Where to dream of a white Christmas

If the thought of any more family festivities leaves you cold, why not break with tradition and head for the slopes? Metro asked Kate Whittaker of Mad Dog Ski to share her five favourite Christmas resorts. Courmayeur: the ideal place for a romantic Christmas getaway

Best for families
The sheer pleasure of a Christmas dinner cooked by someone else, and being able to ski instead of sitting through charades or The Sound Of Music once the presents have been opened combine to make a chalet holiday perfect for families. Tignes (www.tignes.co.uk) offers a snow-sure Christmas, guaranteed sightings of Santa and wonderful festive lights. Many tour operators offer childrens' clubs and there are dedicated ski areas for beginners.
Christmas bonus: Tignes tends to be less pricey than nearby Val d'Isère so your family budget should go further.


Best for romantics
The Italian resort of Courmayeur is perfect for a get-away-from-it-all Christmas break. It may not be the biggest resort in the Alps but the gourmet cuisine, great skiing and luxury spas more than compensate. It's just 90 minutes from Geneva, while Chamonix is close by if you fancy your chance on the legendary Vallée Blanche. For a perfect Christmas Eve, take a Ski-Doo to the Maison Vieille (www.maisonvieille.com) for dinner before skiing back by torchlight (or snowmobile if the red wine has taken its toll).
Christmas bonus: With boutiques from Cartier to Hermès, you're sure to find that perfect something to finish your Christmas shopping.

Best for thrill-seekers
Adrenaline junkies should head to Whistler, Canada. The investment in the resort ahead of the 2010 Winter Olympics takes effect this season with the opening of the Peak-to-Peak gondola linking Whistler and Blackcomb. When you've exhausted the off-piste, try cat skiing (www.powder mountaincatskiing.com). Snowcats (with heated cabins) take you off-piste; you ski down (hopefully in deep powder) and then do it all again. This is a similar experience to heli-skiing but you get more runs at a better price. For a non-skiing buzz, ziplining at up to 80 km/h through the tree tops (www.ziptrek.com) is unforgettable.
Christmas bonus: Treat yourself to the penthouse mountain suite at the Westin (www.westin whistler.com) for the ultimate in luxury including more than 140 square metres of space, breathtaking views and your personal hot tub to soak any aches away.

Best for eco-friendly
Zermatt (www.zermatt.ch) in Switzerland has long been a Christmas favourite. What may be less well known is Zermatt's commitment to the environment. The town is already car-free and horse-drawn carriages and electric taxis are a common sight. All new projects including lift replacements are considered in light of their programme for sustainable skiing. This winter, you can eat Christmas lunch in the new Mattherhorn Glacier Paradise restaurant, which has been built to comply with the highest energy standards. Take comfort in the special sewage treatment (the highest in the world!) which ensures waste water is purified in an environmentally friendly way. The building's solar panels generate almost twice as much energy at this altitude, meaning no external energy supply is needed.
Christmas bonus: Enjoy the charm of Zermatt's traditional village and still do your bit for the environment.

Best for Christmas every day
Courchevel in the Three Valleys (www.courchevel.com) is not just part of the biggest ski domain in the world, it seems they're also setting out to have the biggest Christmas ever. Their 'magical Christmas week' starts on December 21 at the lowest village of le Praz with Father Christmas arriving lakeside. Children can enjoy a show and a present from the Courchevel tourist office. For the next three days, you can follow Father Christmas's progress up the hill as he visits each village, accompanied by ski instructors from the French ski school, before finally arriving at 1850m on Christmas Eve. There's an ice skating Gala on December 23 and a Cirque Troque spectacle on Christmas Day itself. If you haven't sated your Christmas spirit by then, there's another concert on Boxing Day. Oh, and you can ski while you're there as well.
Christmas bonus: Fireworks and free hot drinks for your après-ski four nights running.

Not much Fawlty about this hotel

'It actually looks more like the set of Eldorado,' bemoans my friend Andy as we pull into the drive of the Hotel Gleneagles in Torquay – a building with a continental, Cubist feel that's painted so white viewing it without sunglasses will see its image seared on your retinas for life. The Gleneagles hotel: very, very white

The Gleneagles – not to be confused with the big posh place in Perthshire – does play a huge part in British television history but it has nothing to do with the early 1990s soap opera that proved anything but 'the golden one' for the BBC when it bombed after just a year. Instead the hotel served as inspiration for one of Britain's best loved sitcoms: Fawlty Towers.

John Cleese and the rest of the Monty Python team stayed here in the 1970s, arriving, the story goes, to find their luggage out in the rain. 'It could be a bomb,' said grumpy owner Donald Sinclair of the alarm clock ticking in one case. 'I will not have a bomb in my hotel.'

Cleese was already taking the notes that gave life to hotelier-from-hell Basil Fawlty. 'He was so wonderfully rude,' the comedian later recalled.


Understandably, the local tourist board spent a long time adopting a 'don't mention Fawlty Towers' policy. And who can blame them for not wanting to draw attention to a series that became synonymous with everything bad about British holidays in the late 1970s?

Over time, that attitude has mellowed and Enjoy England recently released a comedy map of Britain that features Torquay, while holiday firm Superbreak started offering Fawlty Towers entertainment breaks at the hotel – the reason for our being here.
Inside Gleneagles – now part of the Best Western chain – Sue Pine, the bright, breezy, blonde manager ushers us into the lounge which has a distinctly 1920s Art Deco feel, urging us to have a drink while waiting for our rooms to be readied.

A glance at the bar menu soon reveals an awful culture clash: a list of continental paninis with that most English of accompaniments, curly fries, while Peter, the East European barman, could easily be a Noughties Manuel. 'Are you here for the Fawlty Towers break?' he whispers. 'Get very drunk. They are too loud.' The spirit of Sinclair, it seems, remains intact.

Nonetheless, our rooms are clean if unremarkable, despite the hotel having undergone a £4million renovation, and the view may not be of the Hanging Gardens of Babylon but it's a pretty spectacular one of a small cove.