Doing a Season in Avoriaz

Avoriaz occupies a specific position in the Portes du Soleil: it's the highest village on the French side at 1,800m, and it functions differently from almost any other resort in the Alps. There are no cars. The only way in is via the Telecabine des Prodains gondola from Morzine, or by snowcat for deliveries. Within the village, horse-drawn sledges and snowmobiles handle luggage and supplies. This isn't marketing gloss — it's genuinely how the place works, and it shapes the seasonal experience in ways that matter.

The skiing

Avoriaz is the hub of the Portes du Soleil's French side. From here you can ski to Morzine, Les Gets, Châtel, and across to Switzerland — Champéry, Morgins, Champoussin — on a circuit that covers around 600km of marked runs across twelve interconnected resorts. The Swiss connection runs via the Chavanette, better known as the Swiss Wall: a steep, often mogulled black run that links the two countries and is genuinely challenging rather than theatrically so.

Hauts Forts (2,466m summit) is the serious terrain. These are steep, north-facing runs that hold powder well after a dump and give advanced skiers somewhere to actually go. If you're working a season in Avoriaz and skiing your days off, Hauts Forts is where you'll spend a lot of time in good conditions. Below it, the Avoriaz bowl is wide, open, and intermediate-friendly — well-suited to progression if you're arriving as a developing skier.

The Stash is one of the more unusual features of the resort: a tree-skiing area designed with tabletops, rollers, and natural terrain features integrated into the forest. It's accessible to confident intermediates, not just expert riders, and it's distinctly different from a standard terrain park. For snowboarders especially, it's a reason to choose Avoriaz specifically rather than another Portes du Soleil resort.

For a seasonaire, the breadth of the Portes du Soleil circuit matters. After four to six months, you need a ski area that doesn't exhaust itself in a few weeks. The 600km circuit combined with Hauts Forts and the Stash means Avoriaz holds up over a full season in a way that smaller, self-contained resorts often don't.

The village

The architecture is 1967 Jacques Labro brutalism — angular concrete and timber buildings clustered on a cliff edge with views south across the valley. It's consistent in style with Tignes but on a more dramatic site. Opinions divide sharply, but it's at least coherent: Avoriaz looks like it was designed rather than accumulated.

The absence of cars is genuinely different to operate within day-to-day as a seasonaire. There is no driving to the supermarket in Morzine for a mid-week top-up. A late night out in Morzine requires planning your way back up, not just calling a taxi. The gondola stops running at a certain point in the evening. These are real logistical constraints, not trivial ones.

The flipside: the skiing starts from your door. The village is small enough to be walkable in ten minutes. The isolation creates a tighter community than in larger, more spread-out resorts. If you find that appealing, Avoriaz amplifies it.

Working rights

Avoriaz is in France — Haute-Savoie, Rhône-Alpes. EU and EEA nationals have free movement and the right to work. UK nationals post-Brexit need a French work authorisation before starting employment. See /visa-guides/france for the specifics.

The job market

Avoriaz is dominated by the major French operators and hotel properties — Les Dromonts being the flagship. British tour operators including Crystal and Inghams have chalet operations here. The ESF ski school is substantial; instructors with BASI or equivalent qualifications should apply directly to the Avoriaz ESF in the July–September window.

One practical constraint the car-free setup creates: self-sourcing your own accommodation within Avoriaz is difficult. Most employer-provided accommodation is in-resort, which works fine. For independent housing, the realistic base is Morzine (lower, car-accessible, cheaper), with the gondola as the daily commute up to Avoriaz. Some seasonaires run this setup deliberately as a cost-saving measure. See our Morzine guide for what that base looks like.

Cost

Standard French Alps range. Accommodation in Avoriaz itself runs €550–850/month shared, but availability is limited and often only accessible through your employer. Grocery prices in the resort are noticeably higher than valley towns — everything is transported up by snowcat. If you're self-catering primarily from Avoriaz's own shops, budget accordingly; if your employer provides meals or you're making regular trips down to Morzine, the impact is lower.

Who Avoriaz suits

Freeriders and snowboarders who want the French Portes du Soleil hub — direct access to Hauts Forts and the Swiss circuit, plus the Stash. Instructors — the ski school market here is active and the client base is large. Anyone specifically seeking a car-free, high-altitude, tight-community experience — if that combination sounds appealing to you rather than restrictive, Avoriaz is one of the few places in the Alps that actually delivers it.

If you want easier access to a proper town, a bigger off-snow social scene, or cheaper independent accommodation, Morzine immediately below is worth comparing directly.