Music with altitude: France’s Snowboxx festival

Not only is Avoriaz part of one of the world’s largest ski areas, it also hosts a banging week-long music festival, so you can ski in and boogie out

There’s nothing quite like blinding white, early-morning mountain sun, a blast of crisp, cold air and an Alpine valley stretching ahead of you to start your day. Welcome to Avoriaz, sitting on a cliff-face at 1,800m – and the only fully pedestrianised resort in France. It is also home to Snowboxx, a week-long music festival where you can combine skiing with partying, electronic music, late-night DJ sets and forest raves. As it’s ski-in, ski-out and vehicle free, you can get everywhere by foot. Better still, take a horse-drawn carriage to get around.

Part of Portes du Soleil, one of the world’s largest ski areas, offering some 600km of ski runs, Avoriaz is a modern resort that crisscrosses France and Switzerland. It was purpose-built in the 1960s, with high-rises and chalets sharp-angled and wooden-clad, working in sympathy with the mountains.