Poster: A snowHead
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The Journey
Our journey was relatively uneventful 12 hours of road, air, and rail travel topped of by a short journey in a converted milk float (Zermatt electric taxis) to our hotel.
Our Hotel
We stayed at the Hotel Butterfly *** which is situated a few minutes walk to the Gornergrat railway station. The Hotel was immaculate, 5 courses meals (not huge portions), and the staff were friendly and courteous. Most evenings whilst dining Madam Butterfly (I kid you not!!!) would do the rounds chatting to her guests.
Despite this, we would in retrospect choose somewhere a little more lively.
The Village
The village is very charming oozing with character. There are numerous shops, restaurants and bars. The shops are expensive so I didn’t venture into many.
The Apres
The après is lively and varied; we mainly did early après and ate later. Our favourite bars were:-
Grampis Look out for the vertically challenged keyboard player, he played his drum and keyboard with just about every part of his anatomy and in every position.
Papperla Pub Very popular, lively après bar with an excellent jazz/funk band
Brown Cow Lively bar, but unfortunately the air was thick with Camel-dung cigarette smoke!
The Pistes
The area is ideal for a weeks skiing with plenty of variety. As we were fortunate enough to have a week of sunshine, Cervinia was well worth the visit, and we would have spent much more time there if it weren’t for our ski lessons.
The pistes were in remarkably good condition, despite this being Zermatt’s driest season for 16 years. However, the pistes are now hard packed and rather icy in places, with
some bare patches on the lowest slopes.
The off-piste is virtually non existent, although the waiters from our hotel were still skiing the itinerary pistes.
The scenery is spectacular. Our first day on the mountain was not so good though, as the winds were high and there was quite thick fog. My first run resulted in me having to stop and regain my balance as the wind was blowing the snow up and across the piste, and |I couldn’t see a thing and ended up feeling totally disoriented. If we had had a week of this my view on Zermatt might not be quite so favourable.
Mountain restaurants
We ate in the main at the self service restaurants as this is were we ended up with the school except for as a treat we had lunch at:-
Chez Vonnry, Sunegga
This was a very charming restaurant, with spectacular views. We enjoyed a very good Rossti, sat in brilliant sunshine and ended up staying for 1hr 30mins. I recommend you visit for a drink, even if you don’t eat there.
Thanks Krammer for that tip!
Getting around
This was the biggest downer of the holiday, my SO was not impressed with the transport system.
I would definitely go to Zermatt again as I really had a wonderful time; my SO isn’t as keen, but we would leave it for a few years before we visited again. There are plans for some new lifts which will make connection to the different areas far easier.
Be prepared for an expensive trip and lots of waiting/walking for various connections to the pistes, it is well worth the effort it IF you get good weather/snow conditions.
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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IncogSkiSno, good report.
How were the lessons?
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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You need to Login to know who's really who.
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IncogSkiSno, great report, captures the essence. Could you have stayed somewhere more convenient? Or was it the lift system your SO objected to? Shouldn't you be unpacking/doing the laundry?
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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IncogSkiSno, Good report, glad that the lessons were well worthwhile. Now you can do black runs, that makes you an advanced skier
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IncogSkiSno,
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Laundry is in the washer, we didn't have an awful lot
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Eewwwh!
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
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snowbunny, Oi, trust you, I still have a couple of loads to go, but didn't wear half of the things that I took
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
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And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
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IncogSkiSno, just got back at 5pm today. (forgot to PM you my mobile no)
Loved the place, we are definitely going back there
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The Apres
The après is lively and varied; we mainly did early après and ate later. Our favourite bars were:-
Grampis Look out for the vertically challenged keyboard player, he played his drum and keyboard with just about every part of his anatomy and in every position.
Papperla Pub Very popular, lively après bar with an excellent jazz/funk band
Brown Cow Lively bar, but unfortunately the air was thick with Camel-dung cigarette smoke!
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Our hotel was 30 yards from Grampi's, and that keyboard player was fantastic, I've never heard anyone make that many mistakes. Dunno whether he was really good and acted the fool, or whether he was just bloody useless He played "Waterloo" by Abba, and it was so unrecognisable, one of our party thought it was a U2 song
Papperla was a great place, as was it's club downstairs. Brown Cow depressed me, altho the burgers were good. Did you try Pollux Tea bar, or the North Wall? Both fantastic places. My favourite place was the HennuStall on the Piste just outside the village on the way down from Furri, a fantastic apreski-hut, with live bands on at 5pm most nights.
