People – Brits especially – fall in love with Méribel. It’s a large main village with several satellites, purpose-built and sitting in the middle valley of the vast Three Valleys ski area, surrounded by 150km of its own varied and fun pistes, plus significant off-piste options. The lifts spring from the middle of the village in all directions, making Méribel a great base from which to explore the rest of the 600km of ski area – Courchevel to the east, Val Thorens to the south, St Martin and Les Menuires to the west and southwest.
This immense convenience does mean that Méribel can be a bit of a thoroughfare, and the relatively low-altitude slopes can suffer in the sunshine, and from crowds and congested lifts. But with 600km to play with, if it gets annoying another resort is rarely more than two lifts away.
Méribel is unusual for a purpose-built resort in that it was made in a traditional chalet style from its conception in 1938, and many of the buildings are self-catered chalets. Choose from rustic traditional farmhouses in Les Allues (1100m), conveniently located chalets in the quiet Méribel Village (1400m), hotels, apartments and chalets in Méribel centre (1450m) or the abundant apartments in Méribel Mottaret (1750m).
