A pro skier’s guide to the French Alps
From epic black runs to high-energy après, daredevil photographer and ski guide Mathis Dumas shows us the mountains, his way
Mathis Dumas didn’t grow up in the mountains—he was raised in the Mediterranean climes of Provence—but thanks to frequent family trips to the French Alps, he quickly fell in love with skiing. He got his first taste of snow as a toddler, and by the time he was 14 he was dreaming of a career as a mountain guide.
Today, having realized that ambition, the 30-year-old is based in the popular Alpine resort Chamonix, near the border with Switzerland, but regularly travels all over the Alps and to the mountains of Norway, Iceland and Japan when he can. When he’s not guiding, he often works as a snow photographer, and his pictures have appeared on the covers of GQ and Montagne magazines.
It’s a side hustle he hit upon by accident. “My parents didn’t know what I was doing in the mountains, so I took a camera along to document my adventures with my friends,” he says. Some of those friends became sponsored athletes, and brands began to pay Dumas for his shots; few other photographers could access these extreme, high-risk environments.
But that’s where he is in his element: “You are shooting a moment that will not happen in the exact same way ever again, as the conditions change all the time.”
In his free time, Dumas likes to ski steep lines with his friends and bag first descents of mountains that no one has ever skied down before. “I don’t feel scared,” he insists. “I’m prepared for this; I’ve built up to it over 20 years. It’s like an F1 driver—they’re trained for it.”
The main risks come from the high mountain environment, where avalanches and rockfalls can occur. While a slalom racer’s morning routine might simply involve waxing their skis, Dumas is checking the avalanche risk and preparing his safety equipment: a shovel, probe, beacon (which transmits his location), plus a special backpack with a rip cord that releases a large balloon to pull the skier to the surface of an avalanche. “When I turn on my avalanche beacon, I know I’m ready for the day: I feel excited, motivated.” And at the end of the day? “It feels great, like you accomplished your mission.”
While many stick to the more famous resorts (scroll down for our map of the best), one of Dumas’ favorites is Alpe d’Huez. It used to mostly attract French skiers but gained fame when it began hosting winter music festival Tomorrowland in 2019.
Mathis’ Alpe d’Huez highlights
“Alpe d’Huez gets a lot of fresh snow as it’s the first mountain range in the Alps, so it catches that first wave of precipitation,” he says. Because it’s high, he adds, the snow stays good for longer, and it’s bathed in sunshine.
It’s a great choice for beginners, with a dedicated progression area in the resort where the slopes are wide and the incline gradual. But it also has “huge potential for more challenging skiing. It’s very cool.”
What does he love most about skiing? “You are doing sport in a beautiful, natural landscape and you have to focus on the skiing, which forces you to disconnect from real life—it makes you happy and lifts your spirits.”
And after a long, enjoyable day on skis, Alpe d’Huez has just what Dumas wants: a lively après-ski and party scene—one of the key reasons he loves the sport. “You can enjoy skiing together and have a party in the evenings,” he enthuses. “It’s a mix of sport and pleasure. A ski trip is so much fun.”
How to max your trip’s mental-health benefits
The French Alps are blessed with majestic mountain backdrops, hearty regional cuisine, fun après-ski and some of the world’s best skiing across vast connected piste networks. With more than 200 resorts in the region, choosing where to go can be overwhelming at first, but these six resorts are great places to start.
Sam Haddad is a journalist specializing in action sports, travel, and the environment, whose work has appeared in The Guardian, 1843, Raconteur, and Huck Magazine. She has visited 46 countries.
