Things to do in Tignes: the frozen lake, and plenty for free
More of it is free than people expect: two snow villages with igloos, nine beginner lifts that need no pass, two lifts that carry pedestrians for nothing and a walk across the frozen lake. The paid thing to do is an ice dive under that lake, and on a bad weather day Le Lagon and Tignespace in Tignes le Lac cover it.
Tignes is practical first: a string of villages built high for the skiing, and a lake at Tignes le Lac that freezes over for the winter. What surprises people is how much there is to do off the snow, how much of it is free, and how much happens on or around that lake.
Start with the free things. There are two snow villages, La Banquise by the lake at Tignes le Lac, with igloos and a toboggan slope gentle enough for a two year old, and the bigger one at Val Claret that most people miss. Nine beginner lifts need no pass, and the Brevieres gondola and the Bollin chairlift carry somebody not skiing up and back for nothing. Conditions allowing, the quick way from Le Lac to Val Claret is on foot across the frozen lake, and on a grey afternoon Le Panorama, above the tourist office, lends board games and runs a virtual reality tour of a hundred years of Tignes.
If you do one paid thing, make it the ice dive under that lake, with a metre or two of ice overhead and a meeting point on the shore that is a walk from the middle of Tignes le Lac. When the weather turns, Le Lagon has a twenty five metre pool, a fun pool with a slide, saunas and jacuzzis, and Tignespace has courts, a climbing wall and a big sports hall. For small children, the net course at Aventure Park needs no harness and suits anybody who can walk.
Evenings here are friendly rather than wild, and the one to plan is a yurt night: a fire aperitif and Savoyard food at a trapper camp near Les Boisses, then a supervised sledge back down. Val d'Isère shares the pass and is a free bus from Tignes 1800. Book the dive and the yurt before you arrive.
Free, and worth knowing
Ten things that cost nothing extra, from igloo villages and sledging to lifts with no pass and board games above the tourist office.
La Banquise, Tignes le Lac
A free snow village on the lake side: an igloo village you can walk into, a curling rink, Inuit games, and a fifteen metre toboggan slope gentle enough for a two year old. All of it free, no booking, no supervision to pay for.
Tignes le Lac, next to Le Lagon
Snow Village, Val Claret
The second and larger free snow area, and the one most people miss. An igloo village, an oversized igloo you can go inside, Inuit games, a land art area where the resort's technical teams build ephemeral snow structures, a life size walk around snow spiral and a labyrinth. Free from half past ten in the morning until eight at night.
Val Claret, next to Aventure Park
Four free sledging areas
One in each of Tignes le Lac, Le Lavachet, Tignes 1800 and Les Brevieres, all free, all open to everybody, and all reachable with a pushchair. Sledging is not allowed on the pistes, so these are where it happens.
All five villages except Val Claret
Nine free beginner lifts
Four magic carpets at Claret, Centre, Boisses 1 and Boisses 2, two drag lifts at Lavachet and Grande Parei, and three chairlifts, Bollin, Almes and Rosset. No pass needed on any of them. That is nine lifts of free practice.
Two lifts that carry pedestrians for nothing
Nine lifts take pedestrians and seven of them want a pass. The Brevieres gondola and the Bollin chairlift do not. That gives somebody who is not skiing a way up the mountain and back down for free, which is unusual.
Le Panorama, the free half
Three floors above the tourist office at Tignes le Lac with a three hundred and sixty degree view, and most of what is inside costs nothing. A virtual reality headset takes you through a hundred years of Tignes history, from farming through the dam and the move up the mountain. There is an augmented reality map table with six points of interest and a game for younger children, and two augmented reality telescopes on the terraces that name the peaks.
Alongside that, a lounge with armchairs, around twenty board games lent against an identity document, a library of novels, thrillers, comics, manga and mountain writing, free wifi, work areas with sockets, an acoustic booth for video calls, and printing.
