Category: News

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The new season begins!

The new ski season always opens more with a whimper than a bang. The tourism industry kicks off around the start of November, with ski shows, new season brochures and resort information updates. Oh, yes, and the first of the winter season openings.

I visited the London Ski and Snowboard Show. There wasn`t a lot new – I was most impressed by the emergence of a the new generation HD cameras built into goggles. My wife has ordered one for me so I look forward to adding some video footage to the blog and associated web site. What was disappointing was how thin the Swiss resort presence was. The Jungfrau Region was represented by the Euroairport stand and Verbier had a decent stall, but that was it. Although the UK is the second largest overseas market for winter tourism in Switzerland, it risks losing trade to the more aggressively marketed countries.

I was lucky enough to be invited to the World Snow Awards which took place alongside the Ski and Snowboard show. Launched by VOS Media, who publish Ski and Snowboard magazine and run the Ski and Snowboard Show, the awards winners included Swiss as the best airline, presumably for being the only mainstream airline still offering free ski and snowboard carriage (although BA and others seem to have risen to the challenge with qualified free carriage). Geneva was voted the best airport. Zermatt got voted the best resort for apres ski, a vote I would endorse. The best family resort award went to Avoriaz, part of the Portes du Soleil circuit it shares with Switzerland. Livigno in Italy and Fernie in Canada won the best overall resort awards. Crstal, Ski Independence and Ski Solutions won the awards for best operators in their respective categories – they all offer packages for Switzerland.

Back in Switzerland the excellent Snow’n’Rail scheme launched its season with its customary brochures and web site (the latter available in English). Prices haven’t changed much, nor has the selection of resorts. All the changes are reflected in the web site. my thanks to Florence at Swiss Railways for all her help in helping me get this information on the web site so promptly.

Unfortunately not such a helpful story from Swiss Tourism and their MySwitzerland web site. They have taken down the feed I used last year as part of a revamp of their site and have not made it easy for me to replace it. For a couple of years I have been trying to apply to get the information with a minimum of fuss, but have still not succeeded for reasons that I can hardly fathom. They do want to promote winter sports in Switzerland don’t they? Sadly, I can’t really commend the revamped Swiss Tourism site. It sucks. The good news is that the Swiss Winter Sports web site gets you the information you need more quickly and even helps you navigate the Swiss Tourism site with fewer clicks.

The new season sees some improvements around the resorts. The Jungfrau has a useful new six seater lift replacing the old Wixi lift, a speedcheck below the Arven chairlift, a photopoint at the Lauberhorn and a skimovie on the Mannlichen – I can only guess at what the latter two are. First also has a photopoint and a new skicross run above Schilt. Children under 15 also ski for free on Saturdays . up to two for each adult pass bought.

In typically understated Swiss style, gradual improvements are taking place right across the country’s resorts. Old lifts are being replaced, more freeride areas, winter walks and snowshoe trails are being opened and there is much more snowmaking being installed. At Adelboden there will be a new blue run from Sillerenbühl to Aebi. Flims/Laax will see some new runs too, alongside a couple of new six seat chairlifts. Anzere continues to see improvements to the lifts following the opening of the new spa last year. Les Crosets has a new six person chairlift, replacing a drag lift and an older chair. A new terrain park will be opened at Saanenmöser (Zweisimmen/Gstaad) continuing to make this one of the best kept secret snowboarders destinations.

The season started in the Engadine on 20th October and will run until 20th May next year, although the early and late season will be limited to Diavolezza. Throughout the season you can purchase a ski pass for CHF 25 per person/day provided you stay at a participating hotel for at least two nights. The list of hotels is pretty much every hotel – even the youth hostel qualifies.

Incidentally, St Moritz will be hosting the Alpine Ski World Championships in 2017 and, together with Davos, is bidding to host the 2022 Winter Olympic Games.

Already open are the runs on the glaciers at Saas-Fee, Engelberg and Les Diablerets (Glacier 3000). Zermatt of course never goes away, but for now it is only the glacier runs that are open. Warm weather will persist for at least another week or two, so it is unlikely there will be any serious skiing and snowboarding available until early December.

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Cableways Association of Switzerland

The organization known in the four languages of Switzerland as Seilbahnen Schweiz, Remontées Mécaniques Suisses, Funivie Svizzere and Funiculars Svizras has declared the winter season 2012/13 open for business. After the bumper fall of snow over the last few days, hopefully a few more resorts will be opening their runs early. It was sad to see on a winter walk this weekend the lifts closed next door to what looked like eminently skiable slopes.

