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Zermatt, ValaisThoughtaccess
The ridgeline above the village, early in the season

A chalet of 1961, four floors on a stone base

Sixteen rooms, one stube, and a basement that held skis for fifty years before it held anything else.

Village
1,608 m
Rooms
Sixteen
Built
1961
Tables
Four

The chalet

Stone to the ground floor ceiling, larch above it

Built in 1961 by a family that had farmed the slope behind it, in the years when Zermatt turned from a climbing village into a resort. The base is local gneiss, laid by a mason from Randa. Above it the frame is larch, boarded in larch, and the roof is at eighteen degrees, which is shallow and correct for this valley: a steep roof here dumps its snow on whoever is walking past.

Nothing has been added to the outside. The balconies are the 1961 balconies with new rails. The windows were replaced in 2018 to the same divisions, which cost more and looks right.

The building in detail

Section through the chalet A stone base holds the basement and the ground floor. Three timber floors of rooms sit on it under a shallow roof. The basement, which was the ski cellar and boot room until 2011, is now the gaming room, one flight below reception. Third floor, four rooms Second floor, six rooms First floor, six rooms Ground: reception, stube, drying room Basement: the old ski cellar, now the gaming room larch boarding, roof at 18 degrees stone base
Four floors on a stone base, with the basement under all of it.

Rooms

Sixteen rooms in three grades, named after what you see from them

Six on the first floor lined in the original larch. Six on the second, relined in ash in 2014. Four under the roof with the deep dormers. Twelve of the sixteen face south, which in a valley this narrow is the difference between four hours of sun in January and none.

No room has a television. Every room has a balcony or a dormer seat, a wardrobe that will take ski clothing, and a window that opens inward so snow does not stop it.

All sixteen

A larch-lined room with the low bed under the window

The basement

The casino room is the old ski cellar, one floor below reception

It is a room of this chalet. The casino floor holds four tables and a bar, and it opens five evenings a week. From 1961 until 2011 this was the ski cellar and boot room: racks down both walls, a boot heater at the end, and a smell that anybody who skied in that period will remember. The racks came out when the village built the depot by the station. The brackets are still bolted to the wall and have been left there.

From reception you cross to the stair beside the drying room and go down one flight. Twenty paces and the flight, all of it inside the building, which in February is the entire point. A member of staff keeps that door through every hour of opening, and the rule there is 18 with photographic identification on every visit.

What is down there

Ground floor and basement, with the walk from reception The entrance opens on reception. The stair down stands beside the drying room. In the basement the gaming room takes the street half and the plant and store take the back. The route never leaves the building. Ground floor Entrance Reception Stube Stair down Basement Gaming room four tables, one bar Plant, store, drying twenty paces and one flight, inside the building
Ground floor and basement, with the walk drawn between them.

The valley

No cars, three lifts, and a valley that closes at the end

Zermatt has been car-free since 1961, which is the year this chalet was finished and not a coincidence. You arrive by train from Täsch. Electric taxis meet it. Steinmattstrasse is eight minutes on foot from the station and the walk is flat.

Getting about, and when to come

The valley head above the village The village sits at 1,608 metres in a valley that closes at its south end. Three lift systems leave it: one east, one west and one south. Steinmattstrasse runs parallel to the main street, one block up the slope. valley floor, 1,608 m the chalet west lift east lift south lift, to the glacier no cars anywhere in the village
The village on the valley floor, with the three lift systems out of it.

Gaming takes place in one room of this chalet and nowhere else in it. The Thoughtaccess Room runs no game over the internet, holds no account and settles no payment through this website.