Tag Archives: Zermatt

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Travel Flashback – Summer Trip to Switzerland (2006) – Part Three

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(Kingston, Ontario, Canada)

Today, I finally pulled the plug on my planned February 2022 ski trip to Zermatt, Switzerland. While I had been expecting this for some time, it was still kind of sad to cancel the Zermatt hotel room that would have formed the base for most of my trip. However, even with three COVID vaccinations so far, I couldn’t justify the costs and complications of international travel at this particular time. Perhaps to compensate, I’ve decided to finally write the final post from my summer 2006 trip to Switzerland. The first part is here, while the second part is here.

Italy! Domodossola’s old town (August 11, 2006)

As we had a Swisspass allowing unlimited travel on the Swiss transportation system, we were highly motivated to stay within Switzerland. However, certain cross-border trips were covered. One of them was to the northern Italian town of Domodossola. It was a nice change of pace, and we really enjoyed having a relaxed lunch on an outdoor patio.

Zermatt’s new town, with the Matterhorn struggling to emerge in the background (August 11, 2006)

While it would have been nice to stay longer, we had to return to Switzerland. In fact, our next stop was…Zermatt! A big part of Zermatt’s appeal is, of course, the Matterhorn. Alas, the grim weather that characterized much of this trip continued. We could barely see the Matterhorn from the village. And as you can see from the photo above, I had to put the jacket back on even though this was early August.

Zermatt’s old town (after many failed Matterhorn photos)…August 11, 2006

While we saw little of the Matterhorn, the trip to Zermatt was still memorable. I didn’t have a digital camera yet, but the views from the train were still stunning enough to attempt some pictures from the train window.

Crossing a bridge by train, and looking at other bridges (August 11, 2006) – near Stalden, Switzerland.

The next day, we explored the popular Swiss city of Luzern. It was much more crowded than our base in rural Hondrich. Once again, however, we used our SwissPass to see something totally unexpected: the Bourbaki Panorama. The Panorama is a very large round room, and it contains a very unusual thing: a circular painting! It is 377 feet long and 32 feet high, but each end is connected to the other. It depicts the French army retreating through Switzerland during the 1870-71 Franco-Prussian War. It’s a very long story – you can read more about it here.

My ticket to the Bourbaki Panorama in Luzern, Switzerland (August 12, 2006)

We took a walk on top of Luzern’s old city walls (the photo at the top of this post was taken from the top of the walls), saw some other typical Luzern sights, such as the old Kapellbrücke (chapel bridge) and the “Lion of Lucerne”, and then returned to Hondrich for one final night at the farmhouse.

At one end of Luzern’s ancient Kapellbrücke – August 12, 2006.

Writing this post has been another reminder of how much we took for granted in the past. Imagine making spontaneous decisions to hop on a train to visit another country! I remain hopeful that international travel will become a part of my life again soon, even if won’t be this winter.

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My top 10 European ski areas

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(Kingston, Ontario, Canada)

I won’t try to objectively rank the best ski areas in Europe… there are far too many for that! But why not try to rank the ones I know?

The question: in which resort would I most want to spend an entire week of skiing, without regard to cost? Everything else can be considered: the skiing, the town, the atmosphere, and the food are all fair game. I tried not to assign too much weight to the particular place I stayed: if I did, one otherwise fine Italian area wouldn’t have been on the list…as our hotel was located next to what seemed to be a sewage plant. Let’s start the countdown to #1!

The insane “Swiss Wall” starts at the French border, in the Portes du Soleil ski region. As you can see, some parts have a 90% gradient!