Anyway, the Cableways Association, has published some interesting facts. They report that on average lift passes in Switzerland will only be going up by about 1.27% for the coming season. They also make some interesting average costings: An average over recent years of more than CHF 400m per year of investment in lifts, 13,600 people employed to operate the lifts and 39% of pistes now with snow cannons. Additional, the cost of preparation of the winter sports terrain is typically 50,000 to 70,000 francs per km of piste,
10,000 to 20,000 francs per km of hiking trail, and 100,000 to 400,000 francs for a half pipe.

Anyway, despite the strength of the Swiss Franc the Cableways Association seems bullish about the prospects for the new season and have announced a number of new initiatives to encourage the uptake of snow sports with young people (see here for details, in French).

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Ski Baselworld

 

Baselworld is the world’s largest and most prestigious watch fair. It’s almost 2000 exhibitors  receives over 100,00 visitors on the nearly 2 million square feet of exhibition space. This year it follows sharply on the back of Basler Fasnacht, the largest of the Swiss carnivals, and as always it co-incides with the ski season. I’m a great fan of Swiss watches and love all the glamour and excitement of this fabulous celebration of the art of watchmaking. After a busy few days working the halls, however I’m sure many of the exhibitors and visitors feel they deserve some downtime, and where better to do it that than in  the Swiss Alps?

For skiers and snowboarders the choice is wide, Klewenalp, Melchsee-Frutt and Engelberg are the nearest resorts to get to by public transport or car. Grindelwald, Wengen and Mürren are not much further away and give you iconic views of the Eiger – although Sörenberg, from the top of the Brienzer Stockhorn also gives you a fabulous view of the Jungfrau massif from across Lake Brienz. Of these Engelberg and Grindelwald have the liveliest nightlife, whilst the others make more suitable destinations for a day trip. If you are going to spend a couple of days in the mountains the resorts of the Valais must also surely beckon – Zermatt and Verbier in particular, both of which have a nightlife to match the skiing and snowboarding. We have had a very warm spell recently, but the conditions have improved and all these resorts have good snow reports.

If tobogganing, winter walks, snowshoe-ing or cross-country is your thing, there is plenty of choice, but Gstaad is probably the nearest best option.

You can drive, of course, but many of these locations are car-free and all are served by public transport. The excellent Snow’n’Rail scheme operated by Swiss Railways provides a significant discount for 1 or 2 day breaks on both the rail ticket and the lift pass. For more details of your transport options visit this page.

The good news for booking somewhere to stay that it is much easier to find a place in the mountains for the night than it is in Basel, at least during Baselworld. The strong Swiss Franc has led to many hoteliers having overnight, last-minute vacancies this season. I easily found somewhere in Verbier only last week.

And where do people who live in Basel go? Well, all of the above and a number of other smaller or less well-known resorts. We also have a small resort across the border in Germany at Feldberg, although it is quite low. I think I might try Gstaad this weekend – Zweisimmen is easy to get to and the gondola station for the largest terrain in the area is right next to the station.

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Facelift for the Jungfrau

A proposed SFr 350m investment in upgrading the facilities in the Jungfrau region has hit opposition from environmentalists and  local landowners according to Swissinfo.

The proposals address concerns that the Jungfrau is losing ground against other international destinations, with the long travel times, lack of integration between the facilities in Murren and Wengen and fact that Grindelwald is not a ski-in, ski-out resort cited as areas to be addressed.

Greater infrastructure integration, a new freeride area, a new rail stop in the Grindelwald valley and a  gondola to Kleine Scheidegg area are proposed. In addition a gondola across the Lauterbrunnen valley is mooted. There is also talk of other development including a bypass for Grindelwald to make it car free.

For sure, the Jungfrau is one of the most beautiful areas in the World and the rail network is quaint and pretty effective. However it is also clear that a gap is starting to emerge between leading winter sports resorts, with the ones making investments doing well and those not doing so, or having  limited facilities, falling behind. The Jungfrau suffers from not having the length of season of some of the other major resorts in Europe, but it has a unique place in the development of winter sports and fabulous variety. Getting the balance right will be a tough challenge, and the outcome is likely to be a compromise. I certainly think attempts to increase the challenge for more experienced skiers and snowboarders off First and Mannlichen would be good, making Grindelwald car-free would be excellent, and reducing the journey time from Bern is always going to be popular. However, people who know the area realize that the challenging runs are off the Schilthorn and that beginners and intermediates will find plenty to occupy them around Wengen, Kleine Scheidegg , Mannlichen and First (an unexpected gem for those who always head the other way). Personally I find it an easy day trip from Basel, and probably one of the best places to head to for weekenders from Northern Europe, probably more so than Chamonix.  I feel that there is room for improvement, but the resort is far better marketed in summer than winter, and a clearer winter marketing strategy (coupled with infrastructure improvements) will go further than extensive investment.