us down some great runs.
Ski Lifts are good but cold, of course! You can leave your pass in your jacket and rub your arm past the sensor and the gate opens, which means you don’t have to keep getting your pass out and swiping it. If you don’t ski you can get a lift pass still and sit and watch your friends/family ski in a bar. Put your thermals on though as it’s still cold up there!!