Pure mountain adventure on the Alpine Circle

Last fall, I embarked on an extra­or­di­nary adven­ture. My pro­gramme includ­ed the Alpine Cir­cle, which com­bines all the high­lights of the Grisons and a side trip to Tici­no in one tour.

The great thing about this tour was that I was able to tai­lor the basic route Laax – Locarno – St. Moritz to suit my inter­ests. The vari­ety of expe­ri­ences and oppor­tu­ni­ties for detours into the local moun­tains are tru­ly end­less here.

Three youth hostels – countless sights

The fol­low­ing youth hos­tels were booked as fixed points for accom­mo­da­tion:

• Laax wellnessHostel3000
• Locarno Youth Hos­tel
• St. Moritz Youth Hos­tel

The train ride auto­mat­i­cal­ly took me past the four main sights of the Alpine Cir­cle: the Rhine Gorge, the Swiss Nation­al Park, the Diav­olez­za glac­i­er world and the Rhaet­ian Rail­way Land­wass­er Viaduct near Fil­isur.

Of course, there were many oth­er attrac­tions to dis­cov­er. In the end, I was lucky enough to encounter all the facets of the Swiss autumn in terms of weath­er.

Mystical mist and wellness in Laax

On the rainy jour­ney to Laax by train and Post­Bus, I ben­e­fit­ed for the first time from the Rhaet­ian Rail­way graubün­den Pass: This GA Trav­el­card for the Grisons gives you unlim­it­ed trav­el on Graubün­den (Grisons) pub­lic trans­port.

As the weath­er gave me more mist than sun­shine, I decid­ed to go to the rows of stones from the Bronze Age in Falera. There, I caught a few shy rays of sun­shine against the colour­ful autumn back­drop.

In the evening, I treat­ed myself at the youth hos­tel – to some well­ness for all the sens­es with a deli­cious plant-based cur­ry at Restau­rant Biblau and a relax­ing break in the Aua Gra­va well­ness area.

In good weath­er, the moun­tain autumn in the Sur­sel­va region is won­der­ful­ly var­ied. You can find inspi­ra­tion here in the Overnight Blog.

Serpentines from Laax to Locarno

This stage excit­ed me: In turns, I was amazed by the incline, the many bends, viaducts and the fan­tas­tic view – but it was a bit tricky in terms of plan­ning. The route went through Ander­matt (in the can­ton of Uri) and thus out of my tick­et com­fort zone. But the lady at the tick­et office in Dis­en­tis quick­ly helped me out, so I was able to con­tin­ue on the Mat­ter­horn Got­thard Bahn towards the Ober­alp Pass with­out any wor­ries.

I also just missed the time win­dow when the Post­Bus ser­vices the «king of pass­es,» i.e. the Got­thard Pass (last year, the last trip of the sea­son was on 9 Octo­ber). Instead, I caught a glimpse of the famous Devil’s Bridge in the Schöl­lenen Gorge on the steep train descent from Ander­matt to Gösch­enen.

Tip:

Any­one wish­ing to pho­to­graph the spec­ta­cle with­out chang­ing seats is advised to sit at the train win­dow on the right (in the direc­tion of trav­el).

My castle extra: A detour to Bellinzona

On arrival at Locarno Youth Hos­tel, I was already look­ing for­ward to the extend­ed stopover – includ­ing la dolce vita on Lake Mag­giore and a cas­tle hike in near­by Bellinzona.

The best place to start the cas­tle tour is at the tourist infor­ma­tion office. There, they gave me a map of the cir­cu­lar route through the UNESCO World Her­itage Site and warned me that the third cas­tle was quite high up. How­ev­er, tired legs and good cam­eras still allow an impres­sive view of the stone giant in the for­est (Castel­lo di Sas­so Cor­baro).

My favourite:

Walk­ing across the wide walls of Cas­tel Grande real­ly took my breath away.

Off to Italy on the Bernina Express Bus

Well-rest­ed, I con­tin­ued my extra­or­di­nary trav­el expe­ri­ence on to Italy, board­ing the red-and-white Bern­i­na Express Bus at Stazione Nord in Lugano. Be care­ful, the bus stops a bit out of the way (hence the tip: Stazione Nord).

Lunch at Piaz­za Basil­i­ca in Tira­no treat­ed me to a very spe­cial encounter: The Bern­i­na Express nois­i­ly crossed the inter­sec­tion in front of the pil­grim­age church before my very eyes!

Things get real­ly excit­ing from Tira­no: This sec­tion of the RhB UNESCO World Her­itage route took me on the Bern­i­na Express panoram­ic car through spec­tac­u­lar Alpine land­scapes on Europe’s high­est rail­way tracks. Not only is it the steep­est rail­way line in the world, it also pass­es through a total of 55 tun­nels and cross­es 196 bridges.

By the way, the Bern­i­na Express is cel­e­brat­ing its birth­day this year: For no less than 50 years, it has been trans­port­ing its guests up to the eter­nal ice, through rugged gorges and – in my case – past radi­ant autumn forests. There is even cur­rent­ly a chance to win a ride in your own panoram­ic car for you and your loved ones: 50 years of the Bern­i­na Express.

Golden larch in St. Moritz

I was also greet­ed by bright yel­low larch­es in St. Moritz. In autumn, they not only frame the award-win­ning youth hos­tel (Ibex Fairstay Award) but they also enhance almost any panoram­ic pho­to tak­en in the famous tourist resort.

The next morn­ing, after an abun­dant break­fast, I took the oppor­tu­ni­ty to admire Lake St. Moritz in all its colours.

If you have more time than me, you can try the Diav­olez­za glac­i­er expe­ri­ence, the Engadin lakes or plan a cul­tur­al tour of St. Moritz.

The Albula Line rocks

The last big route deci­sion that I had to make before return­ing home: Should I take the Albu­la Line or the Flüela Pass?

I didn’t have to think for long, as I def­i­nite­ly want­ed to check off the must-vis­it place near Fil­isur, the impres­sive Land­wass­er Viaduct. To do this, take the Albu­la Line (towards Chur).

With my head and my phone full of impres­sions, I arrived home hap­py. I won’t be for­get­ting this fan­tas­tic and var­ied round trip any time soon!