Grimentz - Zinal Snowboarding

Southeast of Sion and south of Sierre, the Grimentz-Zinal region is located in a spectacular valley that is truly an undiscovered treasure. There are many Swiss snowboarders that feel it has the best slopes in the Alps. The interconnected Grimentz-Zinal ski area has 13 lifts accessing roughly 34 pistes totaling 115km with a maximum vertical of 1,200m. The lifts and pistes interconnect the villages of Zinal (1,670m), Grimentz (1,570m) and St Jean (1,327m). The newer cable car links the snowboarding routes from Zinal and Grimentz.

Although not well known to most snowboarders, the Sorebois sector of Grimentz-Zinal has a large freeride zone for expert snowboarders called Gardes Bordon. The freeride zone offers unsigned, ungroomed pistes spread over 100 hectares that are only open when the Avalanche Level is #1 or #2. One of the best routes is Piste Du Chamois that runs all the way down to Grimentz.

The Grimentz-Zinal ski area is part of the larger Val d’Anniviers Ski Region interconnecting by bus with Chandonlin-St Luc ski area and the Vercorin ski area. Overall, Val d’Anniviers offers 220km of pistes served by a total of 45 lifts that semi-interconnect 12 villages. While Grimentz is a quaint village, there is very little apres ski or nightlife to speak of. With that said, you can always check out Chez Florio at the base for apres ski, and then try Country Pub, Domino or Disco Shaddock for some nightlife.

To reach the snowboarding at Grimentz Ski Area by air, the closest major airports are Geneva and Bern, which are both about 2.5 hours away. There is also a small airport in Sion.

To reach Grimentz by train, the near railway station is in Sierre, which is about 25km away. There is a regular Post Bus from the Sion Train Station.

Overall, Grimentz - Zinal is the 31st most popular snowboard & freeride destination of all 80 snowboarding resorts in Switzerland.