Maison de Tignes le Lac, 3rd floor
Free guided walking tours
Two cultural walks led by a heritage guide. One starts at the church in Tignes 1800 and takes in the rebuilt Saint Jacques, the other starts at the Maison de Tignes le Lac and covers how the resort was built from the 1930s onwards. Both free.
Walking across the frozen lake
The tourist office actively recommends crossing the frozen lake on foot as the quick link between Tignes le Lac and Val Claret, and the activity operators use it as the walking access to their lakeside meeting point. It is free, it is flat, and it is a better ten minutes than the road.
Free events through the season
Opening weekend on 21 November 2026, the Yeti Race on 29 November, Christmas on the 24th and 25th, New Year's Eve, the Mountain Shaker festival from 17 to 22 January 2027, Spring Break across the last two weeks of the season and Black Shoes, the thirty fifth telemark gathering, from 23 to 25 April 2027.
The one to plan around is the Para Alpine Skiing World Championships, 7 to 19 March 2027.
Free with a pass you already hold
A snowpark on the Palet sector with a chill zone, a terrace, deckchairs and picnic tables. A twelve hundred metre boardercross with banked turns and bumps off the Col du Palet drag. A parallel slalom race track off the Palafour chairlift. And the themed family piste off the free Bollin chairlift, which needs no pass at all.
On the mountain
A dive under the lake from a cabin on its shore, and an evening in a yurt, one version of which ends with a sledge back down.
Ice diving under the frozen lake
Under one to two metres of ice on the lake at Tignes le Lac. A day dive, a night dive, or a three dive ice diver qualification spread over two days. The meeting point is a cabin on the lake shore below the aquatic centre, so it is a walk from the middle of the village rather than an expedition.
Over 50 euros · Lake shore below Le Lagon, Tignes le Lac
An evening in a yurt
Three operators run a version and all three are worth knowing. One goes to a woodland trapper camp near Les Boisses with a fire aperitif, Savoyard food in Mongolian yurts, tipis and a transparent dome, and finishes with a supervised half hour sledge back down. The other two go up to the Chaudannes plateau at 2,250 m.
Price on request · Departures from Tignes le Lac, Val Claret and Les Boisses
In the village
Two answers to a bad weather day in Tignes le Lac, and a net course at Val Claret that anybody who can walk can do.
Le Lagon
The aquatic and wellness centre in the middle of Tignes le Lac, opposite the tourist office. A twenty five metre pool, a fun pool with a three lane slide, a waterfall, a bubble bed, counter current swimming and a paddling pool. The wellness side has three dry saunas, a steam room, four jacuzzis and a herbal tea area. There is a gym above it.
20 to 50 euros · Central square, Tignes le Lac
Tignespace
Three and a half thousand square metres of sport at 2,100 m. Three badminton courts, three approved squash courts, three table tennis tables, a climbing wall with beginner, advanced and bouldering areas, a golf simulator, and a sixteen hundred square metre hall that takes handball, futsal, basketball, volleyball and field hockey.
Under 20 euros · 350 Avenue du Lac, Tignes le Lac
Aventure Park
Next door to the Snow Village at Val Claret. A suspended net course with no harness at all, which anybody who can walk can do and which takes about an hour and a half, and a full harnessed rope course on two levels with three zip lines of eighty, a hundred and fifty and sixty metres.
Under 20 euros · Val Claret, next to the Snow Village
Nearby
The neighbour on the same lift pass, a free bus from Tignes 1800 or a ski over Toviere.
Val d'Isere, over Toviere
Same pass, same valley, and Val d'Isere's strength is the opposite of Tignes's. Where Tignes has the outdoor free play, Val d'Isere has the indoor village: a five thousand square metre aquatic centre with a leisure pool, three saunas, three jacuzzis, a hammam, a climbing hall, squash and an indoor sports hall, plus an open air ice rink, a cinema, a free museum and a free media library, all within a few minutes of each other.
20 to 50 euros · Free bus from Tignes 1800, or on skis over Toviere
These are our own picks, not paid placements. Prices and opening times change, so it is always worth checking before you set off.