Exciting headlines from  an informative lead article yesterday in The Independent Ski Supplement.   Ski journalist and guru, Stephen Wood, discusses the difficulties of last winter with the Ash Cloud and the disruption it caused to skiers at the end of the season.

This is something that Erna Low have been watching carefully as we believe passionately that the best route for skiers to the Alps is by car or train.  Here’s  what Stephen says…

“In marketing terms, the ash cloud has a silver lining for others too.  Erna Low, whose business is primarily in resort accommodation and ski/drive holidays, produced an impressive, 32 page document in late August entitled (in part)  “Feel the thrill of snowy mountains… and leave the ash at the airport”;  it raised the specture of further eruptions in Iceland.  The company reports that sales are currently five per cent ahead of last year.  Erna Low also offers rail travel, which being both ash-resistant and guilt-free (in carbon-emission terms) could expect a boost in the coming season.  Certainly the potential is there, thanks to the efforts of Daniel Elkan of Snowcarbon.com in persuading Rail Europe to allocate seats on routes to the Aops for ski operators.  All that is needed to herald the new age of the ski train is a puff of smoke from Eyjafjallajokull.”

Day 1 – Thursday 15th April
I have spent the last couple of days on an educational trip to the Norwegian resort of Trysil, a lovely family resort located a couple of hours from Oslo and am due to fly home today.  Little did I know that this was also the first day of what was to become a team challenge that would make Sir Alan Sugar proud.  It started when I joined my group for breakfast.  I was travelling with representatives from TUI, Ski Dream and Pinnacle Travel, together with our hosts Jenny from SAS Airlines and Robert from Rezidor.  Robert mentioned that he had seen something about a volcano erupting in Iceland and from what he could gather there were no flights operating out of Northern Scandinavian airports.  Luckily (or so we thought) Oslo was still open, so we departed for our dog sledding trip as planned, only to return and find that Oslo had also been closed.  Flights were due to depart on Friday morning, so Robert used the first of many favours to secure us some accommodation for the night in Oslo and we took the 2 hour coach journey back to town.

Fourth train of the day

Day 2 – Friday 16th April
Wake up in Oslo to find that the closure of airspace now affects the whole of the UK as well and appears to be getting worse.  Oslo is pretty much full for a huge Expo, so an hour spent on the internet reveals that all trains and car hire out of Oslo are fully booked.  The news suggests that airspace may open later that evening, so call in favour number two and blag city tour passes.  Trysil educational turns into Trysil/Oslo educational.  Spend the day checking out the many museums and places of interest around Oslo, together with a site tour of the Radisson Blu Hotel, which has hosted guests ranging from Annie Lennox to Bill Clinton.  Favour number three sees us being hosted for an evening meal by the lovely people at the Hard Rock Cafe, followed by two stressful hours in the hotel lobby looking at travel options home, without much success.

Day 3 – Saturday 17th April
Meet for breakfast and check the news, which is becoming more and more pessimistic.  Looks like the chances of getting off the ground in the next few days are becoming very slim, so we bite the bullet and decide to get out of Norway by any means necessary.  Conor, one of the group members has heard of a cruise ship departing from Hamburg for Southampton on Sunday night, so a few frantic calls are made and probably the biggest favour so far finds us with six places on the ship, provided that we can get to Hamburg in time.  With all trains, buses and rental cars booked out, we manage to find space on a ferry leaving from Larvik for the north coast of Denmark, so we grab a taxi and make the two hour journey from Oslo to the port.  A four hour ferry journey and an hour’s taxi ride later, we find ourselves in the town of Aalborg and grab a hotel for the night.

Day 4 – Sunday 18th April
Having managed to book a series of four trains with worryingly little time between each departure, we put our faith in the Danish rail system, which thankfully seems to be far superior to our UK system.  Make it to the German border on time and board the third train, which promptly grinds to a halt before even making it out of the station.  Wait around for the train to be fixed, whilst wondering what happened to the famed German efficiency.  Finally get on our way half an hour late and, with only a twelve minute window before the next train, we can see our escape route rapidly disappearing.  Thankfully the German efficiency proves not to be a myth, the train makes up the half hour delay and we make our connection to Hamburg.  Relax in the station with a cold beer before making our way to the port.
We board the brand new Celebrity Eclipse cruise ship, it’s my first time on a cruise liner and I am blown away by the sheer size of this 15 storey, 22,000 tonne monster.  Realise we were very lucky to have found a route home (especially as 800 of the 950 passengers booked to travel were unable to make it for the cruise) and relax for our two day luxury cruise home.

Our lift home

Day 6 – Tuesday 19th April
Finally make port in Southampton, six days later than planned and having used pretty much every means of transport at our disposal.  Having seen the travel chaos first hand, I head home feeling thankful that I work for a company specialising in self drive ski holidays and planning my next trip – a luxury cruise!

Welcome home John!

I read an article in ‘In The Snow’ yesterday about a company called www.snowcarbon.co.uk who are dedicated to getting to the Alps by train and it got me to think about it all a bit more.

So I’ve read up a bit on what the trains are like and what routes they do.  The TGV only has seats and is therefore good for day trains, but a cheap option for night trains too, while the Corail Lunea doesn’t run as many trains but has a nice reclining seat or couchettes.

Am I leaving a carbon footprint?

Just to give you an idea of an indirect train price check this out for the 19th Feb return 27th Feb 2010 currently available… it certainly seems really easy and a great idea for the eco friendly travellers among us.

Outbound: London St Pancras 17:55, arrives in Paris Nord 21:17 > change to Paris Austerlitz departs 22:34, arrives next morning into Bourg St Maurice at 06:39.
For standard class seat on Eurostar and reclining seat on a Corail Lunea train from £90
For standard class seat on Eurostar and bed in a six berth couchette on a Corail Lunea train from £215

Inbound: Bourg St Maurice 21:30, arrives Paris Austerlitz 06:21 > change to Paris Nord departs 08:07, arrives London 09:36
For standard class seat on Eurostar and reclining seat on a Corail Lunea train from £65.50
For standard class seat on Eurostar and bed in a six berth couchette on a Corail Lunea train from £76.50

Personally I’d be quite happy with a reclining chair!

I’m going to be heading on my ski holiday to Arc 1950 by this type of train in March so I’ll be an expert at train travel when I return, sales aren’t yet open for me but I hope I can bag a bargain like this when they do!

If you want to book or simply find out more, talk to Victoria directly on  0845 863 0525 or check out www.ernalow.co.uk