Most bikes are in the garage by the end of December. Ours are on the trailer. The Valais is the driest canton in Switzerland, and the south-facing slopes at the bottom of the valley hold dry, rideable dirt long after the season is supposed to be over.
That is the whole idea behind the Winter Solstice days: the shortest days of the year, the best light of the year, and a target of 5,000 metres of descent while everyone else is waiting for spring.
Why the Valais still rides at the end of December
Two things make it work. The valley is dry, so the ground does not turn into the slop you get elsewhere at this time of year. And the sunny side of the lower valley sits low enough and faces the right way, so the snow line stays well above the trails we use.
It is a weather window rather than a guarantee, which is exactly why these days are guided. The valley is picked in the days before, not months in advance, and if the window closes the day moves.
The challenge: 5,000 metres when daylight lasts eight hours
In June you can be casual about time. In December you cannot. The target is the same 5,000 metres of descent, with roughly half the daylight to do it in, so the rotations are cut to the minute and the bus is moving while you are still taking your gloves off.
It is the most efficient shuttle day of the year, and it is also the one where being ready at nine actually matters.
The light is the real reason to come
At the end of December the sun never gets high. It rakes across the slope all day instead of dropping straight down, the air is clear and cold, and the whole valley looks like the two good hours of a summer evening, stretched out from nine in the morning until it goes dark.
Riders who come once for the challenge come back for this. Photographs from these days do not look like photographs from July, and neither does the riding.
The cold, and what changes in the pack
Winter shuttling is not summer shuttling in a jacket. What actually matters:
- Layers you can take off on the way up. You will be cold in the bus and warm two minutes into the descent, every rotation, all day.
- Hands. This is the thing that ends winter days early. Warm gloves for the descents, a spare dry pair, and levers set up so you are not gripping harder than you need to.
- Clear lenses. Low sun and shaded forest in the same run, and tinted lenses make the second half of that a guess.
- Lights, if the day runs late. Some Solstice days end with a run in the dark, which is not a hardship, it is the best part.
- Something hot in a flask. Nobody regrets this one.
What it actually looks like
We did five days of enduro in the Valais in the middle of winter, night run included, and wrote the whole thing up. That account is the honest version, weather included.
Prices, dates and private days
Same structure as the rest of the season: CHF 95 guided with a certified guide, mechanical support, the spare bike and the photos, or from CHF 45 for self-guided uplift if your group already knows what it wants. Over the festive period the code XMASRIDE takes 20 percent off registration for the Winter Solstice days.
A private day for your own group can be built anywhere in the Valais, winter included, which is often the better option in December because a small group moves faster through a short day.
The dates are online. What is on board and guided or self-guided cover the rest.
Chris
