Anova Hotel & Spa

Travel. We arrived via Crystal ski transfer and used a local service, SNOWCAB to get back to Turin airport. This was €50 per head. Location. Hotel Anova is conveniently located around a 10 minute walk from the centre. There is a shuttle bus to run you around should you need. It’s ski in, ski out with the button lift accessible directly from outside the ski room. Access to the main slopes is a short ski down to the bubble lift. The rooms. The rooms at HA are modern and arty. We stayed in a double room with a balcony that offered views of the slopes below and the surrounding peaks. There is good storage and hanging space offered, along with a safe. The bed was comfortable and offered a square or rectangular pillow. The bathroom featured a large walk in shower which was lovely and warm and had good pressure. Soap and shampoo bars were provided, along with herbal tea and coffee facilities. Towels robes and slippers were provided for the spa. The bar. Good variety of drinks served at the usual prices. Friendly and efficient staff. NOTE: We ordered a bottle of house red wine, which was charge at €67. I would recommend checking the wine list prior to ordering any bottles. Spa. The spa is free to guests from 10am to 2pm, after 2pm there is a charge of €20 per person, per day. We did use the spa one morning which offers a pool, sauna, steak room and hot tub. It was clean, modern and we had an enjoyable time. The restaurant. And now we come to the part that lets the hotel down, although i am sure if you were just visiting to use the restaurant, you’d likely have a pleasant experience. Breakfast The breakfast was a buffet, offering either pod or bean to cup coffee, a range of teas and freshly squeezed orange, grapefruit or apple juice which you do yourself - which was fun and extremely tasty! There was a range of fresh breads, meats, cheese, fruit, granola, spreads, boiled eggs, scrambled eggs and bacon offered daily. There wasn’t really much effort made to provide anything extra for dietary requirements, but I managed to make eggs on toast by semi boiling an egg and scrambling on my plate. I also throughly enjoyed the granola, cereal and nut selection, and almond milk was provided. Dinner The food was very tasty and appeared to be freshly cooked with good ingredients, and there is a good choice. However, being a half board guest is extremely complicated especially if you have dietary requirements. After a 7 night stay, we still hadn’t fully grasped how they work their menu out. HA offer a 3 course, menu of the day for dinner, which changes daily. During the week we were here, there wasn’t a single vegetarian main option on this menu. However, you can choose to eat outside of the daily menu and can pick from half of the full menu. When you do this you sacrifice your starter (unless you pay a supplement), even if you have a dietary requirement and are left no choice. I have to mention the curly haired waitress we had at the start of the week, she was helpful and worked with us ensure that I got enough to eat, however, once we got a new waitress we were very bluntly told that the menu is the menu and that is that. On the half of the full menu that I could have as part of the half board by sacrificing the starter, there were only 2 vegetarian options, 1 of which was dairy free. A poke bowl with cheese, or a noddle wok. Both were very tasty and I alternated between these throughout the week, although the poke bowl did arrive with cheese sometimes despite me starting that I cannot eat dairy. I tried to have pasta 1 day, and asked for it to be cooked in just egg, however I reacted to this. I cannot complain as each meal I had was tasty, but by the end of the week I was sick of noodles and poke bowls. The rest of my group with no dietary issues also found it confusing to navigate the menu. It was explained differently several times, despite us having a French speaker in our group. And often the menu of the day main was priced higher than the alternatives from the half of the full menu that we could pick from, yet a supplement was charged or starter wasn’t allowed. Personally, as someone with a restricted diet, I expected better and have experienced better from a hotel of this standard and probably wouldn’t return on that basis. There wasn’t really any effort made to accommodate the fact that I don’t eat meat, and especially that I react badly to diary.

Just had a lovely week at the Anova. Our room was excellent apart from poor lighting and kept very clean by the housekeeping team. The bar is comfortable and welcoming. The food is very well cooked with plenty of variety. Breakfasts were very good with lots of choice. Evening meals were well presented but hot plates would have kept the food hotter. All the staff were very friendly.

The Anova is a well priced high quality establishment that is on the piste at The Obelisque run served by a drag lift. You can also walk 80m away from the town at the bottom of the Obelisque to get right on the blue for Tremplin lift over to the other side of the valley and a green to Claviere. The service at this hotel is spot on, everyone from the bar staff, reception, ski hire shop, restaurant and house keepers are all friendly and excellent at their jobs. The outside terrace snack bar is well priced. The main restaurant serves high quality meals, and the half board daily dinner menu is extremely varied, high quality, and good value.