I grew up skiing. My son is finding his own way to love the mountains

For our family, this holiday was never going to look much like the classic family ski trip.

My son Jesse is five, autistic and non-verbal. Ski school was off the table. So was ski gear, for now at least. We couldn't even negotiate snow boots, which is how we found ourselves spending a week in the French Alps rotating between his favourite Hungry Caterpillar wellies and a pair of Vans. Neither would feature highly on our recommended list for deep snow.

I’ve been skiing since I was five. Like a lot of people who grow up with the sport, I had a fairly clear picture of what skiing with my own children would eventually look like: early-morning ski-school drop-offs, watching their first turns, then one day following them down a blue run.

Over the past few years, I’ve had to let go of that picture.

What I wanted to know was whether there might be another version of a family ski holiday that worked for us.

My wife Chloe was pregnant and unable to ski, so whatever we planned had to work for her and Jesse as much as it did for me. My parents - Jesse’s Nanny and Granda - came too. That gave us extra hands with luggage and childcare, someone for me to ski with and, perhaps more importantly, the increasingly rare opportunity for three generations of us to spend a week together.

The question hanging over all of it was simple: does a ski holiday actually make sense when one or more members of the family have no intention of skiing?

With help from Peak Retreats, we settled on La Rosière, a high-altitude resort sitting on the French-Italian border. They helped us think through the journey and accommodation, and put us directly in touch with the resort so we could explain Jesse’s needs before arriving.

Then came the first challenge: getting there.

The 15-hour alternative to flying

Flying and Jesse aren't particularly compatible.

Airports bring queues, noise and long periods of waiting; planes add the requirement to sit still and wear a lap belt at very specific moments. We've done it, but nobody gets off the other end feeling particularly relaxed. So this time we went by rail.

Peterborough to London. Eurostar from St Pancras to Paris. Across the city from Gare du Nord to Gare de Lyon. Then an SNCF train through France to Bourg-Saint-Maurice, followed by a private transfer up the mountain. Door to door, it took around 15 hours. On paper, that sounds awful. In reality, Jesse handled it better than many of our previous flights.

He could get up when he needed to, walk through the carriage to find his Nanny and Granda, head to the café for a change of scenery or spread his toys across our table. At one point, his farm animals were lined up in front of us while we sang Old MacDonald and he rummaged through his bag for the appropriate cast member.

Eurostar made things easier too, with separate check-in and security for passengers with additional needs and a designated waiting area before boarding.

The weak point was the change of trains in Paris. Dragging ski bags, suitcases and a stroller through Gare du Nord to find the right way to Gare de Lyon is not something I'd hurry to repeat. Lifts aren't always obvious, escalators aren't particularly useful when you're overloaded with luggage, and what looks like a straightforward transfer on a map quickly becomes the most stressful hour of the day. Next time, I'd seriously consider paying for a taxi across Paris.

Still, compared with flying, the overall journey felt calmer.

There was one final hurdle. Jesse often struggles with unfamiliar cars, so Peak Retreats arranged for us to receive photographs of our transfer vehicle before the trip. We showed him the van beforehand so it wasn't entirely new when it pulled up at Bourg-Saint-Maurice. Working with such a caring & thorough travel agency in Peak Retreats was worth its weight in gold for moments like this. After more than 14 hours travelling, getting him into that car seat without a battle felt like a significant win.

The holiday started before we left home

Preparation matters when travelling with any five-year-old. For us, it can decide whether something works at all.

In the weeks before leaving, we showed Jesse photographs of the trains, apartment, snow and mountains. We talked about going on an adventure with Nanny and Granda. None of that guarantees an easy transition, but making unfamiliar things slightly more familiar gives us a better chance.

And of course, we packed accordingly. Favourite toys came with us. The laptop was loaded with Monsters, Inc., his current bedtime essential. There were enough chargers to survive a minor electrical emergency and, crucially, we brought some of his safe foods from home.

Our base was Les Cimes Blanches in Les Eucherts, one of La Rosière's two main areas. Rather than a conventional hotel room, we had a two-bedroom self-catered apartment. For our family, that isn't a luxury - it's an essential on any trip we take.

A kitchen meant we could make food Jesse would actually eat rather than gambling on a restaurant menu every evening. The living room gave him somewhere to spread out his toys and decompress. We could have dinner together while he played nearby rather than spending an hour trying to keep him seated at a restaurant table.

