The most beautiful trails in Valais with a local guide and private shuttle

You drop your bags at our guesthouse, your base camp for the week: a warm Valais building, a workshop to fine-tune your bike, and a terrace with a direct view of the Mont Blanc massif, the roof of Europe turning golden at sunset. Here you're not a passing customer: you live the week like a local, with people who ride.

Welcome drink on the terrace to meet the rest of the crew and your guide, who is also your host: a local guide, born in these valleys, who knows every trail in the canton and will tell you why the Valaisans have been carving bisses into the rock since the Middle Ages, how the sun-blackened wooden villages have stood for centuries, or what the cow fights really are. Then the table d'hôtes: dried meat and alpine cheese, local platter and regional wine, a relaxed briefing for the week, tomorrow's weather and the first spot on the programme.

You set up your suspension in the workshop if needed, check your brake pads, and fall asleep facing the peaks: tomorrow starts strong.

We load the bikes into the Exo'bus and head for the Upper Valais for a shuttle day just as we like them: the van goes up, you go down, and we start again. Around Moosalp and Jeizinen, the trails wind at altitude between alpine pastures and larch forests, on ground that invites you to link corners without ever breaking the rhythm.

Towards Leuk, the drier climate and the light of the Upper Valais give the trails a more mineral feel, with the Imperial Crown, Weisshorn, Dom and Matterhorn, lined up on the horizon; around Stalden and Turtmann, the terrain turns wilder, away from the main valleys, for rawer, more committed descents. Trails you'd never find on your own, and a guide who explains along the way why French is spoken at his home and German forty kilometres further up the same valley, in the same canton: that's the advantage of riding with a local.

Over 5'000 m of descent on the counter by the end of the day, back to the guesthouse, bike on the workshop stand, beer on the terrace facing Mont Blanc and dinner with the crew, with the day's stories and those of the valley.

Change of rhythm: today is a tour day, point to point with your pack on your back. From Crans-Montana, several cable cars take you to nearly 3'000 m, at the edge of the Plaine Morte glacier, in a lunar setting of scree and snowfields, with the Valais 4'000-metre peaks lined up on the other side of the valley.

The descent is the Valais in a nutshell: ridges and mineral landscapes, a turquoise mountain lake, a dizzying bisse you follow along the balcony, those irrigation channels cut into the cliff that farmers have maintained for six centuries to bring glacier water down to the vineyards, then the forest and its fast singletracks all the way to the plain. A varied all-mountain route, to be savoured without rushing, picnic break facing the panorama included.

Back to the guesthouse by Exo'bus, active recovery on the terrace: tomorrow, the big descents are back.

Back to the shuttles, in the heart of the central Valais and its four regions with strongly marked characters. In the Val d'Hérens, the trails link tight corners and short pedal sections through the forests around Thyon, on ground that demands precision without ever breaking the rhythm, with the Grande Dixence dam, the highest gravity dam in the world, as a backdrop, and the sun-blackened mazot villages where the local patois is still spoken.

In Anniviers, the terrain opens up and the trails gain speed: wide lines, solid berms and views running out to the surrounding summits. On the Crans-Montana side, the tracks alternate jumps, banked corners and fast forest sections; at Conthey, the drier ground gives way to flowing trails. You can race the front of the group or cruise at the back: everyone at their own pace.

At least five rotations and over 5'000 m of descent on the counter, lunch break at an alpine hut, and a quiet evening at the house: Valais raclette, as it should be, and the story of this cheese that has been scraped since the 16th century.

Early start towards the east of the canton and the Aletsch Arena, in the heart of the Jungfrau-Aletsch Unesco site. The lifts of Mörel, Betten and Fiesch take you to the viewpoints of the Moosfluh, the Bettmerhorn and the Eggishorn, from where the Aletsch glacier, 23 km of ice, the longest in the Alps, unfolds before your eyes.

The day is a succession of rotations with the cable cars: panoramic alpine singletracks, long and varied descents towards the car-free villages of Riederalp and Bettmeralp, then down to the valley floor, and up we go again. 4'750 m of descent for barely 500 m of climbing, with the glacier as an almost permanent backdrop.

It's one of those days everyone still talks about years later, it's that exceptional: few places in the world let you ride an alpine singletrack with 23 km of ice below. Late return to the guesthouse, a well-earned dinner and the day's stories on the terrace.

Today your guide takes you to his backyard: the Lower Valais, between Bagnes, Orsières, Fully, the Col du Lein and the Col des Planches, the whole playground of the region packed into a single shuttle day. Trails cut out for riders who want big descents and singletracks with bite.

A real festival of trails, each one flowier than the last, in the larch forests above the Rhône valley, between terraced vineyards and forgotten passes, with more technical passages for those who want them and always the option of riding at the group's pace. Your guide knows every corner: this is where he learned to ride, and along the way he shows you the trails the maps don't mention. He and the shuttle driver only release you once the 5'000 m of descent mark is passed: no fewer than five rotations.

Evening at the guesthouse, a stone's throw from the day's spots: Mont Blanc view, table d'hôtes and the day's debrief, heavy legs and a wide smile.

Whether for its finely shaped bike park tracks or its many enduro lines, you quickly understand why Verbier has established itself as one of the best MTB spots in the Alps, from the Verbier E-Bike Festival to Enduro World Series rounds.

After a proper warm-up on the bike park tracks, your guide shows you the wildest trails and the best descending options in the area, lifts included: natural lines, rock gardens and forest singletracks down to Le Châble, with the Combins as a backdrop.

Last evening at the guesthouse: drinks on the terrace facing Mont Blanc, farewell dinner and the week's photos.

One last breakfast on the terrace, facing the Mont Blanc massif, legs heavy from six days of trails and a head full of images. No riding today: we take the time to pack the bags, clean the bikes in the workshop and go over the week around a coffee.

Contacts and photos are shared, your guide gives his last tips for what comes next and one final Valais story, then you leave at your own pace during the morning, bags full of memories and your mind already on the next time.

Ready to live a week of mountain biking in the Valais like a local? Small group, limited places: book yours and come ride the finest trails of the Valais with the crew.