Ischgl, Austria - Beyond the Après: Secret Off-Piste Runs, Huts & Skiing to Switzerland with Patrick Walter
Let's get this out of the way first. Say "Ischgl" to most skiers and they'll picture dancers on tables, DJs on the mountain by mid-afternoon, and a whole village that turns into one big party. That reputation is earned. Ischgl sits right up there with St. Anton and Ibiza on the list of the world's party capitals.
But here's what I learned talking to Patrick Walter on the latest episode of Where to Ski: the après is the least interesting thing about this place. Ischgl is one of the most underrated ski resorts in the Alps. The groomers are huge, the off-piste is shockingly easy to reach, and after a storm you can find fresh tracks for days, because almost nobody goes looking for them.
Patrick is a state-certified ski instructor and guide, owner of Silvretta Guides, and an examiner for the Tyrolean and Austrian Ski Instructor Association. In other words, he trains the people who teach you to ski. As he puts it, he's "the bad guy." We recorded this one back in April, and it's still one of my favorite interviews ever. So grab your skis. Let's check out Ischgl.
Getting There
Ischgl is in Austria's western Tirol, in the Paznaun Valley, about 230 kilometers east of Zurich and 100 kilometers west of Innsbruck. Driving is easiest: about two and a half hours from Zurich airport or an hour and a half from Innsbruck. You can take the train, but you'll finish the trip on a bus.
Patrick lives in Galtür, the quieter village ten minutes up the valley. Ischgl grew into a modern resort from the mid-90s on and swells to around 14,000 guest beds in winter, but it's still a traditional village, and the hotels are still owned by local families. I love that.
Start at Idalp
Two of the gondolas out of town drop you at Idalp, the heart of the ski area and home to the beginner zone. Step off the lift and it's all laid out in front of you: a few chairlifts and nothing but blue and red runs. (Quick refresher on the Austrian system: blue is easiest, red is intermediate, black is the hard stuff.) Patrick calls the grooming "unbelievable," with wide, perfectly groomed pistes, and most of the slopes here face north, so the snow holds up all season.
The Four Mountains for Stronger Skiers
For advanced skiers, Patrick breaks the area into four mountains.
The third gondola tops out a bit higher than Idalp, with almost all reds and blacks coming off it.
Greitspitz is the high point, close to 2,900 meters. From the top you can ski all the way to the village without touching another lift, an 11-kilometer valley run Patrick says you can do non-stop. I told him I'd need a break somewhere in there. His answer: "It's good training for the legs." Greitspitz is also your gateway to Switzerland.
Palinkopf has black runs and faces more to the north, which is why Patrick says the best snow is always right here.
Piz Val Gronda has no groomed pistes at all. It's just for freeriding.
One heads-up: the valley run is never blue. It's all red, with some black options, and it gets properly jammed between 3 and 4 p.m. in peak season.
The Off-Piste Is the Real Secret
This was the part of the conversation that got me fired up. Patrick used to guide in St. Anton, and he says Ischgl's off-piste is "much, much easier" to get to. The runs are a little hidden, but they're right there.
And the crowds just aren't. When Patrick started Silvretta Guides, he'd look around and see nobody else off-piste. He actually wondered if there was some danger nobody had told him about. Turns out everyone just stays on those beautiful groomers. So when it snows, Patrick says, "we ski untracked almost the whole week."
His best tip: bring skins. Not for a two-hour tour. He means a 15-to-30-minute skin, then about 1,000 vertical meters of powder on the way down.
Piz Val Gronda is the place to start, with lots of ways down depending on conditions. When avalanche danger is up, there's mellow terrain where you're never exposed. When things are stable, you can go steep.
The Heidelberger Hütte Day Trip
This one made me want to book a flight. Right behind Piz Val Gronda, the Fimba Valley runs back into the backcountry, and in it sits the Heidelberger Hütte, a proper mountain hut run by a local guide. Ski tourers sleep there because the terrain around it is perfect for touring.
But you don't need to be a tourer to get there. Take the gondola up Piz Val Gronda, ski off-piste down to the hut, and have lunch. Patrick says it's his favorite lunch anywhere: traditional food in an old, cozy hut. Afterward, a path takes you out of the valley and straight back to Ischgl.
