One of the quietest large areas in the Alps. You can ski all day at the end of the season and barely queue for anything. La Thuile is a former mining village on the Italian side of the Little St Bernard pass, linked by lift to La Rosière in France. The crossing and back is a proper day out with lunch in another country, and the two sides have quite different weather, so one is often better than the other. The skiing is north facing, tree lined and snow sure, with long descents and a World Cup downhill course that suits confident intermediates and experts alike. Hotels and apartments cost well below the better known names in the Aosta valley. Aosta itself is worth a day for the Roman ruins and the market, there is a thermal bath at Pré Saint Didier twenty minutes away, and the Valdostana cooking is worth seeking out.