White Pearl Lodge Spa — Hotel in Albertville

We stayed as a family of four advanced & intermediate skiers, incl two children aged 11 & 13. Very convenient apartments for Easter skiing and an excellent standard of accommodation all round. The kitchens are well equipped with proper ovens, induction hob, kettle etc. We had a two bedroom apartment which was perfectly spacious for four of us. Would have been cramped for 6.|Very good pool and spa with some cool features like the ice room and salt sauna, and it’s a nice touch to have a corridor running the length of the underground car park so you can walk to the pool in your robe without going outside. Nice to have the games room with pool and table football as well. |It’s worth knowing that to ski back to the ski room at the end of the day for some of the blocks you need to use a button lift which is not suitable for beginners. Beginners would need to walk over from the square in Plagne Soleil, about 5 mins. This is also where the ski school meeting point is.|There is a nice bar in the reception area with a very friendly bar man. The resort of Plagne Soleil itself is very much a self catering sort of place - quiet and only a couple of uninspiring restaurants and no bars with any atmosphere. You can walk to Plagne Villages which takes about 10 mins, either over the piste, or down the road, where you can get the free lift down to Plagne Centre which has more life.||The apartments whilst lovely would be even better if the beds weren’t quite so hard and you could sit up in bed with a cup of tea without banging your head on a shelf. We assume the slightly useless shower curtain in the en-suite was temporary in lieu of an glass screen. Other than that the fixtures and fittings seemed of a high quality.||Excellent and convenient underground parking, with doors to access every block so you would never be parked far from your lift. Very easy unloading and loading which made the beginning and end of the holiday very easy.||The ski and boot rooms are the most luxurious we have encountered, and with one for every block, very accessible, with lots of space to store kit and sit to put boots on. We did think it odd though that the heaters were left on all day and night, which made it almost impossible to spend more than a couple of minutes in there. The staff did rectify this when we mentioned it (thank you!), but we dread to think how much energy has been wasted all season. In this age of global warming, the ski industry really needs to be mindful of the ecological impact. The heaters were so efficient that they could have dried all the kit within an hour or two and still kept the boots lovely and warm to put on.||The staff on reception were really friendly and helpful, in fact it does seem that CGH are raising the bar on customer service in French resorts.|The only legacy thing seems to be the request for a full inventory to be filled out on arrival. This only seems to happen in France, and we simply can’t believe that the staff count every knife and plate after each set of guests leave, so what exactly is the point? We never do it as it’s the last thing we want to do after driving for two days. Maybe this could be phased out?||All in all we had a really great week and would definitely recommend these apartments...

We were delighted that Plagne Soliel has a 5 star ski in/ski out apartment so booked through Inghams. Our initial impression was excellent. Lovely building, welcoming reception team and a fantastically appointed spacious apartment (we chose the two bedroom apartment for up to six).||First the positives. Great position in Plagne Soliel - short walk the centre. Every aspect of the fixtures within the apartment were first class. Great sized rooms, big family dining table, large balcony, on suite shower room, separate bathroom and separate WC.||The boot room on the second floor (we stayed in Grenat building) was quiet and had walk in ski lockers! We rarely saw anyone else in the boot room so never had to fight for a seat. The heaters in the locker were great.||The spa and pool were also of a very high standard and gave a nice relaxing alterative on a day the weather closed in.||The lift in our building felt like our own personal lift and we rarely had to wait for more than a few seconds for it to arrive.||The hotel has it's own bar which is always a positive. Sadly, as beer drinkers, the two draft beers on offer were not to our taste so we did not really use this facility.||In terms of ski in/ski out, as fairly experienced skiers this was ok for us, however the route in and out was down a short pathway and for ski in was slightly uphill. The walk is you stop on the piste is only probably 50 metres so not a huge issue. The run to access the hotel is a blue run with a pommel lift.||There were a few negatives.||On arrival in our room, when we entered the bathroom and shower room there was an unpleasant smell from the drains. We kept the doors closed and put up with the smell. On check out we mentioned this to the reception team and were told we were not the only guests to mention this. Given this is a 5-star accommodation I would think it not unreasonable for the hotel to let us know there is an issue when it was brought to their attention. I suppose from our side of things we shouldn't have done the typically British thing and put up with the smell without comment for a week.||Second issue was the lack of a safe in our room (or if there was a safe we couldn't find it). We notified the reception team who said they would get someone to look into this and get back to us. This never happened.||The final aspect we found a little unsavoury was the end of stay inspection and 'price list' for breakages handed to us on arrival. We always clean our apartments before leaving (as well as constantly during our stay) but have never before been provided with list of what must be done prior to leaving accompanied by the attendant penalty costs if we didn't. We had to strip the beds, fold all the towels and then had to make an appointment for a member of staff to come to the apartment to inspect it before we left. It all felt very uncomfortable and not what we expected from a 5-star residence or experienced in any other self-catering accommodation we have stayed in.||Overall would we return? We certainly would. The quality of the room, building, ski room and spa far outweighed the negative aspects but I personally think the hotel could 'friendly up' a little its attitude and approach to end of...

I think this is a wonderful hotel despite some of the negative reviews.

The location is really good. It is 4 minutes walk to the Plagne Soleil shops/restaurants. It is ski in/out so as long as you have skied before. Otherwise, getting down to the first chair lift and getting back to the boot room will be a challenge. Otherwise it is very convenient. It would be handy if the hotel produced a small picture to get you know where to go from the boot room to the slopes and where the first chair lift is (Bergerie). Also, how to ski back to the hotel. You will need to take the Dou Du Praz button lift, then turn left.

The hotel main building is very nice. The actual rooms are in one of the chalet buildings. The main hotel building also houses the pool, sauna, steam room, spa…

If you arrive earlier in the day, check in is fairly quick and straightforward. If you arrive from 4pm onwards, the queue is quite long. Although you can check in, the room is not available until after 5pm and it can be even later. Our’s was available at 5:45pm. To get between the main hotel building to any of the chalet buildings, you can walk outside which can be cold and challenging if there is ice/snow on the road or you can take the life from the main building to -1 floor where all the chalets are lined by what they call tunnels. Once this floor there are seats to relax in, table football, pool table and a table tennis table.

From the reception, you can pre order bakery for the morning. The price is reasonable. You do not even have to go to reception to collect it. Instead, between 8am and 8:20, your bakery goods are delivered to your door in a tote bag hanging on a coat hook.

The hotel room is spacious. Well fitted with modern appliances. There is a filter coffee maker as well as a pod coffee maker. They give you 10 pods. You also get 7 dishwasher tablets. You get 2 towels each one for the room and one for the pool. You also get bathrobes and slippers.

The other thing worthy of a mention is the ski locker. It is MASSIVE. Very spacious. The heated boot rack ensure we have nice toasty boots in the morning.

Plagne centre is where a lot of the bars and restaurants are. To get there, there is a bus that runs from Plagne Soleil every 20 minutes. Check the YUGE app for the time table. Take the bus to Plagne village telebus and take the egg pods to the centre. It is just the reverse to get back

We really liked the hotel and it is certainly comfortable/luxurious. I think k it is worthy of 5*. We will definitely visit again. Highly...