Zell am See reviews - World Snowboard Guide

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feb 2007

Sun 7 September 2008 matthew

excellent area but very crowded. Also a little hard to find everything if you dont know where your going and watch out for the icy back trails. The night life is good but once again, a very well known place. If you are staying in the local area the I recommend the Saltburger Hof, its the only 5 star hotel in the area and they say you only live once so live it up here and you will not regret it.

Would have been great with more snow

Thu 3 January 2008 Tommo

I really liked the set up of Zell am see - picturesque lakeside town, gorgoues views and lovely train journey from slazburg too! the only problem was that the bottom half of the mountain didnt have any snow eliminating the chance of boarding right the way back down to the town!! which by look of things from the gondala would have been fab!

However although it is not massive there are some good long runs for us as progressing intermediates - i feel i improved a lot throughout this trip - there were some opportunities to head down long wide open blues and some empty and challenging reds to the right hand side of the map. the blacks are also quite tricky as they are narrow and quite icy at times.

Owing to the lack of snow we made a trip to to nearby kaprun, but despite this having much better condititions it was absolutely packed and i got fed up and headed back to the much quieter zell slopes.

the town itself is very nice with a range of shops, bars and restaraunts and hostels/guest houses. if you fancy a quiet restaraunt with traditional austrian cuisine then it is there for you. if you fancy drinking the night away in a bar with live music - its there for you too!

all in all a good place, in a lovely setting - just let down by lack of snow and crowding at kaprun where there is snow.

Not bad

Mon 5 February 2007 TC

I'm an ageing boarder (we're a growing breed) with small children and this place is very good and welcoming for families. I've been to lots of French resorts but this is the first Austrian resort I've been to. The first thing you realise about Austria is the difference in prices for everything. Austria is less than half the price for food, beer and fags than France -a pint of beer is around 2 quid compared to about 4 quid in France. The next thing you notice is that the quality of everything is better. The food here generally is amazing -plenty of cheap fast food places too in Zell if that's what you want as it's quite a big town. Next is the friendly and hearty attitude of Austrians compared to the French -need I say more?

Zell Am See is a very picturesque town with lots to do (especially if any of your party doesn't board/ski) but, to be honest -the slopes are quite limited for the intermediate or advanced boarder. You'll have fun but there are a lot of dodgy mogully or flats to mess about with on the way back to the resort. Saying that, you can get to Kaprun on the free bus in about 25 minutes which is a small and intimate place but heavily geared towards boarders. I have never seen such a concentration of kickers in all my years of boarding. It is possible to hit no less than 11 kickers and 3 rails in a single run. It's high altitude and the fact that it's on a massive glacier seem to help too. The accomadation seems to be a bit more low rent than Zell am See -although this is not going to bother groups of lads. I also noticed that in Kaprun ther were plenty of Youth Hostels and even a campsite! Something that would have appealed to me (cheap as chips) in the past!

Feb 2005

Wed 27 April 2005 Mamcoz
Overall, was the perfect place to learn for me. From being shaky down blue runs on the first day, was carving blacks by day three, due to great teaching at the Zell snowboard school. Mountain can get crowded, but if you stick to the Sonnealm side of the mountain, you can get 0 queue times, even in February half-term. For me, there was plenty of variety (on a clear day the views are some of the best you'll ever see in the alps too) , and apparantly good off-piste if you know where to look. Town was lively, with the Diele and Crazy Daisies being standout bars. All in all, a great place, with the nearby resorts of Kaprun and Saalbach to go to if you ever get bored.

March 2004 & March 2005

Thu 24 March 2005 Speed Freak
Brilliant place to learn. Instructors are of a very high standard and many of us were belting down reds in no time and some on blacks in 3 days with no worries. Didn't go to the pipe but the park was good fun and empty! Some very nice reds on the right side which were empty as the main area was always rammed. Kitzteinhorn is just down the road in Kaprun as an alternative. Village is top fun, the lake is stunning and you can't help but have a good time here - as long as you don't want too much speed!

The black runs back to the resort are bumpy as hell all the way home after lunch and don't even think about the blue run back to Zell Am Sell - flat as a pancake mate!

Get the City Express gondola from Zell and save hours of queing for the 50 Cable Car! We never could work out why so many muppets go past it on the bus knowing they are going to queue! From there, you can ride or get a 3er lift to the top.