Awesome pictures.
Going to Cervinia with a few friends in January and if weather permits, will definitely visit Zermatt as well. Good to hear you've enjoyed it thoroughly. Encouraging, since it will only be my second trip to the alps.
Any chance for being an off-groomer guide for a day at Zermatt?
I guess January isn't the most ideal time of the year, but the only option for the coming winter I'm afraid...
Hi there!
Jan can be great (chances for bluebirds are high), but can be lousy as well considering precipitation. However, the resort is at high altitude, you
will have snow. I won't be in Zermatt in Jan. We go there in spring after our home resort's season ends.
Cervinia is connected with the Zermatt lifts/slopes. Cervinia has nice long runs if you like carving, but the great scenery is more on the Zermatt side, thus on a bluebird day, it's worth to get the pass for the entire resort and hit the Zermatt side e.g. go to Gornergrat and Klein Matterhorn (station is at 12’800ft -> don’t go there at noon when all the by foot turists go there: long queue).
I’m no expert considering off-piste/sidecountry possibilities in Zermatt… If you have a great pow day, it could be worth to hire a guide (in CH this means a certified mountaineering guide; you’ll find the number on the Zermatt homepage). They know where the crevasses/cliffs are and can show you way more great terrain to ride.
Some hints for pow days:
Be aware, you’re in the Alps, in high alpine terrain… leaving the marked run means you’re on your own responsibility. Don’t expect all slopes to be bombed. Some will be in the morning, but only the ones which endanger groomers beneath.
Carry avy equipment if you hit sidecountry. If you don’t have/carry it, stay on groomers and the yellow marked tracks. These yellow tracks are non-groomed, patrolled and bombed where you’re save. Everything else is into the wild
.
Be very careful, if you want to follow tracks of others… they may have initially been done by a guide knowing his way through the cliffs/crevasses/bergschrunds… or they have been left by turists oblivious for what’s beneath them (done it once, been cliffed out. No fun). Besides the cliffs, you’re likely to ride on glaciers without recognizing it. If there’s a rope, respect that rope! It means that you’re on a glacier. There are great inviting slopes on pow days with slightly covered crevasses beneath… many turists hit these slopes…so yes, there
will be many tracks of turists you shouldn’t follow, and just cos there are 20 tracks won’t make it better (every now and then some of them end up
in the crevasse; e.g. around Furgsattel, Klein Matterhorn. Please, DON’T FOLLOW THESE TRACKS; it gives me headache each time I’m there). .
If you “only” want to hit bit pow left n right of the piste, still be aware what you’re doing. Study the piste-map: they indicate if the groomer is on a glacier. Don’t leave the groomers, if on a glacier!
The yellow marked runs around Rothorn, Rote Nase, Hohtälli are nice, but be quick, they’ll get chewed up pretty fast, e.g. the nice steep slope beneath Stockhorn will be a nasty mogul hell in the afternoon. Go there first thing in the morning.