Skiing in St Anton, Austria

We just came home from three days of skiing in the St Anton am Arlberg area. We flew with Niki from Arlanda in the afternoon to Vienna and further to Innsbruck, and took a Herz rented car to St Jakob in St Anton (a one hour drive). Arrived to House Gonda in the evening the 13th (Friday) and had dinner at the nearby Gander Wirt.

March 14:Took a ski bus (5 mins) to Nasserein in St Anton and the cabin up to the skiing. Before that we realized that Herz had made a reservation of 1000 EUR on our credit card even though the car was fully insured and prepaid - they can actually still do such things! Anyway, the weather was very nice with sunshine and a few days old snow. Very nice skiing conditions. We skied on Gampen, Galzig, Albonagrat, Schindler, and Kapall. We had lunch in Stuben, and around 1600 returned to Nasserein where we did a proper afterski with Bombardino and ubåt. In the evening we went to have dinner at Gander
Wirt in St Jakob.

March 15:Took the ski bus to St Anton West and went up to Galzig. On the top we realized the wind was really strong, snow was "falling" horizontally, and that the clouds were so low that we could see only 10 to 25 meters. To make things worse, some runs were closed so the only way down was a black run. It was not a totally peasant experience. On the way down the conditions gradually got better, and half way down we could see again. However, since skiing was only possible in the very lowest parts of the hills, we did not ski much this day. Instead, we drove around a little with the car (to St
Christoph) and explored the shopping in St Anton. We bought ski pants for Elena and a jacket for Paul. The selection was very nice indeed! When we walked to Gander Wirt in the evening, the snow was falling heavily and we were starting to hope for very good skiing the following day.

March 16:We decided to drive early to Lech, however, on the way we stoped at Zürs, which is connected to the same ski area as Lech. We followed the "Weisser ring" which lead us to from Zürs to Zug, Oberlech, Lech, Stubenbach, and back to Zürs. The conditions were absolutely 100% perfect: sunshine, blue sky, no wind, and lots of new powder snow! We totally jumped into the snow and surfed lots and lots
of powder. The skiing that day, particularily before noon, was probably the best skiing we ever experinced (so far ;-)) in our lives. In Oberlech we stoped for lunch, and then continued towards Zürs. In the afternoon we were the last to leave the slopes of Zürs.

At Gander Wirt that evening, we concluded that St Anton is probably ranked the number 1 ski resort in Europe (by many web sites) due to the fantastic possibilities to ski off-pist. In the Lech area, almost every hill gives excellent opportunities for off-pist skiing, either in parallel with the prepared slope, inbetween slopes, or simply alternative ways down to the valley from the top lift station.


For pics see this page.