10. Morzine (Portes du Soleil), France. Full marks for the extent of this region: it’s the second biggest in the world, with 13 different resorts and 208 ski lifts! Some of the resorts are in Switzerland, and it is fun to ski back and forth between countries. I wasn’t as keen on the sheer numbers of skiers, and some of the resorts (Avoriaz in particular) are purpose-built with little or no character. The Swiss resorts are smaller and more inviting, but the skiing on the Swiss side is also relatively limited. But there’s always the Swiss Wall…

Believe it or not: this is on-piste in the afternoon above Borgata (Sestriere)

9. Sestriere (Via Lattea), Italy. Italian for “Milky Way”, the Via Lattea includes 5 Italian resorts and one French resort (and 70 lifts). But getting to the French resort is not easy, especially when conditions are less than ideal. Still, we found some spectacular pistes…that made us forget about the sewage plant beside our hotel. Fortunately, most hotels are located away from that plant. Sestriere is another purpose-built resort, but it is old enough to still be interesting (a cylindrical hotel, anyone?).

Lots of choices, high above Lenk and Adelboden (Switzerland)

8. Lenk, Switzerland. Linked to the resort of Adelboden, this is a sentimental choice. It’s my Heimatort (place of origin) in Switzerland, and I can ski with family members here. While not as extensive as the other places on my list, it still feels very Swiss and I didn’t find crowds to be a problem. It’s also a quick train ride away from St. Stephan, which is part of the separate Gstaad ski area (and home to more skiing relatives). I had one of my best powder days ever here.

Madonna di Campiglio

7. Madonna di Campiglio, Italy. Not as extensive as the Via Lattea area, but scores higher on things like atmosphere and food quality. Like Lenk, it caters more to a domestic crowd. Perhaps for that reason, I really felt like I was on vacation when I was skiing here. I don’t think I heard any English during the entire week. We also spent an entire morning at an outdoor cafe!

Stuben at night

6. Stuben (St. Anton/Arlberg), Austria. The Arlberg ski region is another vast area, including 7 different resorts (perhaps more by now!). I enjoyed tiny and remote Stuben, which retained some Tyrolean character, but still gave access to the larger areas such as St. Anton, Lech and Zurs. You really have to pick your base carefully: St. Anton, for example, is just too rowdy and “in your face” for me.

Our ski group passing through the rocks at Pomedes (Cortina d’Ampezzo)

5. Cortina d’Ampezzo, Italy. Similar to Madonna di Campiglio, this is a major resort with a domestic focus. But I found the setting even more spectacular: skiing even closer to (and through!) the stunning Dolomites, and the legendary “Hidden Valley” actually lives up to the mystique of its name. With 12 distinct resorts in the Dolomiti SuperSki area, the options are endless even though there aren’t too many pistes in Cortina itself.

I’m enjoying the empty slopes at Piz Lagalb!

4. Celerina (St. Moritz), Switzerland. While St. Moritz is too posh for my taste, staying in nearby Celerina was the perfect way to experience this collection of five distinct resorts. Corvatsch had the best overall skiing, but the remote glacier areas of Diavolezza and Lagalb are unforgettable skiing experiences that few people bother to experience. The long-ish bus ride to Diavolezza and Lagalb is worth it: one day, there were only 10 other skiers on the slopes!

The jagged Dolomite peaks

3. Selva (Val Gardena), Italy. At the opposite end of the Dolomiti SuperSki area from Cortina d’Ampezzo, the town is perhaps not as elegant. But the combination of vast skiing options, unsurpassed food, and interesting culture made it one of my very best ski weeks ever (see the most recent post on this blog for proof!). This is the one resort that I keep wanting to revisit, and I would even like to return to the very same hotel. I never thought a hotel meal plan could be so amazing.

Me on the lower slopes of the mighty Eiger

2. Wengen, Switzerland. I have skied here (and the linked resort of Grindelwald) so often that I consider it my “home” ski area. So while it is partly a sentimental choice, I challenge anyone to find a more dramatic experience than skiing in front of (or on!) the legendary north face of the Eiger. I especially love the steep pistes (such as Black Rock or Oh God) just below the Eigergletscher, but there are challenges elsewhere too. One cannot forget the Schilthorn: despite being most famous for a James Bond movie, it’s a demanding and impossibly scenic mountain.

At the top of Klein Matterhorn, just before a wee bout of altitude sickness kicked in!

