So today’s post is maybe less of a blog post and more of a travel ad for the Engadin Valley area! (The Engadin Valley area is where I/we live in case you were wondering.)

There are currently flights available from NYC and DC to Zürich (then from Zürich, just a quick, 3.5 hour train ride to St. Moritz!) for under $500 round trip on quality carriers such as United Basic Economy, Delta Basic Economy, and TAP Portugal among others (I’d go with Delta if you have a choice). Basic Economy just means you can’t bring a carry-on bag and sometimes you don’t get your seat assignment until you’re at the gate. But small prices to pay for such, well, small prices! These excellent deals are showing winter and summer, so I’m going to tell you about all the fun things you can do here in hopes that you’ll come visit us!

WINTER

Winter is kind of the thing here. St. Moritz, the tourist capital of this area, is famous for being an amazing ski area for fancy Russians with private planes and fur coats. St. Moritz the town does have that winter wonderland feel. It has cobblestone streets and narrow alleys, good-smelling bakeries and outdoor bars with mulled wine and hot chocolate. It also has a ton of shopping, appealing or not depends on your budget and interests. Stores represented in St. Moritz include Prada and Gucci and you could also buy a Maserati if you were so inclined. But the Engadin is more than just St. Moritz. For example, we live in Silvaplana, which is just a five-minute drive from St. Moritz and while also over-priced, does maintain a little more “normal person” vibe. So, why should you visit us in winter?

Skiing

This one is pretty obvious. If you like downhill skiing, you’ve probably heard of St. Moritz, but even if not, you would figure out pretty quickly that this area is A+ for skiing. St. Moritz itself has the Corviglia resort with 24 lifts. There’s also Corvatsch/Furtschellas, which is a literal five-minute drive from our house, Diavolezza-Lagalb, Zuoz, plus some baby beginner slopes for all the newbies. All those names are in Romansh, the cool local language here that you definitely don’t have to ever learn to speak but does add that extra flair of culture.

Just a boring old ski day at Corviglia in St. Moritz

Cross-country skiing

If sliding on skis down a mountain doesn’t appeal to you, perhaps sliding horizontally on flat-ish snowy ground does. Just as a disclaimer, while cross-country skiing does sound and seem more benign than hurling yourself downhill, I have sustained many more falls and bruises cross-country skiing than I have downhill skiing. But it is a great workout and we have many many kilometers of cross-country trails here, including some that go across frozen lakes.

Sledding

If you’d rather leave it all to gravity, sledding is a good way to go. Beyond just walking up little hills and sledding down, we have two long trails specifically for sledding where you can get some serious speed (disclaimer: I have not done these yet but they look cool).

Après-Ski

You don’t even have to ski to get into the apres-ski spirit (spoiler alert: it’s just drinking!). There are countless apres-ski options here, but my favorite so far might be the cross-country bar near our house. It’s a yurt that pop-ups in the winter owned by an Italian with an excellent music selection and is kept surprisingly warm given that it’s a yurt in the middle of a bunch of snow.

Walking around

Our taxes are high here, but we get our money’s worth with snow plowing and grooming. Trails around the lake, across the lakes, and just here, there, and everywhere are groomed so you can take nice long winter walks.

Events and Culture

So this isn’t something I’m super familiar with because Sam and I are cheap and lazy, but there are a ton of sports and cultural events around here. We get ski races, polo on a frozen lake, concerts, and a gourmet festival. Also there’s gonna be a crypto-finance conference here in a couple weeks.

SPRING

Spring (and fall) are shoulder seasons. They’re short and there isn’t a lot going on. Skiing here ends at the beginning of May, so spring is really just about two months long. It’s not really an ideal to come here because there isn’t a lot open, but on the bright side, not a lot of tourists. A good time to explore surrounding areas, like one of the nearby valleys where they speak some kind of Italian but it’s not the better-known canton of Ticino.

SUMMER

Summer here is really beautiful. It’s not as long as I would like it to be, but it is really pleasant. Not very humid, lots of sunshine, and it doesn’t ever get too hot, staying steady at a nice 70-75F. The area gets touristy again for summer so pretty much everything is open.

Hiking and Walking

I mean, you can’t talk about Switzerland without talking about hiking right. So don’t even try! We live in a valley of lakes surrounded by beautiful mountains, so there is no shortage of beautiful walks and hikes of all levels, single day stuff and overnight stuff where you can stay at SAC (Swiss Alpine Club) huts along the way.

Monty and I on a little summer hike behind our apartment

Kite Surfing

Silvaplana, our town, is probably most famous for kite surfing. Lake Silvaplana is the beneficiary to something called the Maloja Wind, which is a wind that comes from Maloja, and on a good weather/good wind day, there are over 100 people kiting around the lake. I’ve never tried it, because I feel like it would take me so many hours to stand up on the board for just a few seconds that I’d rather spend my time elsewhere, but it looks really fun and is entertaining just to watch.

Mountain Biking

We also have a ton of mountain biking trails. The ski resorts run their gondolas in the summer so you can take your bike up and then ride down, but if you’re like Sam and believe that that’s a bullshit way to bike, then you are welcome to bike up and down under your own steam. You can also rent e-bikes which make the whole process a lot easier. Or you can do what I do and use a 15-year-old bike to huff and puff up trails that are barely at an incline.

Swimming, Stand Up Paddleboard, Kayak, Sailing

Our local lake stays too cold for summer swimming (unless you like being uncomfortably cold, in which case, go for it, some people do), but there are a couple of smaller lakes like Lej da Staz and Lej Marsh that get warm enough in summer for a pleasant swim and picnic. Meanwhile our lake has kayak and SUP rentals, things you can do without actually going into the water. There are also sailing classes for those who want to really do a thing.

FALL

Fall is also a shoulder season time like spring, but fall is also really beautiful and worth a visit if you like hiking and biking but don’t care as much about the other stuff. The temperature drops to below sweater weather really quickly, but without snow, the trails are all open for hiking, skies are generally blue, and the leaves are beautifully golden. And there aren’t too many tourists! Win-win.

TRAINS!

Switzerland is known for its excellent public transportation and the reputation is well-earned. Beyond the ability to get around without needing a car, some of the routes are really pretty. The trip from St. Moritz to Tirano is a UNESCO World Heritage route. And those can be done any time of the year!

The train from Tirana back up to St. Moritz

Why am I telling you all of this?

Because we want you to visit! We like (most) people and we live in a really special place. Switzerland can be stupid expensive, but by having friends like us with a pull-out sofa covered in dog hair (and in April we’re moving to a place that has bunk-beds behind a wall panel!), you can have a relatively cheap Swiss vacation.

Plus there’s a bunch of other stuff to do in Switzerland, cities to see, old towns to say “aww so cute”, different mountains to climb, and even different languages to practice.

Ok, shameless plug over.

Shameless plug for the Engadin!

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