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Mountain restaurants
We ate in the main at the self service restaurants as this is were we ended up with the school except for as a treat we had lunch at:-
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We ate mostly in the self service places as well, which I thought were quite good, if you go back make sure you go to the Fluhalp Restaurant, on the Rothorn sector. We had a fantastic Rosti, sat in the sun watching the Irish band on the terrace, an unbelievable experience, as it was +6c!!!
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Getting around
This was the biggest downer of the holiday, my SO was not impressed with the transport system.
I would definitely go to Zermatt again as I really had a wonderful time; my SO isn’t as keen, but we would leave it for a few years before we visited again. There are plans for some new lifts which will make connection to the different areas far easier.
Be prepared for an expensive trip and lots of waiting/walking for various connections to the pistes, it is well worth the effort it IF you get good weather/snow conditions.
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I know where you are coming from on this, and it was getting on my nerves at first. We then decided if we were gong the station, we would walk, if not we'd get a milk float down to the cable car To be fair, the job they had done on the pistes was unbelievable for the amount of snow they have had. I only saw one bare patch all week (and that on the run into the village). It will improve when the new links go in, and we managed to do Rothorn, Sunnega, Gornergrat, and the last cable car to Glacier Paradise in one da, so they can't be that disjointed. Saying that, we were going bloody fast We also took an afternoon out to go tobogganing. The best laugh I've had in donkeys years, and fantastic value at 8chf to hire a sledge.
As I said, we are definitely going back, and can only begin to imagine what the place would be like with good snow
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You know it makes sense.
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Charlatanefc, Hi there, we saw your Hotel as we were sat right opposite it. Yes, we did go to the North Wall Bar, but it was very quiet the night we went.
We walked to the Sunnega, but not the Kleine Matterhorn Express, which is were our ski school met most of the days. Did you get over to Cervinia?
So you're hooked on the place then
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Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
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IncogSkiSno, certainly did get over to Cervinia, run 7.0 was absolutely fantastic, they'd had a couple of cms of fresh the night before over that side.
Absolutely hooked on the place, yes. If you never did the Glacier Paradise side, you NEED!!! to go back. There are a couple of red runs above Trockner Steg, which were long, wide and constant in their pitch. Ideal for getting your confidence up on, and practising going faster The snow was also well better up there, with the extra altitude. The red from the top of the Klein Matterhorn was fantastic.
Oh well, going to St Anton in about 5 weeks, but I think we are looking at booking Zermatt for next xmas
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Poster: A snowHead
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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Does anyone know when/if the stockhorn or hochtalli areas are opening this season, i'm going next saturday and would miss the bumps!!!
Thanks,
T.
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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[quote="Charlatanefc if you go back make sure you go to the Fluhalp Restaurant, on the Rothorn sector. We had a fantastic Rosti, sat in the sun watching the Irish band on the terrace, an unbelievable experience, as it was +6c!!!
[[/quote]
If it was the same band as a couple of years ago they were fantastic ! Guitarist was ex 'Bad Manners' the ska band but much more accomplished than that might suggest. Keyboard player was good too and the singer had a great patter. They covered most stuff really well and did requests. I have never seen better on a ski holiday. It was very tempting to jack the skiing in for the afternoon and keep drinking.
As you say, the food and views in Flualp are superb.
We also went to see the band in town one night. If you are under 70, you felt pretty young. It was full of old ones jiving and letting their hair while your man gently took the p*ss out of them. But they did not care, because they were enjoying themselves and it all probably went over their heads anyway.
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You need to Login to know who's really who.
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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Latchigo, sounds like them. They were a three piece, 2 of them brothers IIRC.
Alastair Pink, heh heh heh. poor old Les couldn't be that bad if he tried
IncogSkiSno, nice one. I shall be putting our piccies up on my webspace (underneath) in due course
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Charlatanefc, I wonder if we'll have any from the same vantage points. Did you ever stop at the Olympian/The Sun Trap, on the red run down from Sunnega to the village?
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IncogSkiSno, No mate, we only came into the Village via the Red down from Schwarzsee that went via the Hennu Stall (as did we ) Just checked my photo's, and I never took as many as I thought, our kid must have most of them on his camera.
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Zermatt sets the standard for Rosti IMO...
Never found anything as good anywhere else.... and I've looked ...!!
And Engelberg for soup.....!!
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