It isn't the glamorous part of planning a ski holiday, but it probably had more impact on our week than the number of kilometres of piste outside.

Finding his version of the mountains

Jesse had seen snow before, once at home and once on another ski trip - but both times he was likely too young to remember.

His first reaction was caution. Understandable, really: being transported halfway up a mountain where the entire floor has suddenly turned white is a fairly strange proposition. Then he started experimenting.

Small chunks of snow could be stamped on until they exploded. Powder at the edge of the path could be jumped into. Hard-packed snow, inexplicably, was an excellent place to lie down. The wet socks though, were less popular.

The breakthrough came on the forest path connecting Les Eucherts with La Rosière village. Jesse decided he'd had enough of his stroller, got out and immediately charged off the packed path into deeper snow. He sank almost to his knees. There was a brief pause, then an enormous grin. So he did it again.

The sledging hill in the woods became his favourite place in La Rosière. Initially he rode down squeezed onto a sled with one of us. A few runs later he wanted to go alone. Eventually he decided the sled itself was an unnecessary complication and simply started sprinting down the hill.

Watching him run back up for another go, I realised I'd been measuring the holiday against the wrong thing.

For years, somewhere in the back of my mind, I'd been mourning the ski trips I assumed we'd never have. Your child following you down their first green. The first ski-school badge. That slightly chaotic moment when you're trying to persuade them to make another turn rather than pointing directly downhill. None of that was happening here. But Jesse was halfway up a mountain in the French Alps, throwing himself into the snow and laughing his head off.

This wasn't the ski holiday I'd once pictured but at that moment, it was perfect.

The places that worked

One thing we quickly learnt was not to assume that the activities advertised for families would necessarily be the activities that worked for our family.

The arcade at Via Ferrata did. Jesse spotted the motorbike racing machine almost immediately. It's become “our” game whenever we find one: the two of us sitting side-by-side, holding the handlebars and leaning dramatically into imaginary corners. They're tiny interactions, but I love them.

He bounced between machines while the rest of us could have a drink and join him whenever he wanted us. Upstairs, the bar delivered another surprisingly useful combination: somewhere that felt like a proper bar for the adults without making us feel as though bringing a child through the door was a terrible social mistake.

Then there was the pool. Back at Les Cimes Blanches, wide windows looked out towards the mountains and, during our stay at least, it was often quiet. Jesse loves swimming. Before long, he'd simply appear holding his float whenever he decided it was time to go. Chloe spent more time there with him while the rest of us skied, and when we joined them those swims became some of my favourite parts of the week.

But they also highlighted a problem.

This wasn't a perfect success

It would be very easy to end the story there.
Snow. Sledging. Swimming. Lovely family memories. Proof that ski resorts work perfectly well for families who don't ski.

Except that wouldn't be true. Beyond the pool and relatively short periods outside, we sometimes struggled to find enough for Jesse to do.

The problem became particularly obvious when the weather turned. High winds swept across the mountain on several days and suddenly the outdoor options narrowed considerably. If skiing forms the centre of your day, bad weather is an inconvenience. If you're already looking for alternatives to skiing, it can leave a sizeable hole in the itinerary.

La Rosière does have other activities - bowling, ice skating, kids' clubs - but not everything marketed as family-friendly is necessarily accessible to every family. This isn't necessarily a shortfall of the resort, but one in my planning; I let the idealistic version of this trip overtake the reality we usually put into holiday plans.

There were stretches when Chloe and Jesse simply didn't have enough to do.

That's probably the biggest lesson I'd take from the trip. Ski resorts remain, quite understandably, designed around skiing. Non-ski activities can sometimes feel like additions rather than an equally developed side of the holiday. For families like ours, the distinction matters.

We also discovered how something incredibly mundane can change a day.

Reception at our apartment building closed between midday and late afternoon. When it did, the lift providing stroller access to street level was unavailable. The alternatives were stairs or an icy hill. Ordinarily, that's barely worth mentioning.

For Chloe, pregnant and trying to take Jesse out alone in his stroller, it meant she effectively couldn't leave the building without help during those hours.

The pool remained accessible, thankfully, but the village didn't.

You won't find that sort of detail listed prominently on a booking page. Yet for someone travelling with a stroller, wheelchair or other accessibility requirement, it can matter far more than whether the apartment has a Nespresso machine.

