Ski holidays: Former chalet host shares what it’s really like – ‘creepy, disgusting’ | Travel News | Travel

As countries start to open up again to visitors, many Britons are deciding to leave their homeland to work abroad. A popular option for many is to apply to work a ski season in one of France’s many ski resorts, enabling skiing fans to do the sport they love while spending time in another country, meeting new people, and making some cash.

Jobs in ski resorts vary from being a ski instructor to a chef, but one role that has stood out in recent years thanks to its depiction in pop culture is that of a chalet host.

A film that comes to mind when thinking of this particular job is the 2011 romantic comedy Chalet Girl, starring Felicity Jones and Ed Westwick.

Since its release, past and present chalet hosts have spoken out about how far from reality the chick-flick is.

First of all, there is no such thing as a “chalet girl” in modern ski resorts – only chalet hosts, secondly, a host’s job is difficult and involves doing more than just giving a chalet a quick hoover before getting out on the slopes, and, thirdly, a chalet host’s ski season does not often end in romance.

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Claire*, from south Wales, can testify to this.

The 36-year-old has worked various jobs in ski resorts over the last decade, including as a chalet host and as a head chef.

As a chalet host at popular ski resort Méribel in the French Alps, Claire worked with another female host who was much younger than herself, called Anna.

This job stood out to Claire as “one of the worst”, and she revealed to Express.co.uk what went on behind the scenes.

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She said: “The abuse both me and Anna received was phenomenal. Many creepy, disgusting men would come and stay in the chalets.

“I had one group who would smoke drugs and sniff drugs in the chalet, make sexual advances towards me and Anna, and they were just horrid.

“I told the manager and he basically told us to put up with it.”

Claire revealed the sexual advances, or – more aptly – harassment, got worse with another group – again all male.

“There would be used condoms in the sauna every morning. It was vile!

“Both me and Anna lived in this chalet – she was just 18 and I was 34 at the time.”

Another experience Claire said she will remember forever involved another group, but at the same chalet.

“This lot were very wealthy, from London,” she explained.

“The grandmother in her late sixties was a hypochondriac. She would wake up with a different ailment every day.

“One evening she said she was sick but no one believed her. She took herself off to bed and within three hours I was calling for an ambulance.

“She was indeed incredibly sick and quite possibly one of the first cases of Covid.

“She got diagnosed with COVID-6, but it was likely COVID-19 – we just didn’t know COVID-19 was a thing until three months down the line.”

Claire added that the family was clearly “distressed” and, sadly, “the grandmother died”.

The 36-year-old stressed that being a chalet host is hard work even without the often difficult guests.

“Guests leaving at 8am and a new set arriving at 10am was a regular occurrence,” she said.

“We had just two hours to turn around a whole chalet and guests often complained that their rooms were dirty and not ready upon their arrival.”

Claire added she “walked out of that job” in March 2020, a month before her ski season was about to end.

She hasn’t worked in a ski resort since.

*The names in this article have been changed.