A traveler's guide to St. Moritz
Plan two ski sectors, not one trail map. The town is the base. The far mountain is a bus or a train, and it is worth it.
St. Moritz is the ski resort in the Upper Engadin where the town is half the trip. Corviglia rises behind the palace hotels. Corvatsch and Diavolezza sit down the valley and ski differently. The lake freezes, the light is the famous thing, and the week costs what the town has always charged.
When to go
January through March. The Engadin is drier and sunnier than the northern Alps, which is the sales pitch and also true often enough. Corvatsch is the snow-sure backup. Holiday weeks fill the hotel dining rooms before they fill the pistes.
On the hill
Corviglia is the town mountain: sunny, intermediate, and easy to enter from St. Moritz Dorf or from Celerina and Corviglia's other doors. Corvatsch has the longer, higher skiing and the view down the valley. Diavolezza is the glacier and the Bernina outlook, a different pass and a different morning. Do not try to ski all three before lunch. The marked runs are the resort. The off-piste needs a guide, as it does everywhere serious.
Village and passes
Dorf is up the hill, Bad is by the lake, and they are not the same walk in ski boots. Trains and buses link the sectors more reliably than a taxi queue at 4 p.m. A pass that covers the valley is the one to buy if you want both mountains. The expensive hotels are the point for some people and optional for the skiing. Book them, or book outside them, on purpose.
If you only remember this
- Corviglia and Corvatsch are different days.
- Dorf and Bad are a bus ride apart in boots.
- The sunny reputation is not a guarantee. Bring the same storm kit.
- Diavolezza is the Bernina day. Give it a morning of its own.