It's also his pick for the best view. You start off-piste with just a glimpse of the valley, come around a corner, and suddenly the whole thing opens up. "Everybody always says, picture, picture," he told me.
Ski to Switzerland (and Shop Duty-Free)
Yes, you can ski from Austria into Switzerland. The Swiss hub is Alp Trida, where the east-facing slopes get sun first thing. That means everyone heads over first thing, too, so on busy mornings Patrick stays on the Ischgl side, skiing in the shade on empty runs.
From there you can ski down to Samnaun, a small, duty-free village that's a favorite for chocolate shopping. Patrick prefers a more hidden run just outside the village, down a pretty little valley to a hut with a great lunch. Afterward, take a taxi or the free bus back to the gondola in about ten minutes. You can pay in euros, but food and drinks cost more on the Swiss side. The chocolate is the exception.
Snow, Safety, and the Weather
Ischgl's snowmaking is kind of mind-blowing. With over 1,000 snow cannons, they need just three cold days and nights in the fall to cover almost 80 percent of the pistes, and the season reliably opens at the end of November. Last season only brought about three really deep storms, and the skiing was still great.
When a big storm does hit, the avalanche crews are fast. Lifts normally open at 8:30. After a heavy dump the gondolas might open around 9 or 9:15 while the higher chairs stay closed, and you can ski the valley runs while the avalanche towers boom all morning. By lunch or early afternoon, everything's usually open. I've been to places that shut the whole mountain for two days, so that's impressive.
On a whiteout day, head for the valley runs. Most of the area is above treeline, but the valley runs go right alongside the trees, where you get better depth perception.
Patrick was honest about one weak spot: wind. It's become more of an issue over the past decade. Last season had maybe four or five days with a lot of lifts closed, and around ten when the higher chairs were shut. But the gondolas almost always run, and with 45 lifts and roughly 240 kilometers of piste, there's plenty left to ski.
Don't Skip the Guide
Of course a guide is going to tell you to hire a guide. But Patrick's reasoning makes sense. In St. Anton, the off-piste gets skied so much that the snowpack is constantly packed down. In Ischgl, fewer people go off-piste, and Patrick says the avalanche danger tends to run a little higher.
Guides like Patrick are there all season. They know when it rained, where the weak layers are, and where the snow collects. If you're in for a week, you don't. So carry a transceiver, shovel, and probe, and at least at the start, go with a guide.
Smart Tips for Your Trip
Dodge the peak weeks. Patrick would skip Christmas, Carnival week in February, and the Dutch school holiday week right after it.
Explore the rest of the valley. See, Kappl, and Galtür each have their own smaller ski area. They aren't connected to Ischgl, but one ticket covers all four. They're quieter and great for families with little kids.
Save a day for the season finale. Every year in early May, Ischgl puts on a concert on a stage up at Idalp. Past headliners include Tina Turner and Robbie Williams, and Christina Aguilera was on the bill last year. After the show, everyone skis down and the whole village becomes one party.
The Bottom Line
Ischgl has the party, and it's a legendary one. But the real story is everything else: an 11-kilometer top-to-bottom run, off-piste you can reach with a 20-minute skin, a week of fresh tracks after a storm, a hut lunch in a hidden valley, and a ski run into Switzerland. As Patrick said, too many people only know Ischgl for the après. Now you know better.
Listen to the full conversation with Patrick Walter on Where to Ski, wherever you get your podcasts. And if you head out there, look up Silvretta Guides. Tell Patrick we sent you.
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Episode Transcript
Welcome to Where to Ski, and I'm John Morgan. Before we get started, I can't believe we're starting a new season of Where to Ski. It's been an awesome ride, and it's all because you guys out there, our listeners, subscribers, everyone else, has done such a great job of listening and contributing to what we're doing.
So, today we're headed to Austria's Western Tirol. Grab your skis, let's check out Ischgl. Ischgl is in Western Austria, about 230 kilometers east of Zurich and 100 kilometers west of Innsbruck.
