Annabel Croft
Our last trip stands out in my mind because it was a perfect short blast. Another couple whose parents have a chalet in the Swiss resort of Verbier invited us for a weekend. It was really easy to get to and we had all day Saturday and Sunday skiing before going home on Monday afternoon.
The chalet was wonderfully positioned right at the bottom of the slopes so you could just take your skis off and walk only a few metres to it.
Inside, it was lovely, with big log fires. Our hostess was Swedish so there were lots of candles, even at breakfast.
I love the après-ski and the whole atmosphere, but I made the mistake of skiing one morning with a hangover. It was ghastly, and the glare seemed to make it 10 times worse. Me and my husband, Mel, learnt to ski together, and then went skiing for three or four seasons before having children. We are equally bad, but he's more reckless than me and will go down black runs. I like a big, wide motorway of a slope and Verbier has some nice easy runs.
Going for a weekend was perfect for me because it got me back into skiing but it was short enough not to feel guilty about leaving the children. I saw lots of young ones on the nursery slopes and thought of our three. I'd like to take them in a couple of years when the youngest, Lily, is five. I wouldn't take the other two until she is old enough to ski.
Libby Purves
I've never had a nicer time than in Kandersteg, in the Bernese Oberland in Switzerland. It is a traditional village resort with pointy roofs. We like a bit of yodelling, and if anyone is prepared to blow an alpine horn we are pushovers for that. Give us glühwein, fondues and very old locals on wooden skis.
I first skied as a teenager when my father, a diplomat, was posted to Berne, the Swiss capital.
I especially love the independence of cross country skiing, being free of the queues for lifts and all those Day-Glo ski suits.
At Kandersteg in a good year for snow you can potter around the village on cross-country trails, but if there is less snow you have to go up to the glacier. You can go up on the lift to Oeschinen, the vast frozen lake which is great because it is absolutely flat, or on to the rolling high plain up the other side.
When the children were about 11 or 12 we had a marvellous holiday there. They had skiing lessons in the mornings, while I explored the cross-country tracks, and my husband, who is a non-skier, stayed in the little family-run hotel and did some writing.
We all met for lunch and afterwards he'd announce he'd get us hiking down the valley, where the snow was light and we could walk along the tracks.
I discovered snow shoes, which are wonderful for playing around on deep snow. For me snow is more about landscape than sport, though I am planning to take up downhill skiing. Then I'll become one of those sad people with a plastic ski pass round my neck in the queue for the lift.
• Libby Purves's new novel A Free Woman is published by Hodder at £16.99
David Gower
We went skiing again this year for the first time since having children. My cousin Richard, who is a very good skier, invited us to join a group of friends in St Anton in Austria for a week. Our two daughters, Alex, seven, and Sammi, who is five, had never been before, but his two children who are younger had already been skiing for a couple of years.
The girls went to ski school in the mornings and really enjoyed it. Alex was slower to get going but was doing well by the end and, after her first 50mph crash, Sammi understood that turning was allowed.
St Anton suited our party because its ski school is very good. Richard and his wife could do their powder skiing and there were easier runs for the rest of us, while my wife and I fall into the broad band of intermediates. It was an excellent mix.
It was the week before Easter and we found the snow pretty good high up but slushy down below, which made it a bit difficult.
Some afternoons we took the children skiing with us, using a harness and Richard's expertise to get them through tricky bits. If they didn't feel like going on they'd go down in the lifts and spend the afternoon at the hotel pool.
We stayed at the Schwarzer Adler hotel,which has a fabulous new wing with a swimming pool, a spa and good-size family rooms.
The only trouble was that it was above one of St Anton's most popular night clubs. So we ended up shifting to the back of the hotel which was less noisy.
Our first family ski trip was a great success and we are keen to go again.
