Schladming was a wonderful skiing experience in every way. This not so well know resort in the Eastern Alps is much larger than it appears. Each mountain is a nice size in itself but add the four link mountains together and you have a week of exploring to do.

The ski runs are extremely well groomed. Restaurants are everywhere. A great excursion is to rodel at night at Hoch Wurchen. A wonderful rodel piste with a small restaurant at the top by the name of Hoch Wurchen Alm.

The glacier at the Dachstein is definetly worth the trip. You do not need a car because there is a bus system to get you around, but things are a bit spread apart so a car is useful.

All in all a ski area well worth the effort.

My family and friends have been coming to Schladming for 15 years and have seen constant improvements in the area over this time.
What this resort really excels in is its Piste management, across the 4 mountans they have the largesst quantity of snow cannons in Austria, even the piste bashers have got a brand new snow depth radar system that allows them to concentrate on the problem areas of snow and keep the pistes in mint condition. They are the first resort in Austria to have this system.
One area that the town was lacking in was a lively apres ski scene, this has been remedied this year with the opening of the HOHEN TENNEHAUS, which is a new 3 floor 1000 seater apres ski bar/restaurant and nightclub that opens until 4:00am, at the base station of the Planai gondola in the town. They host regular live music nights and other events. Add in the season opening party,which included a concert by the artist PINK and the world cup Nightrace in late January which draws a crowd of 40,000 plus, this by no means a quiet town. There are about 12 other bars around the town and numerous quality restaurants.
The Salzburger Ski Armade pass covers not only the 4 local mountains totalling 165kms but a vast area of up to 850km's throughout the Salzburgerland. My tip is to fly to Salzburg and get a hire car (ranges from £130 per week for an economy size car)and take full advantage of the mountains on offer, most of which are within a 1/2 hour drive of Schladming.
Wednesday evening the Planai gondola runs until 7:30pm, as most of the Planai mountaintop huts host apres ski parties on this day of the week. Also great fun is the floodlit 5km toboggan run on Hochwurzen,(20 euros for the bus from town and back, which runs until 12:30am, plus the gondola to the top of Hochwurzen and toboggan hire). Finish off with a few drinks and a boogie in the TAUERNALM at the end of the toboggan run for an excellant night out.
The resort is becoming more and more popular with Brits, as they discover it, but it is still a firm favourite with the Austrians, Germans and a growing number of Dutch.
There is also an excellent swimming pool with outside heated pool in winter, as well as good winter walks on cleared paths. For those into cross country skiing the world cup resort of Ramsau sits on a high sunny plateau about 4 miles outside Schladming.
The resort also has its own Glacier sking on the DACHSTEIN glacier which includes a high altitude guided glacial ski route of 20km's or so, to Obertauern, with transport back to Schladming.
Definitely a world class resort, that has won several awards over the years. In fact we think it is so good that I am buying a property there, so we can enjoy it even more.
PS. It is also a top place to visit in the summer, and only one hour from Salzburg by car or train.

User Photos (click to enlarge)

I have skied in this resort since I could stand up, my family have taken loads of other familys skiing here, i can gladly say that the skiing bug has biten evryone of those familys very hard, and we get numerous offers to take them back evry year! Great for kids, adults, pro's, begineers. Beautiful town even better mountains! Hope to see you all there this year! Greg

Schladming was awesome, beautiful & friendly! I was there fom the 21st til 28th of january amongst a party of ten, from beginner's to very experienced and everything about it was great! As a beginner snow boarder i had a fantastic private lesson then went off with my family and friends that could ski well and had the best time, the many red runs were wide and steep with not too many people on them. Staff in all the bars and restaurants we went to were great & we were really lucky as after not a lot of snow this winter, there was plenty while we were there. Hotel mitterhoffer where we stayed was perfect! A friendly family run hotel and along with the pool, sauna, great staff and lovely food they even have a dog! Didn't want to go gome!