Easy to get there by car, less so by train. It's about two and a half hours driving from Zurich airport, hour and a half from Innsbruck. And the train, well, you take the train, then you take a bus.
It's not too bad, but it's not as easy as it is driving. Ischgl is known as one of the world's top ski resorts, both in terms of skiing and opere. Yeah, we'll get to the opere in a minute.
The official stats are 23% for beginners, 62% intermediate, 15% advanced. There's 76 lifts and 365 kilometers of piste. That's big.
So, there's a ton for beginners and intermediates, but there seems to be plenty for experts and those skiing off piste as well, and we'll get into that with our guest. However, there's some really good off piste when it snows. Just make sure you use a guide or avi equipment.
It really helps. Ischgl's gotten rep for being one of the hottest apres spots in the world. Apparently, it starts mid-afternoon on the mountain, most days with live DJ sets, dancers on tables, plenty of cocktails, somewhere around Kustal or Nikkistammel.
Then it moves into town for night shift, where you can find pretty much whatever type of opere you want at the Schatzi Bar, Golden Eagle, Fire and Ice, and Kitzlach. Our guest today is Patrick Walter. He's a state certified ski instructor and ski guide and owner of Silvetta Guides.
He's also an examiner for the Tyrolean and Austrian Ski Instructor Association, which means he trains the teachers. Whereas, he puts it, he's the bad guy. We had a ball talking to Patrick.
This was recorded in April. You're not hearing it till October, but it was one of my most fun interviews to date. After a quick break, we'll talk to Patrick and find out how Ischgl skis.
Patrick, welcome to Where to Ski. Thanks for joining us today, sir. Thank you for having me, John.
Yeah, you live near Ischgl. How did you come to live around Ischgl? You've been there quite a while now, I believe. Yeah, you know, I'm living not directly in Ischgl.
I'm living in Galtür. That's just the end of the valley. You know the name of the valley is Potsnau.
It's 10 minutes away from Ischgl. It's a little bit smaller village, much more quiet to live really good. But the big player in the valley is Ischgl.
Yeah, that's one of the big boys. Ischgl wasn't really... I spent a lot of time in Austria years ago, and Ischgl was never on my radar. It's sort of popped up in the last, oh, say 10 or 12 years into one of the major resorts in Austria.
You know, I would say since the 90s, middle of the 90s, Ischgl developed really into a modern ski resort. But I need to say, you know, it's still a normal village. It's not a town, traditional village.
But of course, in winter, winter season is really crazy. You know, they have guest beds about 14,000 people. That's really a lot.
That's a lot of people. Yeah, it is. It is.
But all the hotels are still owning local people, local families. You know, that's really good. Actually, it's crazy in winter.
Well, I've heard, you know, the opera is like legendary. And there's a lot of partying that goes on. But, you know, we're not going to talk a lot about that.
But it is one of the party capitals of the world, apparently, like with Ibiza and St. Anton and a few others. Yes, yes, it is. I'm always saying, unfortunately, just a lot of people just know Ischgl from the opera ski.
They don't know actually how good it is, how good the ski resort is, how many opportunities you have to ski there. And that's what we're here to talk about. We're not talking about the opera.
We did talk earlier before we started recording this about the end of the season party, which I can't help but talk about, which is that's amazing. You have Christina Aguilera in Ischgl doing the performance for the end of the season. That's pretty awesome.
It is. It is. You know, they have a stage up the mountain always.
Yeah. So it's not down in the village. It's up in the ski resort.
And always at the beginning of May, ending of season, they have always a concert. You know, this, like you said, it's Christina Aguilera this time. They had already, you know, John, Tina Turner, Robbie Williams.
So it's amazing. It's amazing. And I need to say that's also, you know, end of the season, a good party, season ending party.
You know, at first, all the people, the concert is in the afternoon, about one, two o'clock in the afternoon. Everybody's up there having fun. And then they go down into the village and the whole village is just one party.
It's incredible. That sounds wild. But let's talk about the skiing.
Skiing is, there's actually some real deal skiing there. You know, I've heard some things about Ischgl that, you know, the skiing is not very challenging and all that. But then I looked a little deeper, and I've never been to Ischgl myself.
