Teetering between joy and terror: extreme sledding in the Swiss Alps
To reach the top of the Waldspritz, you can go sledding above the village Grindelwald in the Swiss Alps I hiked 90 minutes into the backcountry, dragging a small walking sled on a rope to about 7,500 feet.
Above tree line, the snow – a beautiful fondant with granite ridges and filling meadows – lay deep on either side of a four-foot-wide tow path, groomed in perfect corduroy. When I reached the frozen Lake Bachalp, I turned around, straddled the sled and dug my heels into the unyielding snowpack to keep from careening off the mountain. I took one last look at the panorama of milky blue glaciers clinging to towering peaks, then braced myself for the six-mile descent. I let go of my heels and immediately shot toward a blind turn, rolling my ride off-piste into the depths to avoid sailing off the mountain.
Sledding – a recreation I had previously experienced by briefly walking uphill, sitting on a plastic saucer and letting gravity make me laugh – never struck me as a skill. But sledding in Switzerland, where it is called sledding in English, is different. Here, locals heading to the ski mountains carry lightweight axle-frame mini sleds on the train, in addition to those carrying skis, snowboards and trekking poles. For visitors, ski shops rent out sturdy touring versions to access ski areas with networks of toboggan-specific runs that are often classified according to their difficulty, like ski slopes.
While sledding is an old tradition here – exhibitions in the Grindelwald Historical Museum trace its development in the 19th century as both transportation and entertainment – the pandemic gave new life to the activity.
“During the pandemic, everyone wanted to come to the mountains, but not everyone can ski,” says Bruno Hauswirth, director of Grindelwald Tourisme. “So they tried sledding.”
Today the activity attracts families, older skiers and winter enthusiasts like me looking for variety on their ski holiday.
A tobogganing center
I was first introduced to the joys of Swiss sledding many years ago on a ski trip to Les Diablerets in the western Vaud region, during a tipsy descent from a mountainside chalet after a dinner of fondue and Swiss wine. Wearing a headlamp, I repeatedly blacked out, lying on my back looking at the stars as I ran to the village.
Last February I returned to central Switzerland Jungfrau region to visit Grindelwaldwhich claims to have the longest toboggan run in the world, over nine miles long Large Pintenfritznamed after a 19th-century mountain hotelier known for his sleigh rides into town.
After a 30-minute climb by train from Interlaken, my husband, Dave, and I arrived in Grindelwald and discovered glaciers surrounding the village of about 4,000 residents. Chalets lined the main street, which takes about 15 minutes to walk from end to end.
Looming above the city is the infamous north face of the 4,000-meter high Eigerberg and other giants, including Wetterhorn and Mettenberg. Nineteenth-century climbers popularized the region, creating mountain resorts and, in 1912, a railway that tunneled through the Eiger in a feat of engineering Jungfraujoch, a glacier-filled saddle between the peaks of the Bernese Alps. It is accessible via Europe’s highest train station, at an altitude of over 3,500 metres, and remains the region’s biggest tourist attraction.
On the other side of town, opposite the top of the Fiescherhorn, we checked into the new one Hotel Fiescherblick, a classic chalet with Swiss-modern décor run by fifth-generation hoteliers, brothers Matthias and Lars Michel. Combining tradition and innovation, the Fiescherblick attracted the local yodelling club for drinks and spontaneous singing one evening and on another served elegant shaved beet salads and trout in pea miso sauce in the Scandinavian-chic restaurant.
Explore by sled
The surrounding mountains are home to three ski areas – Grindelwald-Wengen, Grindelwald-First and Mürren-Schilthorn – collectively known as the Jungfrau ski area. Grouped together on one pass (75 Swiss francs, or about $84, per day), they are mapped with both ski and toboggan runs and connected by bus, train and tram lines, all included in the pass.
Reaching the slopes in Grindelwald-Wengen is a sensation in itself on board the 26-seater Eiger Express tram running from the city to the Eiger North Wall, part of a $470 million investment by Jungfrau Railways that opened in December 2020.
From the tram terminus at the Eiger Glacier, tourists transfer to the electric train that goes to Jungfraujoch – Top of Europe for a beautiful view of the almost 22 kilometer long Aletsch Glacier. Skiers and sledders begin their descent just below the steep ice.
Dotted trails on the resort map, often parallel to the ski slopes, marked toboggan trails that wind through the mountains offering vertical sensations and tour routes to remote villages including Wengen, famous as the end of the Lauberhorn World Cup Ski Race.
