Life on the Piste - The Swiss Traveller's Guide.

OTP’s Top 10 things to do in Switzerland in 2014! 1. Go Hiking/Mountain Biking Switzerland has more than 48 300 km marked trails, and the nature that is right at the heart of it is second to none! The air is fresh, and you often find yourself alone with nature. Hiking in Switzerland is easy and varies in difficulty and altitude. Most of the time there are restaurants and hotels along the way. Hikers can choose between camping in a hut, or staying over in a hotel. If hiking is not for you then just going for walks in Switzerland is a beautiful experience, at all times of the year. Even in wintertime, for those who aren’t so keen on skiing there are beautiful walks you can take up at the ski fields. For those who fancy viewing these incredible sights at speed can make the most of our mountain biking holidays. If it’s your first time riding in the Alps then we offer a huge range of trails to build up your confidence and skills in this very different environment to British...

Saas-Fee Glacierbike Downhill - 8th March 2014 Have you ever thought about cycling down a ski piste as quickly as you can? Well that's exactly what they do here in Saas Fee. The annual Glacierbike downhill race is due to commence on the 8th March 2014 for the 11th time.  This adrenalin pumping event is an incredible event for spectators and the competitors themselves. Road and dirt downhill racing can be fast enough, but on ice and snow reaching scary speeds really makes this event for the adrenalin junkies to enjoy!  Competitiors start all together at the start line at 3,500 meters a.s.l on the Mittelallalin and ride down to the village based at 1,800 m. Providing an exciting ride not only having to deal with the steep track covered in snow and ice, but avoiding the other competitors also. A big challenge for even the most experienced mountain bikers!  See the video above for an on board view of what the race is like for the competitors.  Click h...

          Even before leaving the train station at Bern , its perfect blend of history and contemporary culture is startlingly obvious. With the preserved remains of the old Christoffelturm, the tower that formed part of the wall marking the Westernmost point of the city for most of the 14 th Century, being used as the perfect setting for The Rock Garden , a train station restaurant like no other. Passing through a glass frontage, which keeps out the hubbub of passing commuters before entering under a rock archway, with it’s neon under-lighting and walls adorned with decorations that you would expect to see in the Hard Rock Café, wide range of cocktails and a rather superior menu, all set among the 700 year old stone.             One of the great things about Bern for a first time visitor, and part of the reason for its listing as a UNESCO world heritage site, is the well laid o...

Swatch Skiers Cup - 4-10 January 2014 Zermatt was once again proud to host the Swatch Skiers Cup in our beautiful town. The 2 continents battle it out for freeskiing supremacy, with America yearning for vengeance after last years defeat. Both captains Julien Regnier for Team Europe and JP Auclair for Team Americas have made their picks for the head-to-head matchups for the Big Mountain competition in Zermatt. Athletes will get two runs each, with a cumulative winner being decided from each heat. The competition got off to a fierce start with the Backcountry Slopestyle heat. Team America came out on top of the first day, winning 9 rounds to match Europe's 7. Despite the imperfect weather forecast, it was a beautiful, mostly sunny day in Zermatt, with a blanket of untouched snow covering the course. The first round was full of historic matchups with Nicolas Vuignier (SUI) taking down Sage Cattabriga-Alosa (USA), and Richard Permin (FRA) defeating Dane Tudor (USA) to no...

In the next two weeks Saas Fee will once again become home to the UIAA Ice Climbing World Cup 2014, one of the oldest and liveliest stops on the UIAA Ice Climbing World Cup circuit. From the 18th to 25th Jan u ary 2014, the Saas Valley will become a Mecca for all ice climbing fans from across the globe. An action packed programme of sporting events and legendary ice climbing parties in the multi-storey car park.  After 15 years of hosting this prestigious event, Saas Fee really knows how to put on a show. Two weekends of events in the Saas Valley around ice and snow. The car free alpine village has a very unique competition wall for the event, built inside a circular car park at the edge of the village set against a backdrop of the towering Swiss Alps.  The unique location for the speed and lead climb  competition Competition organisers build a lounge area on the ground floor of the 10 storey high parking garage called The Cave, home to the after-party, which g...

History of the ski link and the new gondola When the new gondola running between Siviez and Plan Du Fou opened up this week it was more than 60 years since the first Nendaz ski lift was put in (before 1952 the only way the first skier’s could get up the mountain was by a type of coach on a sled). The real skiing began in 1958 when they installed a cable car between the village of Haute-Nendaz and the plateau at Tracouet. This is when Nendaz became more than just a local farming village. Gradually throughout the 1960’s ski tourism really began to take off and the Telecabine was not enough to cope with the demand so the first big investment was made. In 1968 1,700,000 CHF was spent on upgrading the Nendaz Telecabine, more comfortable cars, greater capacity, and new lifts on some of the slopes leading to and from Tracouet. By 1976 the surrounding areas of Veysonnaz and Verbier had also developed their lift systems and so a link was made, by means of Super-Nendaz, to...

FIS Ski World Cup – Lauberhorn, Wengen With it being less than eight days until one of the worlds most prestigious downhill, slalom and combined races on the skiing calendar the Jungfrau region has once again turned into a bustling hive of activity. From the 17 th - 19 th   of January 2014, it is expected that up to 30,000 spectators will come to watch the 84 th   International Lauberhorn Races. The Lauberhorn is a mountain situated between Wengen and Grindelwald, north of Kleine Scheidegg. Although, when compared to the mountains which surround it such as the Eiger and the Jungfrau it is very much belittled, its summit still reaches an elevation of 2,472m (8,110) above sea level.   Whilst attracting thousands of tourists during the winter months, the mountain is best known as the site of the Lauberhorn alpine ski races. The downhill course itself boasts the longest run in the world, with an enormous length of 4.455km (2.768mi). However this does not...