I've heard that once you start going off-piste a little bit, or in certain areas, there's some real deal skiing there. It is. It is, you know.
You know, I used to be a guide or a ski instructor in St. Anton, and compared to St. Anton, it's much, much easier. You know, really easy to reach off-piste runs. They're just a little bit hidden, but really easy to reach.
And less people, really less people are the main people go off-piste. It's off-piste, it's, you know, if we have a snowfall, we ski untracked almost the whole week, you know. We find the whole week something untracked.
That's normal here. It's not like other ski resorts. That's pretty awesome.
You know, that means that, you know, the stuff that's groomed, that a lot of people are staying on that, and that you're getting a lot of places where you can go off-piste or on the side where it's not so groomed and still get the powder a week later. That's amazing. It is, you know.
It's like, when I came back here, you know, and started this with Silvretta Guides, at the beginning, you know, it was for me, I was skiing up there with students, and nobody was going off-piste, and I was thinking, like, it's so easy to reach. What is going on here? Is there a danger? I don't know, you know, what is it? But at the end, I figured out, you know, there are no people. They are going mainly on-piste.
On-piste, you know, the pistes are unbelievable here. They are really wide, perfect groomed. It's really nice, but off-piste is, yeah, it's really good.
Let's start with the easy part here first, talking about how intermediates and early-stage skiers get up. There are three lifts at a town, and then you get up to Edalp, and that's really the beginner area, correct? Up on the hill? Yes. You know, Edalp is, that's also where the concert is always.
That's the main place in the ski area. So, two gondolas end up there. You're coming right up out at Edalp, and around Edalp, that's the beginner area, and there are a few chairlifts, and all the pistes are, you know, in Austria, we have this blue-red-black piste.
So, blue is the easiest one, and around Edalp, there are just blue and red ones. So, really easy. So, if you're an intermediate, it's a good start to go around Edalp.
That's easy. Okay. That sounds like that's pretty easy.
Is there a specific lift that makes sense to take up, or is it pretty much whichever one you can get to easiest? Right away, you know, right away when you're coming up, you see it just in front, and see all the pistes, and then you can choose. They are really easy. Okay.
Okay. So, that's where the beginners and the intermediates should start off, and that sounds like it's pretty good, easy skiing, groomed, and the grooming, I assume, is just spectacular. Yeah.
Yeah. So, now, let's start on the good stuff, or the harder stuff. Honest, let's start off with, you know, a sunny day.
If you're skiing groomers for an expert, what have you got there for, you know, really advanced skiers? I need to say, you know, you can speed up the whole ski area, let's say, in four mountains. You know, there is one, that's the third gondola, which is going up, that's a little bit higher than Idalp, and there are almost red and black runs going down. So, and the second mountain is Greizspitz.
You know, Greizspitz is the highest point in the ski area. It's close to 2,900 meters. Yep.
From there, actually, you know, and that's really great. You can do right away from the highest point, you can ski down directly to the village, to Ischgen. You don't need to use any lift.
So, the run is about 11 kilometers. You know, you can go non-stop through. You can go non-stop through.
At 11 kilometers, I have to take a break in there somewhere. It's good training, good training for the legs. And from Greizspitz, of course, you know, you can go also to the Swiss side, the weather run, down to some mountain.
Then the third mountain is Palinkopf. That's black runs. Actually, there is always the best snow right there.
It's north-facing more. And, yeah, the fourth mountain is the Piz Vargonda. You know, in the ski area, it's just for freeriding, no groomed piste.
It's, yeah, really good. Yeah. Now, I was going to say, what about off of Piz Vargonda? Is there any good stuff up there? Yeah.
You have many opportunities at Piz Vargonda to go down. It's just off-piste, like I said. Yep.
And you can really choose. You want to go flat. You know, if the avalanche danger is higher, you can really go down flat stuff.
You're never in danger. If the situation is better, you can go steep stuff. And, you know, right behind Piz Vargonda, there's a valley going into the backcountry.
It's called Finbach. And right there is a hut, the Heidelberger Hut. I don't know if you've heard about it.
