Silvretta Montafon 1/29/2025 Valisera/Garfrescha. Includes Golm 1/30/2025

Today was a day removed after downpours and 8-10 inches of terribly wet and heavy snow. I was wondering how that combined with elevation and aspect would play a role in the conditions as is talked about here so often. I was not expecting it to be great. That said I am not a snow purist either so YMMV. Truth be told for all things considered. The day was beautiful. ~34 degrees, mostly sunny.

Started at Valiseria lifts and did some warm up runs and then moved on to the upper sections of Valiseria and Rinderhutte. As with any new place it takes some time to figure out the topography lifts and take in the sights. Today was no different except this sector finally gave SCALE so much more so than even the Hochjoch section. And for being a “medium” sized place the size pretty cool to see in person what I’ve seen in pics on the forums for many years. I intended on ending the day checking out the Nova section but apparently cut too far below the access and ended up down a great long blue that was really in my wheelhouse but ended up at bottom of Vermiel / Garfrescha. Currently not super interesting due to zero snow toward the valley. There is definitely potential in the treed area for pow days. It had a N. Rockies feel to it with the conifers.. I never did make it to Nova, the clock ran out.

Lines short to nonexistent. Snow was largely hard pack, scratchy in places, warmed up and velvety in places but to my surprise nothing too terrible. The off piste was shredded from the day before so it was obviously skiable…then…but the tiniest bit I dabbled in was pretty heavy and truly not fun or worth the fight. Proof of this was pretty much zero people were in it today save a few that were obviously flawless all condition skiers.


Here I thought toting these on planes was ambitious. Strollers seemingly everywhere on the terraces.

Looks nice! Did you ski the entire time at Silvretta Montafon?

Hah, my Fohrenburger pic from the summit of Golm. Each region has its own omnipresent local beer.

jamesdeluxe said:

Looks nice! Did you ski the entire time at Silvretta Montafon?

Hah, my Fohrenburger pic from the summit of Golm. Each region has its own omnipresent local beer.

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I did not…
And as long as you mentioned it…I did goto to Golm for three hours on Thursday. Not much of a report. So I’ll just notate it here. Was a pretty monochrome day there now two days removed from the rain and snow. Visibility was really flat at times and never got above good. Pistes were rock hard and the loads of kids didn’t help. Some trails off the upper Golmerjoch down to base of Diabolo had the best snow. Ironically the softer, mildly slushy stuff on the lower trails going to the parking lot was actually nice to ski on there was just not much of it. Nice views but not sure I’d break my neck going here again. It kinda all felt like the exact same pitch on 85% of the hill.

After 3 hours here. I went back to the inn. Checked out and headed to Chur. Next on tap: Tschiertschen for some legit local flavor.



I did find these posters of the different lift from the era cool.




Buddy was just chillin.

jnelly said:

Next on tap: Tschiertschen for some legit local flavor.

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Excellent! I just checked and five years after my last visit (the final day before all skiing was shut down Alps-wide due to the pandemic), they're still running the "Pistenknüller" special on weekdays -- attractive advert below. 49 CHF ($53) includes lift ticket and lunch at any of the five mountain restaurants (Hühnerköpfe and Furgglis were both pleasant, but cash-only/maybe that's changed?). You have to purchase your day pass on their site.

Not quite the screaming deal that I got back then ($29), but a lot better than in the States. Atypical amongst Swiss ski areas, there's no 5 CHF parking fee.

Looks like bluebird on Monday, enjoy the 100% natural snow!

jnelly said:

the tiniest bit I dabbled in was pretty heavy and truly not fun or worth the fight. Proof of this was pretty much zero people were in it today save a few that were obviously flawless all condition skiers.

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This is something I encounter in the Alps fairly often -- skiers carving perfect GS turns on steep rock-hard boilerplate or effortlessly gliding through manky offpiste as if it were chalky powder. They just deal with whatever the conditions are in situations where I (and apparently you) say "nah." For example, I noted it in this Dec 2023 report halfway down ("The ungroomed snow stiffened up on this facet while approaching mid-mountain. It didn't bother this guy though").

There are obviously North Americans with this skill (Tony and I have cited @Patrick); however, it seems far more prevalent in Europe. Hopefully I'll be able to do that in my next life!

jamesdeluxe said:

Excellent! I just checked and five years after my last visit (the final day before all skiing was shut down Alps-wide due to the pandemic), they're still running the "Pistenknüller" special on weekdays -- attractive advert below. 49 CHF ($53) includes lift ticket and lunch at any of the five mountain restaurants (Hühnerköpfe and Furgglis were both pleasant, but cash-only/maybe that's changed?). You have to purchase your day pass on their site.

Not quite the screaming deal that I got back then ($29), but a lot better than in the States. Atypical amongst Swiss ski areas, there's no 5 CHF parking fee.

Looks like bluebird on Monday, enjoy the 100% natural snow!

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Boom! I had the Pistenknuller bookmarked from a while back. It was the last day it was available (Jan 31st) for this part of the season. I was able to get it and even told a kid in the parking lot about it who never heard of it…pro tips from gringo to local, gotta love that. Except they didn’t really tell me a beverage must be purchased with it for $5 so when I went to leave lunch I got yelled at for “must pay!” then a small standoff with the dude running the Hutte; who graciously jacked me up for $8usd for a glass of tap water.. I have mixed feeling on things like that. I’m alone, minding my business and very respectful of people’s cultures and customers even when not speaking the native tongue. Ie. I try not to be THAT tourist. Point being I get it, truly. I can’t read the flier I got with the pistenknuller so bad on me…I guess… However I can’t picture ANY place or business in the US that would demand you pay for tap water in lieu of you not getting a bottle/can of beverage. Particularly if there a genuine misunderstanding. Nothing lost other than some pride in a 2 table hut....well and 8 bucks! LOL. Credit where credit is due. The pasta bolognese was slamming.

jamesdeluxe said:

...where I (and apparently you) say "nah."

There are obviously North Americans with this skill (Tony and I have cited @Patrick); however, it seems far more prevalent in Europe. Hopefully I'll be able to do that in my next life!

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100% agreed on this. I have a reference to this on my Arosa report I'll try to post later today. Big picture, leaving some untracked-untracked at the same time as keeping my knees INTACT is my default. All of the small powder skiing ive done has been in light, dry virgin snow and the cut/chop I actually like and seek out was in the same snow...not days old dense. I'm simply not proficient enough in it.

The speed at which some of these guys/gals were going was crazy (impressive)..Beautiful to watch some of them as you say effortlessly ski. The lengths and width of these runs make that seemingly much more possible than most of the stuff Ive witnessed here in NA. I'd add it took me until the last day to utilize that piste width and "ski outside the box" in terms of actually using that width to its advantage. Just not used to that much real estate here.

jnelly said:

they didn’t really tell me a beverage must be purchased with it for $5 so when I went to leave lunch I got yelled at for “must pay!” then a small standoff with the dude running the Hutte; who graciously jacked me up for $8usd for a glass of tap water

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WTF? That's not cool. I don't recall any fine print about purchasing a beverage. I would've told you beforehand! That is often a challenge when you ski at locals joints -- you can't expect that the people there are going to speak top-notch English (sometimes they barely speak any) or have translations on signage.

The opposite of ^^ that happened during my first visit there in March 2018 -- the Hühnerköpfe (chicken heads) restaurant comped me a $25 lunch when I didn't have any cash and refused to accept it after I skied down and got some from an ATM at the base! See above, about the upsides of speaking the language.