With a rental sled from the ski shop Intersport (17 Swiss francs), I left the tram station, took off on a moderate slope and panicked straight into a snowbank. Scores of experienced sledders – including a woman with a pug on her lap and a grandmother with two toddlers on board – whizzed by confidently.
I followed their directions, straightened the sled, dug my heels—which served as both brake and rudder—into the snow and learned to pull on the reins to come to a stop, throwing my weight left and right to negotiate turns. to bend. Occasionally risking the passage of ski slopes where the trails intersected, I trusted the snow to cushion my falls.
As a means of exploring, sledding in my warm, flexible Sorel boots was more comfortable than in ski gear. Charting a course for WengenI coasted through forests and fields, walked across flat stretches and shared the path with the occasional winter hiker in the hour it took to reach the car-free village.
There, a gondola took me easily back to Männlichen, another mountain in the posh ski area, and I finished the loop by returning to Grindelwald from the summit in time for an après sledding of Eisbier (ice beer) at the tram terminal.
Gliding in the dark
If daytime sledding balances between joy and fear, night sledding tips for the latter.
Within Grindelwald-Wengen, a roughly two-mile stretch of the Eiger Run – rated easy by Swiss standards – is floodlit for night rides (from 19 Swiss francs). A train shuttles back and forth between the top and bottom about every 30 minutes for easy loops between 7 p.m. and 11 p.m.
At the start of the ride, Dave and I waited for more experienced riders – mostly families and small groups of friends – to leave before heading downhill. The route started gently by descending into a wide snowfield and then narrowed into a series of switchbacks that looped back amid the dark pine forest, eventually propelling the sleds onto a wide ski slope. Pinballing around the bends and unable to see what lay below, I held my breath until we reached the open track and gave in to gravity with a shout of joy.
When slaloming we almost collided with the chalet Restaurant Brandeg at the end of the trail, where, after a few exhilarating laps, we parked our sleds with dozens of others and joined a frenzy of Swiss high school students warming themselves over sticky pots of melted cheese during a winter break.
As we took the last train to Grindelwald, we asked our waitress how she planned to get home. “I always bring my sled,” she laughed.
Adventure sledding
The longest toboggan runs in the Jungfrau region enhance the adventure with high-alpine starting points that riders must hike to.
From the gondola atop the Grindelwald-First ski area, which overlooks the Eiger across a narrow valley, we hiked as far as we could towards the start of Big Pintenfritz, only to find it closed due to insufficient snow (it went the day after us departure open). Since we were excluded from Switzerland’s longest toboggan run, we opted for number two, the 10.2 kilometer Waldspitz route. We began a steep ride that I paused occasionally to regain control by rolling the sled off the track into the deep snow as an emergency brake on an exhilarating five-hour round trip.
From sections apparently cut into cliffs to forested slopes and plains that passed closed barns of dark wood, Waldspitz followed a seasonal road to highland meadows. Once the snow melts, dairy cows spend their summers on these slopes; many of the barns we passed are used to make cheese the old-fashioned way, over an open fire.
As far from civilization as we felt, peering over rocky outcrops and gazing at mountains draped in hanging glaciers, we made a turn and sailed straight to Gasthaus Waldspitz. The mountain chalet played alpine music on the open deck and served rosti (Switzerland’s famous fried potatoes) and sausages in a dining room with red checked curtains and blondwood tables straight out of the ‘Heidi’ novel of my imagination.
After lunch the sun had softened the snow, making it easier to control our sleds on the long descent through evergreen forests and open meadows, downshifting frequently and at one point driving straight through a terrace with seating on either side of the road. walk. On the outskirts of Grindelwald, a bus with snow chains on the tires and racks for sleds took us back to town.
If sledding isn’t exciting enough, Grindelwald offers a higher level of difficulty in the velogemel, a bicycle-like vehicle with wooden runners instead of wheels, invented by a local postman in 1911 to replace the bicycle he used in the summer. Now Grindelwald has one velogemel world championship every year in February.
I met Peter Kaufmann, a resident of Grindelwald, who is a velogemel while training for the competition. Mr. Kaufmann lent me his brakeless snow bike for a test and warned me about speed.
“We don’t wear helmets for sledding,” he said, “but we do for cycling.”
Elaine Glusac is the Frugal Traveler columnist focusing on budget-friendly tips and travel.
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