Five-star hotels in Méribel (Les Allues)

Méribel hotels in the valley of Les Allues

Méribel is not a commune but the resort of Les Allues, which covers about 86 km² of the Doron des Allues valley and counted 1,736 residents in 2023. Its villages, resort and ski area lie in the outer zone of the Vanoise National Park, outside the park's protected core. The Les Allues valley is one of the three that give Les 3 Vallées its name, alongside Courchevel's Saint-Bon valley and Les Belleville, and Méribel sits at the centre of the linked ski area.

Anyone comparing Méribel hotels is really choosing between four districts strung along one road. The tourist office names them as Méribel-Les Allues, the old villages between 1,100 and 1,400 m; Méribel-Village at 1,400 m; Méribel-Centre, spread between 1,400 and 1,750 m; and Méribel-Mottaret, from 1,750 m. The free Méribus shuttles link every village and district, from Les Allues up to Mottaret.

The name has two stories. The resort's own history says the founders borrowed it from a hamlet called Méribel, partly because English speakers would hear 'Merry Bell'; the tourist office's district pages also trace it to the Latin mirare bellum, 'the point from which the view is beautiful'.

From a farming valley to a chalet resort

In the mid-1930s the village of Les Allues was down to 520 inhabitants, living from farming and the summer pastures of Burgin, Mottaret and Le Saut. In 1935 the municipal council launched a ski resort above the hamlets of Mussillon and Morel. It entrusted the project to the Parisian architect Paul Sirvin and to Jean de la Valdène, an engineer and former flying ace, who in 1937 gathered investors including Peter Lindsay, Lily Alvarez and the ski champion Billy Clyde.

The first buildings went up in 1938: the Ski Club des Allues and the Chalet Doron, which ran a man-driven motorised sledge that hauled up to 19 skiers to the Cave de Burgin. The war stopped work. In 1946 the Scot Peter Lindsay restarted it with a team of French designers that included Charlotte Perriand, and made the architect Christian Durupt guardian of the Méribel style.

That style still defines the resort: wood and stone walls, double-pitched roofs covered in slate and chalets of controlled height. The first chairlift followed in 1968 at La Chaudanne. Méribel-Mottaret came much later, designed in 1972 and opened in February 1976, and the first snow cannons appeared in 1978.

Les Allues, Méribel-Village, Centre and Mottaret

Les Allues, at 1,100 m, is the chief town and the valley's year-round village, with the town hall, church, museum and library among old barns, a bread oven and narrow lanes. Its hamlets include Le Raffort, Cruet, Vanthier, Chandon, Nantgerel, La Gittaz and Plantin. The Olympe gondola, 500 m from the centre, lifts skiers to La Chaudanne in a few minutes, and Méribel-Centre is 5 km away by shuttle.

Méribel-Village, at 1,400 m, held only a few scattered sheepfolds until the 1990s. It is now a hamlet of restored chalets and barns around a sunny square with a chapel and a bread oven; the Golf chairlift climbs from the square to the Altiport sector, and the blue Lapin run brings skiers back down. Méribel-Centre is 2 km away.

Méribel-Centre is the largest village: tourist office, cinema, shops and bars, and in the lower La Chaudanne district the Parc Olympique, with its pool, ice rink, bowling alley and climbing wall. Its chalets of wood, stone and Savoy slate stand on the sunny side of the mountain.

Méribel-Mottaret is the skiing village: residences at the foot of the slopes, ski schools grouped between the Laitelet and Châtelet districts, and the Pas du Lac lift towards the summits. Mont Vallon, close to 3,000 m, stands over it.

L'Hélios on the Route de la Renarde

Hôtel L'Hélios stands on the slopes of Méribel in the Les Allues valley, on the Route de la Renarde (Chemin Durupt in the register), with views across the 3 Vallées ski area. It describes itself as a family-run chalet hotel on Méribel's first ski slope and has welcomed guests since 2009. The Atout France register lists 18 rooms, classified five-star on 13 April 2023.

The hotel says all its rooms and suites face south or west, towards Mont Vallon and the valley. Superior rooms of 26 to 29 sq m have south-facing balconies; Junior Deluxe Suites of 37 to 41 sq m sleep two or three, with separate bathroom and toilet; Premier Suites of 54 to 59 sq m sleep two or three. Families have two duplex layouts, the 45 sq m Duplex Suite with a mezzanine bedroom of two single beds and the 65 sq m Duplex Deluxe Suite with a second bedroom upstairs; the largest, the west-facing 95 sq m Hélios Suite, has a first double bedroom opening onto a large living room.

At lunch, Le 2 du Doron serves crêpes on a sunny terrace; in the evening the L'Hélios restaurant takes over. There is a spa area with Phytomer treatments, a concierge service, a luggage room and a ski shop that rents equipment on site.

Skiing from the centre of Les 3 Vallées

The Méribel valley has about 150 km of its own slopes within the 600 km of Les 3 Vallées. The tourist office says 85% of Méribel's ski area lies above 1,800 m, half its runs are green or blue and half the valley is covered in spruce.

The D90 from Moûtiers: reaching Méribel

Whatever the starting point, the last leg is the D90: from Moûtiers the road climbs 18 km up the Les Allues valley. The nearest station is Moûtiers-Salins-Brides-les-Bains, where Altibus line S64 to Méribel and Mottaret leaves all year from the bus station beside the tracks, more often in season. In winter, Altibus also sells the Alpskibus coach from Geneva Airport, which connects at Moûtiers, and the LYS'Express from Lyon Saint-Exupéry; the tourist office lists coaches from Chambéry airport too.

The tourist office reminds drivers that snow tyres, or at least chains or socks in the car, are compulsory on the way up between 1 November and 31 March. From London, the Saturday Eurostar snow train of winter 2026–27 also stops at Moûtiers, after a change at Lille Europe.

Olympic Méribel, the Tueda reserve and summer

Méribel's racing slopes date from the Albertville Games. Roc de Fer, created for them, opened with World Cup races in February 1990, and the ice rink and the Rhodos cable car were built for the same event. In 1992 the valley staged all five women's alpine skiing events and the whole ice hockey tournament, 46 matches in all. In February 2023, Roc de Fer was the women's venue of the Alpine World Ski Championships shared with Courchevel, and it also staged the team and parallel races.

In summer the valley turns to walking. The Plan de Tueda nature reserve covers 1,100 ha at the entrance to the Vanoise National Park, which was created in 1963 as France's first; chamois, ibex and birds of prey live there, and a reserve house holds a permanent exhibition. Méribel's 18-hole golf course, opened in 1966 as the first in France laid out above 1,500 m, runs alongside the Altiport between 1,565 m and 1,850 m, among fir forest.

From Méribel-Village, a summer loop climbs to the Col de la Loze between the two valleys, where the tourist office warns of gradients above 20%.

Courchevel, Les Arcs and Chambéry from Méribel

Courchevel lies over the ridge to the east; on skis the Col de la Loze and the Saulire lead across, and our Courchevel page covers its six villages and altiport. Bourg-Saint-Maurice and Les Arcs, the last stop on the valley railway, are reached up the RN90 from Moûtiers. Chambéry is the city on the A43 on the way in from Lyon.

For the wider picture, browse our selection of French Alps hotels and our explainer on what makes a hotel five-star in France, useful when reading how Méribel hotels are classified.