A family snow holiday without skiing in Europe: snowshoes, sledges, a rail toboggan and cheese cellars in the French Jura
By Robin — your host · sources at the end · 21 October 2026 · 4 min read · Our method
Not every family wants to ski, and not every budget can. A snow holiday without skiing still needs real snow, short drives and enough to do when the sledge loses its charm. The French Jura plateau delivers that: snowshoe trails graded for children, a rail toboggan, an ice rink, cheese cellars, and a whole house on the snow. Here are the figures, the drives and the limits.
Why skip the skis
Ski holidays are built around lifts, lessons and kit, and each of those costs money and patience. Remove them and a snow week becomes simpler: boots, a sledge, a thermos, a short drive. Children under 8 rarely mind. What they remember is the snowman, the first snowshoe track in a silent forest, the toboggan run that made the grandparents scream. The Jura plateau suits this kind of week because the snow lies in the villages, not only on the summits, so the day starts at the garden gate rather than at a lift queue.
Snowshoe trails made for small legs
The Foncine-le-Haut nordic site, a 10 min drive from the house, marks 17 snowshoe routes in Jura Tourisme’s listing, several of them short loops through spruce that a 6-year-old finishes with pride. Mouthe, 20 min away by car in our measurements, adds 20 km of marked snowshoe trails in the cold valley where the Doubs rises. Hire shops in the area usually stock children’s snowshoes; we do not hire them ourselves, so ask before you set out. Flat trails, a thermos and a bag of biscuits carry a family further than any gadget.
Toboggan run, ice rink, sledging slope
Métabief, 40 min away by car in our measurements, runs a rail toboggan open from age 3 with a weight limit of 150 kg per sledge, according to the station. It is the one ticket of the week worth buying twice. Near Les Rousses, 30 min from us by road, Prémanon keeps an ice rink in winter, a good answer to a cold sunny afternoon. The cheapest slope is the field behind the house with a plastic sledge; it is also the one the children ask for first. The first family ski trip page covers the areas if one child wants to try skis after all.
A cheese cellar for the grey day
Every snow week has one day of fog or sleet. The Fort des Rousses, next to the Les Rousses ski area, ripens Comté in its vaults at 8 °C according to Jura Tourisme, in wheels of 40 kg each, stacked along corridors built for soldiers. Book the visit ahead, as places are limited. Children find the scale funnier than any museum, and the tasting at the end settles the question of lunch. Our winter page for families adds the other indoor options on the plateau.
The house after a day in the snow
Our house has one floor and no more, in Foncine-le-Bas, 835 m up on the plateau, with a fenced lawn, 400 m², that becomes the sledging field and the snowman site. 6 to 8 people share 3 bedrooms, plus 2 bathrooms, with no stair for a tired 4-year-old to fall down. The ski room dries the wet gloves, the dining table seats everyone for a fondue, and nobody else sleeps under the roof: the booking is always for the whole house. Grandparents who do not walk in snow have a warm sofa and a view of the field.
Honest limits
Snow is likely on the plateau in January and February but never guaranteed; a mild week happens, and we say so when it does. We hire no snowshoes, sledges or skates; the villages do. Foncine-le-Bas is tiny, with no shop, so the car does a run to the supermarket once or twice in the week. The toboggan run and the ice rink have opening days that change with the weather, so check them the evening before. Families who need entertainment every hour will find the plateau quiet; families who need space and snow will find it exactly right.
Getting here
The nearest big airport is Geneva, 1 hr 20 min away from our door by our own measurement, with hire cars at the terminal. By rail, the quickest Paris–Frasne service needs 2 hr 48 min; Frasne to the house is then a further 40 min by road. On the plateau the loi Montagne asks for fitted winter tyres, or snow chains carried in the car, for the cold months of November to March, and car seats travel better than they hire.
What it costs and how to book
A week in the whole house begins at €4,200. The snow activities above cost a toboggan ticket, an ice-rink entry, a fort visit and the hire of snowshoes; there is no lift pass and no lesson in the budget, which is where a non-ski week saves most. Write with your dates, the ages of the children and who does not walk in snow, and we will answer plainly what the week can hold and what the forecast says.