No, I haven't heard that one. You know, that's a hut where you can sleep, actually, you know. Really? Yeah.
It's run by a local guide. And you can sleep there. Of course, you get food and everything.
A lot of guys, you know, which are doing ski touring, staying there because the area around is perfect for ski touring. But it's also reachable just with normal skis. You know, you go up to Piz Vargonda with the gondola, ski down off-piste, having lunch there.
By the way, for me, the best lunch. It's really traditional food and really nice. And, you know, the hut is, you have a cozy feeling.
It's a little bit old. And having lunch there and then there is a path going out the valley and you're coming straight away back to a chalice. So really easy.
It's a nice day trip, you know. That's pretty cool. That sounds like a great trip.
It is. There's some pretty steep stuff that goes into town on the valley run too, isn't there? No, actually, yeah. You know, on the valley run, you can do, valley run is never blue, no blue.
It's just red. But, you know, also with some parts, you can change the piste to do black runs. But it's, yeah, it's a little bit more difficult to valley run.
Yeah. And it's probably crowded too, especially at the end of the day. Especially, I would say, you know, at the main weeks, the main season, there from three to four o'clock, it's super crowded.
Oh, that's no fun. That's not good. Okay.
It's not good. So Ischgl faces north and so it probably holds the snow pretty well. When does the skiing sort of start there? When does it start to get good? I know it depends on when you get the snow, but usually it's sort of an idea of when it starts to get good.
Yeah. But you need to know, you know, that the infrastructure, what the snow company has is unbelievable. They have over 1000 snow cannons.
So in autumn, they just need three days and nights cold. And almost 80% of the piste are covered. Really? So yeah, it's unbelievable.
You know, it's so modern. And the season starts always end of November. And of course, you know, it helps us really that, like you said, it's north facing, you know, right away when you come at Idalp.
And all these pistes we're talking about intermediates are just north facing. And the snow holds are pretty good the whole season, of course. And yeah, but with the artificial snow, it's, you know, this season, for example, we had really less snow.
You know, the snowfall was really, we didn't have really big snowfalls. But the skiing was still unbelievable. Because with the artificial snow, it's, yeah, unbelievable.
Well, it gets you a good base. But you had a couple of good dumps. You had sort of a drought in December, but then or January and then February, you got hit hard, right? February was just one time.
Now in March, we had another one. I think it totally, to be honest, it was, I think, three times really deep. And this was it.
Interesting. Now, what about Salmon? Is there any decent skiing over there? That faces south. So it gets the sun, which is probably pretty nice, like in January.
But is there any decent skiing over there? Yeah, you know, it's connected to Switzerland. I was gonna ask you about that in a minute. You know, you can ski over to Switzerland, and Salmon is in Switzerland.
And it's, I hear it's duty free as well. Yeah, you know, it's, when you go over to Switzerland, you know, on Ischgl side, the main part, or the main place is Idalb, like we said. Yeah.
The main place on Swiss side is Alp Drida, it's called Alp Drida. And skiing down there, it's east slopes. So right away in the morning, there is sun.
So for example, if you are here, and it's a busy week, you know, if you go straight away there in the morning, everybody's going there. So it's super crowded in the morning, because of course, everybody wants to ski in the sun. And it's not as big as Ischgl side.
But of course, it's like I said, it's sunny in the morning, in the morning time. That makes up for a lot. I like, I like skiing in the sun, I can see that.
Of course, of course. But then, you know, we are not always doing this, because then we stay on Ischgl side, you know, skiing in the shadow, but less people. Everybody's going over there.
So like you said, yeah, it's a noun, it's duty free. It's duty free. So going down to some noun is there are two rally runs.
One is a little bit, it's a red one, one is a little bit steeper and getting a little bit narrow, but you're ending up really in the village. It's really a small village. They have guest beds, I think two and a half 3000.
So it's much smaller than Ischgl. And can go there for duty free. You know, Ischgl is famous for good chocolate or stuff like this.
I prefer another run. Another run is it's going a little bit outside from the village. It's also a little bit hidden.
Less people do it. It's super beautiful. You're going down a really nice short valley.
