A skiing trip for two dads, three kids and two alps at the resort that moves mountains to help you

“ARE YOU all travelling together?” The check-in assistant was making no assumptions, even if we weren’t quite the average family.

Two middle-aged blokes, no wives, three kids . . . we might have been a pair of divorcees, or civil partners who’d done exceptionally well at the IVF clinic.

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In fact, we were an Important Holiday Experiment.

I’d hatched a plan with my oldest friend, Adam, to give the wives a break and take the kids skiing.

The younger ones, we thought, could keep each other entertained while we caught up in the bar. Simple!

Skiing is rarely cheap and February half-term even less so, so for single parents or anyone else outside the usual mum/dad/2.4-kids set-up, buddying up with another adult means not having to sacrifice the better package prices typically enjoyed by “traditional” families.

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So with Zoe, ten, and eight-year-old twins Ava and Miles, Les Deux Dads set off for Les Deux Alpes.

What could possibly go wrong?

Nothing at first. The Neilson Hotel Aalborg proved a good base: right on the slopes with ski shop on site.

Our interconnecting family room worked just fine, though with three kids and two grown men, let’s just say two bathrooms were advantageous.

Like the Aalborg, Les Deux Alpes is built with convenience in mind.

Les Deux Alpes may not have the beauty or charm of an old mountain town but it is practical

Last year they literally moved a mountain. Or part of it, anyway: a massive £8.5million development created a continuous blue or green run all the way from the top station at 3,500m back to the resort base.

The Jandri piste — so named after the lift that serves it — is a boon for families or mixed groups who want to ski as much of the mountain as they can together.

It is a great achievement and typical of a purpose-built resort, where convenience is king.

Les Deux Alpes may not have the beauty or charm of an old mountain town but it is practical and, being French, still crammed with boulangeries, chocolatiers and patisseries.

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My personal favourite was the Fromagerie.

“Where do you stay?” asked the owner Stephan, while giving us generous free samples of the local Tome cheese.

“The Aalborg,” we told him. “Aaah!” He smiled as if he had just smelled a particularly good Roquefort.

“It was the place 20 years ago!”

The French have such a way with words.

Well, it’s the skiing we really come for, I reason.

“Not for the people? You can’t have France without the French people!”

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I could sense this might turn ugly, so I staged a quick Brexit — after buying a particularly good piece of Beaufort.

At 16 Euros (£13.60) a kilo compared to £24 at home, it would be rude not to.

But what about that skiing? I wasn’t lying to Stephan.

As the name suggests, there are two sides to Les Deux Alpes — the sprawling main face, with its glacier providing skiing right into summer, and the smaller Vallee Blanche side.

In short, it’s big and would benefit from the sort of informal guiding that tour operators used to offer for free.

Unfortunately, they can’t do this any more because of the strictly enforced rule that outlaws unqualified guides.

So Neilson employs fully-qualified ski instructors to show guests around the mountain for free.

It is a terrific bargain — choose from a morning or afternoon session and you get a bit of guiding with some instruction thrown in.

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One day might be moguls, another day powder, or an introduction to snowboarding.

I was looking forward to some gnarly off piste but, sadly, was getting far more use out of the kids’ club.

Because the Deux Dads’ plan eventually fell apart.

When my two came down with a mystery illness, our skiing was sacrificed for days indoors, playing Uno in between tantrums (mine), and feeling miserable (them).

It is hard being a single parent. Much, much harder than I thought — and I could hardly ask Adam to take it in turns to dole out paracetamol.

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So thank God for the kids’ club, which at least stepped in when a doctor’s visit confirmed there was nothing much wrong with either of them.

Did I feel guilty dropping them off for an afternoon or two while I finally got some skiing done?

Of course I did. But there was just too much of this resort to discover instead of sitting indoors watching Frozen again.

And this does at least highlight the benefit of a good package holiday: there are other pairs of hands available when things go wrong.

We also have a reason to go back — because in two years’ time, Les Deux Alpes will be getting even bigger.

A link-up with neighbouring Alpe d’Huez has been on the drawing board for years and is finally happening: an 18-pylon gondola will connect the two areas, creating a mega ski area to rival the biggest in the world.

So roll on 2018 — I’ll be packing extra paracetamol. And the wife, just in case.