Rosswald

Rosswald is the area you can reach fastest from the chalet. The gondola leaves from Basweri in Ried-Brig, climbs 790 metres in altitude in seven minutes, and sets you down in a village where no car ever comes. Four hundred parking spaces at the valley station, and above that nothing but snow, timber and views. Valais calling this plateau its sun terrace isn't just marketing: it faces due south, high above the mist that lingers in the Rhône valley.

The ski area has twenty-five kilometres of piste between 1,800 and 2,600 metres, served by the gondola and four drag lifts. It's small enough to get to know in a single day and large enough to enjoy for a whole week, with mostly wide blue and red runs. Queues are practically unheard of here. At Restaurant Fleschboden, 2,135 metres up, you look out over the Valais Alps while you eat, and anyone teaching the children to ski will find a nursery slope with a magic carpet lift where nobody comes flying past.

Rosswald's real signature is the toboggan run. Seven to eight kilometres of bends from the mountain station all the way back down to the valley, the longest in the region. There are also three snowshoe trails, including the route over the Fleschboden, and a weekly torchlit descent with fondue heads up the mountain. Paragliders launch here throughout the winter season too.

In summer Rosswald turns into a walking area with more than twelve routes, from the 4.7-kilometre Bergwasserweg loop along the old water channel to the Alpenpassenroute, which covers nineteen kilometres to the Simplon Pass. Mountain bikers ride the Rosswald Bike with 840 metres of descent, or take on the Saflisch Bike as a stage of the Valais Alpine Bike Route. And then there's the small mountain lake with a playground and a free barbecue spot, for many guests, the unexpected highlight of the week.