Laax and Flims, Switzerland

Early morning rise ... 7am ready for the 7:30 "nice" breakfast .. in reality cereal and bread with homemade jams and dried fruit ... the bread was really nice, but the rest was "OK".

Being the first morning of the trip, it took a while to get sorted, then a walk backup to the ski lift, and exchanging money for a lift pass.

A long wait for the cable car, but finally underway .. packed in as usual we had managed to get a window view.
Up to Crap Sogn Gion, then in the same building into a second cable car, but timed to go quite quickly.

At Crap Masegn, it was time to venture out into the clouds. heading down to Fuorcla with aim for the highest point in the ski area.
Flat light and rustiness lead to the first  face plant of the trip. I did not see a steep drop and tangled the basket under a ski. Next I was sliding down fast trying to get my skis under me to stop.
Getting back up, pride diminished, Bryon pointed out my glasses had cut my cheek as I landed.  Time for the goggles.

Yet another enclosed lift ... this one a bubble lift, up to Vorab. We exited to some strong winds, however these came from the nearby pass and we dropped down to a feature of Bryon's nightmares - the T-bar lifts .. twin drags up to Vorab Gletscher ..  I originally wanted to drop over the Sattel, but with the flat light and my earlier indiscretion we returned to the Vorab station, hastily to get out of the bitter wind.
The drop was not so bad .. there was a little more definition to the surface and we were more awake ..  the bottom half was much flatter, gentle schuss territory.

Heading out along a cross slope track, with only enough gradient to move slowly, we headed down to Sogn Martin, and another Bubble lift ...  this one had the strange experience of "heated" seats .. most disconcerting..  The top at La Siala was empty, desolate concrete box, however the descent to Grauberg was with the wind behind us, and also had the added advantage of some nice powder as we cut the corners (little did we realize that this would be the last we would see this trip).

This now gave us access to the outer reaches of Flims - we wanted to investigate about a lift that seems to have disappeared from the maps that would make an excellent starting point for trips up the glacier.

Dropping down in the same general direction, we passed the Segneshutte checking out the descent routes from the glacier, but could not see much use. Looking across to Naraus we could see that, although the pylons remained there was no wire and no lift!!  time to rethink the plans for the glacier.

continuing to drop down, I could not find a suitable link to get through the trees to Foppa for the lift to Naraus, and we ended up dropping down to Flims via some slushy motorways. The biggest challenge was negotiating a foot bridge part way down.

In Flims, after a slight circumnavigation mistake, we were soon riding the chair back up to Foppa, then a second chair (both of which carried the skis rather than wearing them) and we arrived at Naraus. This was very run down and obviously suffering from the lack of the top lift. The sun was struggling through the clouds as we ate lunch looking over the valley.

Now we needed to get back to the start point ...  so plotted a speedy return ..  across to Startgels when we were lucky to catch the cable car just about to leave, preventing a long wait. Then from Grauberg we dropped down to Plaun -  a convoluted route to get down the deep gorge, almost returning to Sogn Martin. Taking the chair up to Crap Sogn Gion then heading down to Laax ...  we had wanted to take the spur to the village, but this seemed to be not marked anymore.

A walk back to the hostel and we were done for the day .. lots of Kilometers and height descended.

For dinner, we headed down into the village proper (as opposed to last night's foray to the new build area), and settled on another Italian Restaurant Romana .. this one dubbed "fat Benny's" as the chef was showing his indulgences. The walk there took us around the scenic route behind the hostel with views of the small lake. However the way back was more direct up the main road .. with the distraction of some lighted trees...
Early night with plans to go across the valley in the morning .. thoughts of the glacier put back until later .