Charmey
16th July 2006
After a couple of weeks of needing to visit Zinal we finally got time to take a walk locally at Charmey. It’s one of the local ski stations although I’ve only managed to ski there a couple of times this season ( 2006 03 14 - Charmey and 2006 02 19 - Charmey ).
There’s one great lift, the “Rapido Sky” from 887m to Vounetse at 1626m and the Restaurant des Dents-Vertes which does good Rösti and Croûte au fromage and, of course local white wines.
At the top there’s only three lifts, all drag lifts of course, a couple serve some short slopes near the summit while the other rides up from (I think) around 1200m.
It’s surprising how close by the other ski stations are, La Berra and Schwarzsee are very close, La Berra is visibly near and one of the reasons I wanted to walk at Charmey was to asses how accessible La Berra would be on touring skis. In fact, as I suspect we’ll bi in Zinal for the season it’s probably academic for next season. It’s certainly feasible to look at crossing to La Berra though, it’s a fairly long but gradual climb but on a good day it should open up a long off-piste descent through some nice terrain.
The trail winds round the hill opening sort sections of terrain I’d not really noticed before and a couple of potentially interesting short off-piste sections for the winter.
This is the pre-alpes really and part of the Gruyère area with the peaks no more than 2000m or so. It’s all pretty much used for grazing of cattle or (below) goats, all of which have bells so there’s always a constant ringing.
As we were walking it was getting pretty hot in open so as the route descended into the forest it was a welcome relief as the temperature dropped accordingly.
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