And yes, I did actually ski

The irony of writing about a ski holiday where skiing wasn't the most important part is that La Rosière itself is extremely good fun on skis.

I fitted my slope time around the rest of the family, sometimes heading out alone and sometimes with my parents.

Solo skiing remains one of my favourite ways to explore a mountain. There's nobody to lose at a junction, no debate over which lift to take and no pressure to match someone else's pace. Pick a direction and see where you end up.

One of my favourite circuits of the week came from doing exactly that - although, admittedly, I was trying to reach Italy and went completely the wrong way.

I headed up Plan du Repos towards Roc Noir, using the Belette blue as a warm-up before climbing towards Fort de la Redoute. There's a small historic fort at the top and, more importantly after a cold chairlift, somewhere to get an espresso.

From there, the Lac red gets the legs working before the mountain opens towards Mont Valaisan, just shy of 2,800 metres. On a clear day, Mont Blanc sits across the horizon.

The skiing back towards the village strings together the sort of long reds that make you forget to check the time.

On other days, I skied with my parents.

We spent a lot of my childhood doing exactly this, but hadn't properly skied together in years. Now here we were again, only this time their grandson was waiting for us at the bottom.

Tetras, the broad blue near the Roches Noires lift, became our repeat run. There's enough width to let the skis go, carve big turns or play over the gentler rollers without constantly looking over your shoulder.

Halfway down, L'Antigel provides an extremely persuasive argument for stopping for a beer. We generally listened.

So, would we do it again?

Not next year.

That's perhaps not the conclusion a ski publication is supposed to reach after a week in the Alps, but it's the right one for us. The balance wasn't quite there.

When the weather was good and we could move between snow, sledging, walking and swimming, things worked. When the weather closed in, the limitations became much more obvious. Chloe and Jesse needed more to do, and I don't want our family holidays to involve me disappearing onto a mountain while they wait for me to come back.

For now, the traditional family ski trip isn't our family ski trip. Maybe that changes. Maybe one day Jesse decides snow boots are acceptable. Perhaps skis eventually follow. Perhaps they don't.

What this trip changed was my sense that skiing has to be the measure of whether taking him to the mountains was worthwhile.

I'll remember skiing with my parents again.

I'll remember the quiet pool looking out onto the Alps.

I'll remember the running alongside Jesse's sled.

Most of all, I'll remember Jesse sinking into that deep snow for the first time, looking briefly confused and then breaking into an enormous grin before throwing himself straight back into it.

I spent years imagining I'd make mountain memories with my son on skis. It turns out we didn't need them.

THE STANDARD: Taking an autistic child to the Alps

Make the unfamiliar familiar. We showed Jesse photographs of the trains, accommodation and mountains before leaving so parts of the journey were recognisable when we encountered them.

Prioritise accommodation over luxury. A self-catered apartment gave us a kitchen for safe foods, room for Jesse to play and somewhere we could retreat to when he needed downtime.

Interrogate “family-friendly”. Don't just check whether a resort has activities for children. Look closely at what those activities involve and whether they'll actually work for your child.

Ask about the boring details. Lift access, opening hours, stroller routes and how you physically get from the accommodation into town can have an outsized effect on the trip.

Build in time. Saving 30 minutes on a transfer isn't worth much if a tight connection turns the entire journey into a stressful one.

Talk to people before travelling. A specialist operator and the local tourist office may be able to solve problems you wouldn't know to ask about otherwise.

THE STANDARD: Taking the train to the Alps with children

Tell Eurostar about additional needs before travelling. We were able to use dedicated check-in and security facilities and a separate waiting area.

Don't underestimate Paris. Gare du Nord to Gare de Lyon was comfortably the most stressful part of our outward journey. Allow plenty of time - and consider a taxi if you're carrying ski equipment, luggage and a stroller.

Bring more entertainment than you think you'll need. Toys, films and devices helped enormously on the longest stretches.

Use the freedom of the train. Being able to walk around, visit the café and change scenery was one of the biggest advantages over flying for us.

Leave a buffer on the way home. Train journeys involving multiple connections don't reward an aggressively tight itinerary.

(Article originally featured on In The Snow - https://www.inthesnow.com/ski-holiday-autistic-child-la-rosiere/)