1. Zermatt, Switzerland. It’s huge, in every sense of the word. The resort spills over into Italy. You can ski a 20 km-long piste!! It even includes the Matterhorn (see photo at the top of this post)!!! But the best summary of Zermatt is a simple one: it is a resort that is unquestionably meant for skiers. If you are a serious skier and can only ski once in the Alps, you need to seriously consider Zermatt. Not every run is 20 km long, but many of them do seem to go on forever. There is an exceptional variety of terrain, with the Swiss side in particular having some very challenging on-piste skiing. Now, if only cost weren’t really an issue…

Posts from Base Camp

Who Reads This Blog?

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(Kingston, Ontario, Canada)

Have you ever wondered who else reads this blog?  While the blog software doesn’t tell me who specifically is reading the blog, it does tell me in which countries the blog’s readers are located.  So don’t worry – I don’t know who you are…unless you post something!

Incredibly, there have been visitors from 97 countries so far!  Many of these countries have very few views (it would not be reasonable to expect thousands of hits from Vatican City or Réunion) but the numbers are significant for the first 30 or 40 countries.  It should come as no surprise that, by far, the most readers are in Canada.

The Matterhorn, as seen from a small alpine village in the Gornergrat/Sunnegga area
The Matterhorn, as seen from the small alpine hamlet of Findeln in the Sunnegga area

It also probably isn’t surprising that the U.S.A. and the U.K. occupy the second and third positions.  Rounding out the all-time Top 20 are Brazil, Germany, Croatia, the Netherlands, Costa Rica, Switzerland, France, Italy, Bosnia & Herzegovina, Czech Republic, the United Arab Emirates, Spain, Sweden, Peru, Ireland, Poland and Australia.

The rankings definitely change over time.  Croatia really spiked during my visit there last spring but has been falling ever since.  For 2015, I’ve noticed increases in France, Australia, Thailand and Russia…but decreases in the U.K., Costa Rica and the Czech Republic.

My friends will do anything to take the perfect photo of the Matterhorn
My friends will try any angle to take the perfect photo of the Matterhorn

Most notable, however, is where there are *no* hits at all. Given its large population, it is interesting that not a single person from China has visited my site (other than people in the special administrative regions of Hong Kong and Macau, which are tracked separately)…yet I have  numerous hits from nearby Vietnam, Taiwan, Mongolia, India, Pakistan and Bangladesh.  Despite significant numbers across Northern Europe, I also haven’t connected with Latvia yet.

The other side of the Matterhorn (as seen from Italy)
The other side of the Matterhorn (as seen from Italy)

One does have to be careful with interpreting the data.  There is an apparently benign but also persistent automated “webcrawler” based in Brazil that is, I believe, exaggerating the numbers in that country.

I can also get information on which “searches” have led to visits to my site.  The most popular search that does not include my name has been “London Oxford Street”.  But multiple views have also resulted from “Megadisco Machu Picchu”, “schöne bilder von Paul Young 2014”, “van der ley cheese Groningen” and “place d’erlon Reims night”.

Arrival at the Valtournenche ski area above Breuil-Cervinia, Italy (just after crossing over from Zermatt, Switzerland)
Arrival at the Cime Bianche ski area above Valtournenche, Italy (just after crossing over from Zermatt, Switzerland)

There are also many searches that resulted in a solitary visit.  Some of my favourites include “abandoned wood bobsled”, “context of the movie Invictus South Africa in 1992-1995”, “gray research sound effects console”, “Inus Mor and rabbits sea lions”, “Budapest hockey and soccer teams jerseys”, and “casado con carne en salsa” (as well as plain old “casado con carne”).  If I ever start up another band, I am going to seriously consider calling it “Abandoned Wood Bobsled”.   I am really curious about the story behind that search but it will probably remain a mystery forever.

Another view of the Italian side of the Matterhorn (with lots of tiny skiers below)
Another view of the Italian side of the Matterhorn (with lots of tiny skiers below)

Today’s photos are from my 2011 visit to Zermatt.  I don’t think it would make a lot of sense to do a separate travel flashback for my second visit there…but I did want to share some of these pictures.  If you like them, take a look at my previous post for more words and pictures about skiing in the shadow of the Matterhorn.

