GstaadLife

 
For those of you who find yourself moaning about the lack of challenging skiing in Gstaad: or groaning about how our ski areas are not inter-connected. Well, pipe down and get yourself over to Lenk - yes that Lenk, down to Zweisimmen, turn right, all the way along the valley to the town, then left up to Bühlberg at the first intersection. Make sure you leave Gstaad no later than quarter past the hour, as the mountain road to Bühlberg is strictly direction up in a ten-minute window beginning at quarter to the hour (driving up to Bühlberg saves you having to slum it in the big gondola from Lenk). Park the car right next to the ski lift, snap on your skis, and from there you can enjoy endless runs, all day sunshine, some tricky blacks, wide, fast big-carvin' reds, and never the same run twice unless you want to. You can even test your skills on the men's downhill run above Adelboden (watch it because it's still icy from the race in January). Even this year, the on-piste snow quality is inexplicably good, and this despite the fact that the snow-making is limited (ok it's high, ranging from 1'600 to 2'400 meters). For eats, skip the mass market Berghaus scene at Hahnenmoos and Sillerenbühl, and ski down towards Aebi at the back end of the ski area. About a third of the way down, you'll pass by the sun-soaked Alphütte Chüebodmi (+41.79.335 27 48), where the Swiss farmer and his Japanese wife will surprise with delicious noodle dishes, open sushi, a simple green salad with a stunning miso dressing, flavorsome barbecued steaks, an engaging Syrah from Wallis, and other Swiss-Japanese specialities all prepared with a touch of gourmet that goes beyond the same-old-thing from most alpine huts in Saanenland. In a recent survey on 20Minuten.ch, the Swiss voted the Lenk-Adelboden ski area as the 5th best in the land. They're not wrong. Let us know how you get on.

 
On March 20 2011 the Ermitage Golf Hotel in Schönried closes its doors for a complete renovation. The main building will be pulled down to be replaced by two completely new buildings on the site now occupied by the existing structure and the beach volleyball court. The militantly-naked wellness area will be enlarged and modernized. The top floors of the new buildings will feature 8 apartments and the new hotel will have 95 rooms instead of the current 78. So what, we hear you say, another Gstaad-Saanenland renovation. But the amazing thing about this one is that all of the above will be done for a reopening date planned for December 21 of this(!) year 2011.

Looking for some action this coming weekend? Here are some possibilities: all weekend the Curling Swiss Championships are taking place at the Sportzentrum in Gstaad (see picture below); Friday February 25 2011 sees Snow Night Gstaad at 19h30 at the Gstaad skischool area (see video of last year's event above); on Saturday February 26 2011 we have the 25 heures freeride Dominique Perret on the Wispile from 11h00 to 17h00 (due to the snow conditions it's not actually 25 hours this year, but who's counting); and Sunday February 27 2011 we can offer up the wooden sledge race in Saanenmöser at 12h30 from the middle station of the Saanersloch gondola (see picture bottom).

We have to admit that we had not heard of them before, but this seems to be a big faux pas in Switzerland - the actors Isabelle von Siebenthal and Hans Schenker are national celebrities as a result of Swiss soap Lüthi und Blanc which ran on SF1 every week, 288 episodes in total. We found quite an amusing video in Swiss German (above) and post it with the hope that they will be as good hosts as they are actors.

February 12 2011: The Bertarelli Foundation and the Blue Marine Foundation held a convention for the protection of the oceans at the Grand Hotel Park. SFr 1.2 million were raised for the good cause.

 
In Sunday's nationwide vote regarding new measures for tighter gun control, 20 of 26 cantons and 56.3% of voters rejected the proposal to no longer allow current and former military personnel to keep their weapons at home.  The table above shows how gun-mad Saanenland is, with over 77% of local residents in favor the keeping of weapons at home. Interestingly Geneva was one of the few cantons which voted in favor of the plan. There are an estimated 2 to 3 million guns in Switzerland (nobody knows exactly how many because there is no national registry of fire arms), and soldiers have been allowed to keep their weapons at home since World War II. This vote ensures that this militia tradition will continue, and will probably also mean Switzerland will maintain its place at the top of another less desirable ranking: the number one country in Europe for gun-related suicide.

by Gottfried von Siebenthal

On December 16 2010, 88 year-old film producer Blake Edwards died after severe illness in Santa Monica, USA. A good forty years ago, Blake Edwards came for the first time, together with his wife Julie Andrews and their five children, to Gstaad. Both were so enthralled with the village that two years later they bought their own chalet. For a few years, the three younger kids were sent to school in Saanenland, which made their contact to the village and its people all-the-more intensive.

by Hans-Ueli Tschanz. Article published in Gstaad My Love Magazine in December 2010 just prior to the death of Blake Edwards on December 16 2010.

The world-famous Julie Andrews turned 75 on October 1, 2010. For the past 40 years, the Hollywood and Broadway star and her husband, producer Blake Edwards, have spent their holidays in Gstaad. They feel at home here, they have raised their children here, and it is here that they find strength for their new projects. Some of her greatest cinematic successes originated in their Gstaad chalet, the 'Fleur de Lys'. Julie once gave Christmas lighting as a gift to the town of Gstaad to the amazement of the guests and locals alike. She also committed herself personally for the benefit of Gstaad’s film festival, CINEMUSIC, in the 1990’s by way of various performances and by using her own personal relationships within the film industry. In an exclusive conversation, she offers details about their personal memories of the many years spent in Gstaad and her deep bond with our region. She ended the conversation with this sentence “I hope that you can understand how much I love Gstaad”.

This year sees the 13th edition of the High Fly in Saanen Rüblidorf. Saanenlander Jamie Reichenbach (pictured above) and his team High Fly will be amongst the international competitors.

 
The board of the Gstaad-Saanenland tourism has finally made its decision for a new tourism director. And the winner is: Martin Bachofner, 38 years old, from Moosseedorf. The somewhat unexpected part of it is that he so far had nothing to do with tourism in his career. He started off with an apprenticeship at an insurance company, studied law at the University of St. Gallen, worked for Credit Suisse, has an MBA for entrepreneurship from Liechtenstein and won the Swiss TV show 'Traumjob', (the Swiss version of 'The Apprentice') which earned him a SFr 200'000 job at Marquard Media. Quite a CV, and from May he will run the tourism business in Gstaad. Young, bright, and hopefully full of new ideas. Welcome to Saanenland and good luck from GstaadLife.com!