Swiss tennis star Roger Federer recently bought a home in the Swiss village of Valbella, part of the large Lenzerheide-Valbella ski area in the canton of Graubunden.
Federer (27), who lost his world number one place to Raphael Nadal after five years has won 13 grand slam titles and earned more than $40m during his career to date. He owns other properties in Switzerland and a condo in Dubai.
Lenzerheide-Valbella has nearly 100 miles of (155km) of piste and is due to add nearly half as much terrain again for winter 2009-10 with the completion of a ski link to the neighbouring resort of Arosa, already included on a shared lift ticket.
Archive for the 'Ski Switzerland' Category
Western ski resorts opening; look for bargains
Colorado’s Copper Mountain, Breckenridge, Keystone and Wolf Creek ski resorts were scheduled to open this weekend, following in the footsteps of Arapahoe Basin and Loveland, which began limited operations in mid-October.
Quebec’s Mont Tremblant earns Ski mag’s top rating
In the notoriously fickle realm of popularity, a year can be a lifetime. Which is why it is positively astounding that for the past 12 years a single resort - Quebec’s Mont Tremblant - has been rated No. 1 overall in Eastern North America by the readers of Ski Magazine. Tremblant garnered top honors again for 2008-09 in the individual categories of lodging, on-mountain food, dining and service.
Usually at this time of year, even the Glacier village of Saas Fee, Switzerland isn’t sure that there will be snow. But for Hallowe’en this year, it looks like the Allalin Glacier decided it would dress up as Old Man Winter, and provide total white-out conditions yesterday for the second FIS World Cup contest of the season.
An unexpected snowfall of close to six feet descended upon the Glacier over the past two days, canceling Wednesday’s training, and the originally scheduled Qualification rounds on Thursday, leaving it up to a “One and Done” format for today’s final.
Continue reading ‘White-out conditions cancel second FIS boarding championship race’
The respected Geneva-based consultancy Laurent Vanat Consulting SARL has reported that Swiss ski resorts enjoyed one of their best seasons. Overall, visitation was up 18.4% to Swiss ski resorts, compared to the former season, with 28.7 million skiers days recorded.
The total turnover experienced a nearly identical rise. The resort of Davos-Klosters stands at the top of the list this year, exceeding, along with Zermatt in the Valais canton, 2.5m skiers days each.
Switzerland’s fortunes look set to rise still further this winter as the country benefits both from the rising cost of the Euro and the high altitude of many of its leading ski areas, making it a “best bet” for anyone concerned about snow conditions. This led resorts like Zermatt to increase business in the “poor snow” previous season 2006.
Gregor Koncilja, Country Manager UK & Ireland for Swiss International Air Lines, reports that their sales are well up for the first few months of next year, “Our booking figures to Switzerland are up 28% in January and 46% in February compared to last year’s,” he said.
There has been a large increase in Swiss destinations available to book from the UK’s leading operators this winter too, with Crystal adding six new Swiss resorts, more than for any other country, and Mountain Heaven adding the idyllic resort of Grimentz.
A report drafted in French is available to download:
Skiers hoping to get a break from Andorra’s Grandvalira regional price increase for skiing are in for a big surprise as the six day ticket increased to 210 euros, making it one of the most expensive ski tickets Europe.
By comparison, a high season six day pass for the area which includes the villages of Pas de la Casa and Soldeu has been priced at 213.50 Euros, more than the cost of lift tickets at Verbier or Val d’Isere.
Indeed very few single European resorts now charge more for a lift ticket than Grandvalira. The highest price at Ischgl for skiers who don’t qualify for guest discounts and visit high season is 219.50 Euros. Otherwise it is area passes that cost more, with Dolomiti Superski priced at 220 Euros in high season, the Three Valleys 225 Euros, the Chamonix area’s Mont Blanc Unlimited pass will be 235 Euros, the Paradiski pass linking La Plagne and Les Arcs costing 243 Euros.
Europe’s most expensive single ski area lift tickets are likely to be again found further west than Andorra with Spain’s Baqueria Beret charging 222 Euros for a six day pass.
In a challenge to Murren’s long standing Inferno race, Zermatt has announced that it will stage the ‘Infinity Race’ which it is dubbing “The World’s Biggest Drop” a 10km course with twist and turns on December 14th.
Starting from the 3,800 metre (12,500ft) peak, the highest served by lifts in Europe, at the Matterhorn Glacier Paradise, competitors will descend windy 2,200 vertical metres course via Garten, Furgg and Furi to finish in Zermatt itself at 1600m (5,200ft) after a 10km (6.25 mile) run.
The race, which will have a Le Mans style start, is open top all and even families can win the event as when a child under the age of 12 takes part, their time is divided by three. To be eligible for participation, competitors must ski, snowboard or telemark down the course. Registration is available online at www.infinity-zermatt.com . A preview of the course will be available the day prior to the event.
Visitors to St. Moritz will be welcomed by a new cable car operating at Corvatsch this winter.
The new lift, which will follow the same route as the lift it replaces, has larger cabins each capable of holding 100 people, rather than the 80 person capacity of the old lift.
This greater capacity and other efficiency improvements means that passenger capacity on the route will increase by 30%.
As part of the reconstruction project both the valley and mountain stations of the lift have been redesigned to a more attractive architectural design. The new lift can carry 1,200 people per hour over its 1,660m length at a speed of 10 metres per second. The total cost of the project is 13 million Swiss francs.