Zoombu

Posts Tagged ‘French Alps’

Zoombu saves you from hanging around

Friday, February 12th, 2010

Image by Dru

This week we welcome a guest post from a new Zoombu Ski user:

Whilst skiing is the sport that dominates the Alps during Winter, another, more remote sport, is also in full swing: ice climbing. This form of climbing involves the climber donning ice-axes and crampons, before they begin their upward ascent of a waterfall. Despite looking extremely precarious, it is not in fact as dangerous as some might think; the climber secures their ropes to ice-screws meaning that any fall is not usually serious, and the lower altitude (compared to climbing to the summit of an Alpine Peak) means the seriousness of an ascent is reduced.

In January I headed over to Chamonix to indulge in the sport of ice climbing. On the way out I was rather haphazard with my travel; I picked my flights far too late, didn’t plan my transfers, turned up at Geneva airport and spent a good while there figuring out how to get to Chamonix. I found a lift and got to Chamonix in one piece, although if I had to guarantee my arrival time, I would not recommend this approach. On the way back I didn’t leave things to chance – a missed flight would be disastrous.  Fortunately Zoombu’s ski search was available so I used it to see what they could offer. Using the site I found out that Holiday Taxis would pick me up from the flat at 6:45am with no dramas, which indeed is what they did (and after a week swinging around on the ice, the last thing I needed was to be running around the town in the early hours looking for a lift!).

I’m off to Cham again in the summer and will definitely be using Zoombu. If only they had launched their site before I had booked the flight as well!

- Posted by Geoff

Best way to the French Alps? Zoombu Ski goes public and can tell you the answer.

Thursday, February 4th, 2010

Photo taken by Shay Haas

For those of you who are keen followers of Zoombu, you will have seen that this week has been a busy one for our team.  We have just opened a mini version of Zoombu to the public, in the form of Zoombu Ski.

This side product has the functionality of the main Zoombu service, but a subset of the coverage.  With Zoombu Ski you can find the best end-to-end way to travel from your home in the UK to a resort in the French Alps.  We search a range of modes of transport and will pick out the cheapest, fastest or greenest end-to-end route for you.

With Zoombu Ski we want to find out what you the users like, don’t like and want to see improved about Zoombu. We are very keen for your feedback on the product and we listen to all of it.  We meticulously log, debate and prioritise all of the points raised and this directly influences the product development plan.

Search speed is something that many of you have raised as important, and we are working on this as we speak.  Shortly the Zoombu search will be noticeably faster.  We’re also just about to add coverage to a bunch more ski resorts so look out for this in the next few days.

For those skiers amongst you, if you haven’t had your powder fix for the season yet, or you could be tempted to take another trip, then run a Zoombu search to find the best way to get to the slopes.  There are some bargains to be had: we found a search result for door-to-door transport from Oxford to Chamonix over a long weekend in February for £100 including a flight out of Luton.

Happy planning!

- Posted by Rachel