Posts from Base Camp

Travel Flashback: Skiing the Matterhorn 2010

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(Kingston, Ontario, Canada)

The Matterhorn isn’t like all the other mountains.  I had heard that the Matterhorn was special but I didn’t truly appreciate it until I saw the Matterhorn on a cloudless day.  This is what the picture above shows – it was taken from above the village of Zermatt and shows just how distinctive the Matterhorn really is.

Straddling the border between Italy and Switzerland, the Matterhorn rises to an elevation of 4,478 meters (14,692 feet).  This is very, very high but it is all the more remarkable because none of the neighbouring peaks are anywhere close to that elevation.

This picture was taken just after we skied the closest piste to the Matterhorn. One feels very small when skiing there!

Wherever you go in the village of Zermatt, or wherever you ski in the Sunnegga-Gornergrat-Klein Matterhorn ski region, you constantly find yourself looking up at the Matterhorn.   Of all the mountains I’ve seen up close, only Grindelwald’s Eiger (with its sheer rock face of nearly 2 uninterrupted vertical kilometers!) comes remotely close to having such a magnetic effect.   I think we all took at least 100 photos of just this one mountain.

It's very cold and desolate as you near the top of the Klein Matterhorn ski area (and the Italian border)
It’s very cold and desolate as you near the top of the Klein Matterhorn ski area (and the Italian border)

Even without the Matterhorn, however, skiing in Zermatt is quite spectacular.  The pistes on the Swiss side are extensive and there is an impressive vertical drop of about 2,200 meters (about 7,218 feet).   From top to bottom, it can be a 20 km ride!   There isn’t much in the way of easy terrain here and it has a reputation of being a real skiers’ resort.   But even if you can manage the terrain, you still have to conquer the altitude:  the top of the Klein Matterhorn area is a (literally) breathtaking 3,883 meters (12,736 feet) above sea level.

At the top of Klein Matterhorn, just before altitude sickness kicked in!
At the top of Klein Matterhorn, just before altitude sickness kicked in!

I was OK with the altitude when I just skied down from the top of the Klein Matterhorn.  This is glacial skiing and you don’t have to work too hard.  However, on another occasion, we climbed up to the top of a viewing platform for an even higher view.  This extra exertion left me feeling listless for the rest of the day:  I suspect that I had a minor case of altitude sickness…something I’ve never before had while skiing.

The "Hennu Stall"...we stopped here for not quite apres-ski apres-ski on our way down to Zermatt
The “Hennu Stall”…we stopped here for “après-ski” shortly before finishing our descent to Zermatt

There is another reward for going to the top of Klein Matterhorn:  Italy!   Yes, the Italian resort of Cervinia is connected at this high alpine saddle and it is possible to ski on the Italian slopes if you bought the “all areas” ski pass in Zermatt.  The slopes on the Italian side are sunnier and easier…and the food is a nice change too!   The resort of Cervinia has some architectural missteps, to be fair, but it was really fun to end up in another country for a few hours.

Skiing above the clouds! View from the top of Klein Matterhorn
Skiing above the clouds! Looking towards Italy from the top of Klein Matterhorn

The only problem with crossing over to Italy is that you really need to time your return properly.  If you don’t make it back to the Klein Matterhorn by the time the upper Italian lifts close, you are stuck on the Italian side.  It is a very expensive (hundreds of dollars) taxi ride back to Zermatt, as there is no direct road connection between the two resorts.  Somebody said that it would take “a few hours” by road.

One of the creatures we encountered while skiing down to Zermatt
One of the creatures we encountered while skiing down to Zermatt

For an intense week of skiing in the Alps, I would certainly put Zermatt at the top of my list.  Grindelwald/Wengen/Schilthorn would be close but the presence of other tourist activities (such as the Jungfraujoch cog railway) dilutes the ski atmosphere just a little bit…so it might be a good choice if you have non-skiers in your travel group.   Like most Swiss resorts, Zermatt is not cheap but it is possible to find deals if you don’t insist on a private bathroom.  After all, you’re there for the skiing!  We liked skiing in Zermatt so much that we went back in 2011.