Nine helpful things to know before booking a ski holiday in Trysil

In the latest Ski Safari blog post - straight from the piste - Ski Safari’s specialists compiled this handy list of 9 helpful things to know before booking a ski holiday in Trysil.

If you’re looking for fabulous family terrain Trysil has it by the bucket load. Gentle, cruising runs with plenty of wide-open space to make your first turns. The great range of confidence-building slopes has just the right balance for intermediates to progress in a safe environment. This is one of the very few resorts you can all travel up on the same lift and then take a different run meeting together at the bottom - perfect for mixed abilities. Combine all this terrain with the excellent English speaking ski school and you’ll progress to a new level of skiing in no time.

Even though we didn't actually travel with any children (not under the age of 26 anyway!) it didn't take long to see how well Trysil works for families and how child-friendly the resort is. There is a great selection of accommodation to suit all different group sizes with excellent facilities including swimming pools, bowling alleys and indoor surfing. The ski schools have really well-equipped beginner areas and there are miles of confidence-building green runs throughout the resort. Then there is, of course, Valle, the super-friendly children's mascot which we might have squeezed a few hugs from. There is no doubt Trysil is incredibly well set up for providing everything you would need for an all-round family ski holiday.

Even though Trysil is Norway’s largest ski area, the resort is ultra-convenient with 80% of the accommodation in a ski-in ski-out location. Trysil ’s two key accommodation areas (the Turistsenter and the Høyfjellssenter) both have grocery shops, rental shops and ski school within close proximity meaning there is no need for shuttle buses or driving all week. With a setup like this, the logistics of rounding up your children and getting to ski school for 9 am becomes a feasible challenge!

Why should skiing ever have to end? Night skiing is free on your multi-day lift pass on Tuesdays, Fridays and Saturdays until 8 pm! Take a few runs after the après-ski and then head to the Knettsetra restaurant at the mid-station for a meat fondue experience (moose anyone?) and a few shots of Aquavit, after which you’ll be flying down the mountain back to your hotel! If you’re not up to the skiing you can still meet the rest of your group, by catching the lift up and then hop on the restaurant's snowmobile to get back down the mountain after dinner, as some of our group did.

The quality of what’s on offer is mind-blowingly fantastic. And from me that’s saying something - I’m a self-confessed foodie. The breakfast in the Park Inn was a wonder - be it eating like the locals with the array of pickled fish, cottage cheese and salad or a more traditional English fare - I simply couldn’t fault it. Lunch on-mountain in Skihytta came in the shape of half a litre of deliciously hearty soup (five mouth-watering flavours including chicken curry or goulash), served in a half loaf of freshly baked white bread in place of a bowl. A soup lunch somehow will never quite compare again! The meat fondue (moose - hunted by the restaurant owner - chicken and beef) in the Knettsetra restaurant was very memorable. The star performer here was the vegetable gratin. I have never heard so many comments about a plate of vegetables! It may not be cheap to eat out but it is very, very good...

Trysil is a truly superb destination for families, however, as a group, we were pleasantly surprised by what was on offer after ski wise (après ski). The base area at Fageråsen where you will find the beautiful Park Inn hotel offers the Stabben Afterski bar, which soon became our favourite watering hole. Whilst prices are a little high, the quality is excellent and not many resorts can boast having a Boris Becker lookalike playing live music and keeping us well entertained twice daily! The Stabben is open from lunch onwards but really gets going from 4 pm and closes around 2 am on weekends. The liveliest after ski is at Laaven, just a couple of minutes from the Radisson. Get there early as it is very popular and very good. In the resort's own words “very high party factor on weekends!” Of course for families, this is also a great choice from Monday through Thursday when both children and adults are welcome.

Our hosts arranged a very special activity for us deep in the Nordic wilds. Beautiful horses pulled our sleighs, complete with jingling bells and fire torches, through the Norwegian spruce forest as tiny snowflakes fell on us and reindeer skins kept us snug. Bowls of steaming elk stew and red wine awaited us at the cosy lavvo, a traditional Norwegian tepee, with a roaring fire in the middle where anyone who was still peckish could cook sausages on sticks. All in all, just magical.

The Radisson Blu is probably the best family hotel I have come across in all my travels! Fantastic value, amazing facilities and ski-in ski-out to the children’s ski school - the perfect option for a young family or as a first ski trip. The Park Inn was also designed as a modern mountain hotel, entirely ski-in ski-out, with loads of room types including some amazing apartments. Alternatively, if you fancy more of a cabin-in-the-woods feel, there are lots of options for all budgets, most of which are ski-in ski-out.

Granted perhaps not the most exciting part of our trip (although fill a bus with Team Ski Safari and there’s always going to be a lot of laughter), the ease of the journey to Trysil is one of the resort's big selling points. Norwegian Air is a great flight operator (a real cut above certain low-cost airlines), Oslo airport is slick and modern with lots of places to eat and shops to wander around and the transfer to resort is incredibly scenic with beautiful views of fjords, forests and picturesque Norwegian towns. Albeit a means to an end, but really quite a pleasant one at that!

Here's a little video for a taster of what you might experience in Trysil too:

Huge thanks to Camilla, Turid and Carina from the resort for hosting us and for their wonderful hospitality throughout the weekend. Have you been to Trysil? Tell us what you think!