You're ending up at a really nice place where a nice hut is, you know, good lunch. And after lunch, if you're having a taxi schnapps, you know, they bring you back to the gondola. Ride in the taxi is about five minutes, 10 minutes.
If you don't want to have a taxi schnapps, you just grab the bus, the bus is for free. And in 10 minutes, you're back at the gondola and going back to the ski resort. It's just far enough away so you're not getting the big crowds and you get a good lunch.
You're paying in Swiss francs too, probably. You can pay in euros, but you know, all the drinks and food is more expensive on the Swiss side. Yeah, except for the chocolate bars that are duty free.
So let's talk about some off-piste skiing. I've heard there, it really is some good off-piste skiing. And if you go way off, you need to take all the right equipment.
You need to have the equipment you need. You need a transceiver. You need a shovel and a probe, right? Yes.
Yes. Yes. We do.
It's just the same as here. You know, they, of course, they have also, we have some ski routes. You know, we also, we have the ski routes, which are where they do safety work, avalanche.
If it's safe, they're open. Do avalanche work off-piste. Okay.
Yes. Yes. You know, around Ischgl is, how you say in English, you know, this blowing down the avalanche towers, how you say.
There are many of them. They really have to do a lot of safety work if there's a heavy snowfall, but the system, what they are running is really good and they are really quick, to be honest. You know, it's not like other ski areas that some lifts are for one, two days closed.
Yeah. I've been to some places where they shut the whole mountain down and slowly over the course of like, you're right, two days, they finally get it open. No, it's let's say we have a heavy snowfall and the avalanche danger is really high.
You know, the gondolas normally opens in the morning at 8.30. Yeah. And if there's a heavy snowfall and they have to do safety work, maybe they are a little bit later, nine o'clock or 9.15, but normally then it's open so you can go up. Of course, then up there, many chairlifts, the higher chairlifts, they are still closed because of safety work, but then you can do the valley runs and you will hear all morning, you know, blowing down the avalanche.
And then normally at lunchtime or early afternoon, everything is opened. That's pretty, that's pretty aggressive. That's good.
That's great. Yeah, it is. It is.
I mean, that can save a day or two of skiing if you get some snow, which is nice. Yeah, it is. You were talking about some ski routes.
What are your favorite ski routes up there? Are there some good ones? I'm sure that it all depends on where the snow is and what the wind has done, but are there some that you really prefer over there? You know, but what I really like, like I said to you, there are many hidden runs. So it's, if you come to Ischgl and you want to do off-piste, I would recommend to have some skins. And I'm not talking about skinning, you know, you're going one hour, one and a half or two hours.
I'm talking about skinning 15 minutes, 30 minutes, and then you can go 1,000 high meters down in the powder. Really, like I said at the beginning, it's really easy to reach. And, and yeah.
You know what I mean? That gets you on a, you know, a traverse, a slightly inclined traverse, and then you can get to the good stuff, right? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
It sounds like guides are a good idea. I'm sure you, you run a guide service, so I know what you're going to say, but I always recommend that people get guides, especially when they go off-piste. Yeah.
Yeah. Of course, you know, it's a little bit different, you know, when we, when we, you have been to St. Anton, you know, in St. Anton, almost everybody's skiing off-piste, you know, everything is pumped down always, always, you know, it's a little bit different because there the surface is always consistently under pressure because everybody's skiing down. Here it's a little bit different, you know, average danger, we say it's always just a little bit higher here.
And of course, like you said, I'm a guide, but you should always take a guide at the beginning, you know, it's much safer. Oh, it's much safer. You know, you guys ski these hills every day, you know, if you get a guest there who just skis it for a couple of days, they don't know where the snow's collecting.
They don't know what, what slides and what doesn't, you know, usually, and you know that off the back of your hand. Yeah. You know, that's, that's, that's also why, you know, that we are the whole season here.
We know how the weather was, was it raining? Are there more weak layers in the surface and all this stuff. And if you come here just for one week, you don't, you know, nothing actually. Exactly.
And you don't know what the, you're right. You don't know what the bottom layers are. Yeah.
