Skiing
St Moritz Ski Resort
The skiing takes place in three main areas, and between them they offer an impressive 350km of pistes.
The Corviglia area is adjacent to St Moritz itself, which has a very respectable resort altitude of 1,800m, and rises up to the Piz Nair summit at 3,057m.
This region, which is well equipped with snow-making systems, comprises mainly broad, sunny slopes ideally suited to good intermediates. There are plenty of efficient high-speed chair lifts, but queues can still occur, especially at peak weekend dates.
The biggest queuing bottleneck tends to be at the base of the cable car that runs up from Corviglia itself to Piz Nair and gives access to some of the more challenging runs in this sector, both on and off piste.
The Corvatsch area lies across the valley from St Moritz at Surlej (1,870m), and is generally reached by shuttle bus. (A car can be useful for getting between the different ski areas, but you need to be sure of having somewhere to park it at night.)
The slopes here rise up to a glacial area at 3,451m, and many of them have a northerly orientation so that snow remains in good condition well into the spring. (The first stage of the two-stage cable car here has been renewed with a much higher-capacity model so queuing problems should be fewer.)
There is a spectacular long red run from the Piz Corvatsch to Margun Vegl. From here you can work your way over to Alp Margun and on across to the Furtschellas sector, also accessible by cable car from Sils Maria on the valley floor, where there is a good array of red and black pistes.
The third of St Moritz’s main ski areas is Diavolezza-Lagalb. This is reached either by bus or train, and it is actually two separate mountains, each rising up to almost 3,000m, which lie on opposite sides of the valley. (A shuttle bus links the two base stations.)
Diavolezza is served by one main cable car and offers some excellent north-facing pistes on its front side and a very popular off-piste route off the back. This runs across a glacier and down a valley beneath the Piz Bernina, and comes out at Morteratsch. Lagalb has gentler, west- facing slopes, which are served by a single cable car.
The Engadine is an exceptionally good area for cross-country skiers, with 150km of trails. Many of them are located close to the village of Pontresina, which is reached by bus or train from St Moritz.
Snowboarders might think such a long-established resort as St Moritz is not for them. On the contrary, this is a fashion-conscious destination, and boarders abound here. The slopes of Corviglia are especially popular with them.