Just had a day's skiing at Engelberg, first time skiing this century. Did a "Snow'n'Rail" thing(82CHF with 1/2 price rail card) couldn't have been easier. 7ish train from Zurich, up on the slopes at 10ish, hired skis with discount on train pass from Intersport(circa 35CHF). At 3pm I skied down to Engelberg meaning to go up to Brunni on the other side of the valley to do that - sat outside the station and realized I'd rather go for a beer and leave that till the next visit. To quote someone else on this thread - "Awesome"

Top tip: if you're hiring get them from the Titlis/Trubsee station not the one in town like I did, in which case you just come out of the rail station and jump on the bus to the station pick up yous skis and get in the queue.

Can't wait till the next one!

Oh yeah, coming back through Luzern - there was a strange brass band/fancy dress/kareoke thing going on in the bahnfof, looked a lot of fun, what was it?

Flumserberg is pretty good as far as I know.

Have been to Elm on Friday very first time and had great time. Does it count too?

It's that effing time of year again. If you think that's fun after the 20th time of playing their 3-song repertoire, you must be drunk.

I also went to Engelberg skiing on Saturday. First time ever, so didn't venture outside of Klostermatte.

Anyway ... took this at Luzern station Saturday evening.

Attached Thumbnails

 

Went to Arosa on 22/1 and there was pretty good snow cover (at least on the blues/less steep reds).

Just got back from Zillertal Arena in Austria this weekend and they just had a fresh dump of 40cm so it was phenomenal. I even got to try a few steeper reds, being that it was required in order to get back to the chalet we were staying at :P

Only 5 days of snowboarding under my belt but already I love this sport. I only wish I had started earlier.

No real snow in wallis since dec. 25th. Going biking this weekend instead.
Even though they say the piste is "gut". Sure, if you like man made icy runs with the occasional rock sticking out then yeah, it should be super. Not for me.

You're right, if you check the last page in 20min, it always will say "gut" snow. They try to keep the resorts open and money going into it. In reality, it's not so much fun anymore with beschnieted pistes and plus temps. I'm going to take a bike for a spin

I was at Davos and the pisted runs were fine until mid-afternoon, then they got very icey but skiable if you don't mind that sort of thing. Off-piste was pretty horrible. No snow for almost two weeks, and none coming anytime soon, plus rising temperatures this weekend mean that even the canons will be useless.

Just to refresh already well known...

If you plan to go to the mountains and do "dare-devil" stuff e.g. offpiste in free ride areas of the resort, it is good to get your: http://www.rega.ch membership card just in case. It only costs CHF30 per annum but such cost is nothing compare to the costs of rescue operation of being airlifted by chopper i.e. if you wouldn't have the card.

I only subscribed to it last week, (relatively late upon being reminded by one of my skiing buddies) and it had arrived in my mail box today.

__________________
🎾That's what we do to help English speaking expats community in Switzerland:
General Information About Swiss Tennis
Tennis Lessons Summer Winter Seasons
🎾🎾Our charity organization to help unprivileged kids to realize their dreams:
FMTF Supports Tennis For Children in Southern Africa

It is the very best + best value Insurance ever. Only draw back - your membership card will say GONNER on it, which means 'donor' (eg member).

Of piste is really cruddy and rocky at the moment - so keep to the pistes and go as high as poss to avoid ice, and rocks which are coming through on pistes too. The top of Verbier, Col des Gentiannes, La Chaux, Lac de VAux is still great. Avoid Tortin (the Wall) - it is horrible now.

I skied Feldberg this weekend, a resort in the Black Forest. Being a sunny Sunday it was as crowded as it gets, but the queues weren't too bad and the runs, though icey, were in reasonable nick. The resort is low, limited and has too many t-bars, but on the plus side it does have a good range of runs, you can just about ski everything without using the T-bars, it's cheap and it is only an hour by car from Basel.

Arosa on Friday was hard - even early on. It is all artificial snow and the surfaces are very very hard.

Not the best - but makes tackling the black runs on a board a challenging and fast experience.

I'm not keen to go again until some fresh snow is down

I wish it was pounding like in the States at least for a while but the weather forecast for the whole week shows spring temps up to +10 and even above in several places

According to here there'll be some snow this Saturday...not much mind.

Is there any hope? Am I destined to fall on ice for ever??

So we all know that the snow is crap but I'm wondering what the conditions will be like at Zermatt for the weekend? I see that it hasn't snowed there since January 13 but the elevation is a lot higher and it looks like they've got some serious snow production going on. Am I naive to think that it will be worth the trip, and price? I'M DESPERATE!!

What about Grindelwald? I know it's probably worse than Zermatt but I've got a buddy from Germany going this weekend.

saas fee was apparently gut this last weekend and very quiet, but it is shadier than sunny Zermatt.

Personally I think the slopes are generally fine, it's the off-piste that is horrible. I've skied a few places this last couple of weeks and have no real complaints. Few bare patches here and there and a bit icey at times, particularly late in the afternoon, but there's still some lovely groomed runs out there. Zermatt would be fine on the higher runs, but I'd bet even the valley run off Furgg is still pleasant enough - it usually stays open into April. Off-piste should also be good up there too - if you fancy a bit of a hike I bet the Breithorn is good value.

Ok great, that's good to know. Do you guys think that Glacier 3000 is high enough to still have some "gut" snow? I know the pistes aren't great but if I decide to go there what I'm mostly wanting to do is learn to ride switch better and try some stuff in the park. It says "bonnes" but then again, it says that about everywhere and that's not what my friends are telling me. And so the hunt for snow begins!

I found some gut snow. Its kinda out of the way, but at least they have freshys.

http://www.youtube.com/user/beavercr.../1/8BhgfiOqlLU