Your Winter in the Évolène Region

At the head of the Val d’Hérens, winter keeps a face that is now rare in the Valais: a lived-in mountain, with no vast lift system and no queues. The Évolène region, of which Arolla is the highest hamlet, lives the cold season at the pace of its farms, its larch forests and its ridges that turn pink at daybreak. From the Grand Hôtel & Kurhaus, at 2,000 metres, you touch that authentic winter the moment you step outside.

Skiing on a human scale

The Arolla ski area stays family-sized: a few drag lifts, pistes facing Mont-Collon and the Pigne d’Arolla (3,796 m), and the feeling of skiing almost alone. Lower down, the Évolène–La Forclaz and Les Masses–Thyon areas widen the choice for those who want to vary the slopes. Here you come less for the mileage than for the silence and the quality of the snow, dry and cold at this altitude.

Ski touring and snowshoeing

This is surely the finest way to live the Arolla winter. Ski-touring routes open straight from the village, towards the Tsa valleys or the approaches to the huts. On snowshoes, the walk to the frozen Blue Lake or through the larch forest makes a day within everyone’s reach. To venture higher, it is wise to go with a guide from Hérens Montagne, who knows the snow and its moods.

Cross-country, dog sledding and the rest

The valley also lends itself to cross-country skiing along the Borgne, and each winter hosts dog-sled races in the Évolène region. Between outings, you wander the villages with their brown timber barns, sit down to a raclette, and let an afternoon drift by in the hotel lounge, book in hand.

Traditions still alive

The Évolène region is one of the last in the Valais where the patois is still spoken every day and where carnival keeps its masked figures, the empaillés. It is this continuity, more than any attraction, that makes a winter here so precious: a mountain land that has not forgotten where it comes from.

Winter in Évolène does not try to impress: it invites you to slow down. You ski in the morning, walk in the afternoon, come back into the warm at night — and you understand why you return.