French ski towns off the beaten path.

Less-touristed ski towns in France, for travelers seeking fewer crowds but all the beauty.

Morbier and Abondance each lent their names to the cheeses made from their valleys' milk, and that specificity — a place so defined by what it produces that the product carries its name — runs through all eighteen picks here. From the thermal springs of Ax-les-Thermes and Cauterets to the lakeside ski station at Gérardmer in the Vosges, and across the Hautes-Pyrénées resorts of Saint-Lary-Soulan and Bagnères-de-Bigorre, these are towns with a reason to exist beyond their slopes.