Skiing in Europe, in August, surely not…..

A good friend of the ski-concierge team recently returned from a holiday in the Italian Alps and has kindly authored the following post.

“One of the highest resorts in the alps is a rather unnattractive little resort called Cervinia. Or if you are feeling brave Breuil Cervinia to give it it’s full French Italian name. It is twinned with the much nicer and far prettier Zermatt in Switzerland and on good days you can ski both resorts very well. In summer you would have thought that the place would be deserted except for a few mountain climbers and walkers and with the resort being under the shadow of the beautiful Matterhorn mountain (the picture at the start of the Paramount hollywood films), there certainly are plenty of both. However, Cervinia/Zermatt has a secret up their sleeves, well a secret that most of us don’t know about, but the ski teams of Europe certainly do. The glacier. Which means that you can actually ski all year round in Cervnia. It is not for the faint hearted, because mostly it is the most highly skilled and trained who are there, whizzing down the slalom courses or taking big air in the half pipe that is built each year, ensuring that their skills are not getting rusty.

Summer skiing in Cervinia

It is a wonderful sight to behold. Beautiful scenery, especially as high as the skiing here goes (circa 3500m), coupled with some of the most amazing skiers and snow boarders (with a few amatuers dotted around) all under a beautiful blue sky. The sun is out along with a lot of happy faces and generally lots of fun is being had all round with a good atmosphere. It is a surreal experience and one everyone should undertake at least once in their lifetime.

The upsides are the fact that you are skiing in August, the downsides are that skiing is from 7am until 1pm (the snow becomes too slushy after that) and it is still 41 euros for the (half) day, with only around five or six slopes to explore. But hey, skiing in sunshine, with people wearing t-shirts and shorts is fabulous and for this snow boarder who gets withdrawels during the summer periods it is a way of starving off the summer blues…

Oh, and if you do decide to go, don’t forget your walking boots, your mountain bike and your golf clubs (there is an eighteen hole golf course in Cervinia)…

What more could you want from a real summer break? Who needs a beach, grab your skis and your boards and go to Europe!”

Thanks for the great post Neil.