You know, you can take a guess at what might slide and might not, but you don't have the experience to be able to know it's right. Yeah, that's true. So net, net, get a guide if you're going off piste.
Yeah. So where in Ushgul has the best view of the mountains there? What's your favorite view? And I'm sure you've got a place where you take guests and go, here you go. Here's your picture.
To be honest, for me, the best view is when you go Piz Valrhona and you ski to this Heidelberg hut. You know, it's off piste at first. When you start, you see the valley just a little bit, and then you need to make your skiing down and going.
Then you're going right around the corner. And then suddenly everything is open. You see the whole valley.
It's, it's, that's, everybody always says, picture, picture, let's make a picture. It's, but of course, it's also in, in the ski area, there are many spots, you know, for example, when you go up to the border to Switzerland, when you see all the mountains on the Swiss side, you know, it's, it's really impressive. There are a few points where we're really good.
That sounds pretty cool. Now there's some other towns that have skiing in there, you know, or near there down the valley. I've heard that there's some skiing down.
Oh, what is it? Yeah. Is there some skiing down there? Or is it just not worth the time and effort? No, it's, uh, you know, but in the valley, there are four villages. It's the first village is C, then it's Kappel, Ischgl and Kaltür.
Every, every village has its own ski resort. They are not connected together, but it's possible, you know, to buy a lift ticket, for example, which is working in every four ski resorts. Yeah.
Of course, the other three ones, they are much smaller, let's say a little bit more cozy. So if you have a little kid's family and you don't want to have it too busy on the piste, I would suggest to go there. Like you said, Kappel, for example, is in January and February really good because the south side, that's the sun again, John.
It's not good in the springtime. They close a little bit earlier, but, uh, yeah, but the big player, of course, that's Ischgl. Oh, Ischgl's the, it's the elephant in the room here, but I've heard that there was some good stuff further down valley in a couple of places that sometimes you might even have to hike to to get to, but that's for powder skiing, I think.
Yeah. Yeah. Okay.
Now back to, back to Ischgl. When it's really dumping, is there, um, a better place to ski? You know, visibility gets locked down. You know, you've had it, let's say a full day of snow and you can't see a lot.
Is there a place where it's like in the trees where you get some depth perception and it's a little bit safer? Yeah. But we do, you know, if let's say it's really bad weather, visibility is bad, you know, because of course the ski is always so high over the tree line, but when you do the valley runs, the valley runs is, uh, you're skiing beside the trees. You know, it can go also, also in the trees, you know, we do it always there.
Then it's much, much better. You know, the only thing, but what we are struggling always a little bit, and that's, I need to be honest is wind. We have quite a few wind days.
You know, when I just remember 15 years back or 10 years back, we had never much problems with the wind, you know, but now it's a little bit changing. It's often more wind. I don't know.
Are they the northerly winds that really whack it or is it like that really is hard to deal with? Both. Really? Yeah, it is. So we have quite, let's say, I think the season was, uh, maybe four or five days where more lifts were closed because of the wind, but it's still, you know, it's still possible to ski.
The gondolas are normally always working. So the valley runs you can do always. Yeah.
Four or five days out of a season. That's, that's like a, that's a rounding error. Yeah.
But when I say four or five days a season, then I say, you know, more lifts, more chairlifts are closed. We have days, you know, that, that the higher that's a little bit often that the higher chair lifts, uh, let's say 10 days that are closed, but it's, but it's still, you know, enough to ski, you know, we have, there are 45 lifts, 45 lifts, almost 240 kilometers of beasts. So it's, it's big enough.
That's huge. That's, that's almost as big as the Arlberg in itself, in terms of kilometers. Now, what do you do when you get, there must be some days where it's just crazy crowded.
How do you deal with that? Is there a way to be able to avoid some of those crowds besides just getting out early? Getting out early is a good idea. Yeah. Uh, if, if I would go to Ischgl for a vacation, I would try to avoid really the main season.
So let's say Christmas, let's say Carnival Carnival week is normally in February, right after Carnival, there are the Dutch, the Netherlands, they have vacation. That's another week where it's super crowded. And, and, but the other weeks it's still okay.
You know, we're talking about when I say super.
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