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"411"41111:4' icF4 ' "' " '' ' - '' - z111:301001 -' ' I ''0 ""4 - Lc' '' '' '' : A '' ' ' '''fij'slinoiltt14 r 144 - ':'''' '''''''1 '4-- 44 1 '' ' A i '' - - ei 4641 - " ' ' S o 490 4 ' I4444 4h' ''''!tet im Imo ts sin aa ille b'40 ' bi6v'& Peter Shelton photo Dyes spices silks: Marco Polo would look right at home in Srinagar's Old City bazaar By Peter Shelton The essentials of skiing are pretty much the same e wherever you go: dark blue sky crisp air against cheeks and mouth the swishing of skis on snow the feeling of waltzing on a white planet beyond the world These are givens But there are ski destinations where the skiing is complemented even eclipsed by a larger human architecture These are places where you don't need to ski to be swept away Places where if the weather is uncooperative or you simply need a day off the slopes you can listen to centuries-olchurch bells in Zermatt for instance or wander a Moslem bazaar in Kashmir or pull gold miners celebrated up a bar stool where payday in Telluride Colo In other words don't be surprised if your strongest memories come from the streets of the village rather than the ski trails Skiing is a mountain sport of course and no mountain is etched more indelibly in the Western mind than the Matterhorn that Swiss icon of an alp Who has not memorized the image of this sharp 14683-foo- t obelisk hovering almost leaning over the tidy village of Zermatt at its base? Disney's "Third Man on the Mountain" romanticized the first successful ascent of the peak and climbing is indeed the primary association for many But Zermatt is also a ski resort one of Europe's best and The downhill sliding is superb And the village is like something out of "Heidi" but with modern plumbing It's a community that goes back 900 years before skiing and that in the midst of a restive epoch possesses a graceful timeless continuity The past pervades Zermatt but does not smother it in Alpine kitsch as is the case with some other European and American ski resorts Here cows' breath still steams from ground-floo- r winter stables in the heart of town This is not a historical theme park In Zermatt the age-olstruggle with the mountains inviting and ominous remains very close to the skin Just getting there takes an act of modern heresy: You must abandon your car At the tiny Rhone Valley town of Visp you change to a train and wind 30 kilometers up the narrow canyon to the edge of Zermatt There are no cars in the village The hotel sends an electric cart or a horse-draw- n buggy to pick up visitors meandering over cobblestones through streets barely wider than the wheels past chalets of whitewashed stucco and hand-hewlogs with great slabs of slate for roofs At first the people may seem more efficient than warm But these are only first impressions Like many mountain peoples they are wary a little bit feral but and generous once they get to know you And when they're skiing effortlessly down the slopes they've known all their lives their exuberance spills out like the potent plum brandy called "pflumli" quaffed in Zermatt On a tram ride up the mountain for an afternoon run several Zermatters unexpectedly burst into yodeling harmonies their voices entwining in haunting song On the way down one laughed aloud as if skiing high-altitud- ''' '' "'"r ''' et ' t : ' a( 7'"'"! :fii::-"2--2''- 7'AV '''''41"0 ' '' ' ' " 1 ' q : ::: N4 emr"'"m1 ''"'4474 '4 4 rt41'“ t L'''' ''' '- tt : ' '' ' 4 - IA tk 4' A 04 1 "'4---- -" 0'ar' '" ''''Ir it r : Al4At 1100164100 k '''''' iti ort44404 Ar 0m--- ltock N1411146togochogi) -- it I de - 5 - 4ii - r - 01 1' 'i e ' 44 t4r' t 10 A07:00 ' I 4 - 4 1- 1' ' I 9 44 tt yt ' ii I ft Jot to14 - ' h 4 1 v i I :(rt II (i) I t A - 'i ' I 1' '' ' - I 44141e : ' A' ' ' -- 10Sks : '4' ' r - ' ' a d 1 11 pr:pt 000:1 ' : T1°7 i 01 Is ' 0 op n le ' '177 -- best-know- n '-1 ''''71elege : - 0 !'4W'' tio'r i t i - loP 11--'5- ''':'''''4" '''' k'''obo':'''' v'''' ' ""4 '''''' i''''''''''4' 4r 7'4 "'' -- 7 1 - 3' f ti -d- t rl''"-- - ''''''''''" : t' i 4 ''"q '2 tl! )41t1t? file k ) t P 1 l' dC-- 7 0'" °C) zo dttp ' P kfitl 01 Iiiiromb ref5: cl ft'S-- c' '311 71) tr krfa T i A - - A o : kir" t i I' -- it' not::' - t r )4 4 '' ' ''''' ' t t'abd t mtfoor 11-- Usc - 1070711 1 k "74$4 f' ' Ir' :fr If': I - N : 1: i :::1:4: 1vt' P ''''' 4'641L-- r t4A' '4"4 00' ' ' A064111it - "" 4 Z 19th-centur- y '1 1'''': ' ' -- ' ! : ::- - 6''''---- 4:44:44Z -- '1104t044 ' :4 '17tk : 5 5 d 3 : - - -- good-hearte- - tNt r- - I tf‘- L 5 -' d '- - Their practice slopes are colossal by American standards: five mountains and four glaciers with uphill transportation via eight trams three gondolas a cog train an underground funicular and at least a dozen surface and chair lifts The vertical rise from town to the top of the Klein Matterhorn lift is 7431 feet almost all of it in the white expanse above timberline To ski it all would take weeks But one needn't ski to the Restaurant Trockener-Steperched practically in the shadow of the Matterhorn's north face Just follow the signs and ride the two consectrams slung like webs over the piste& Go for something fancy or order the Swiss tional fast food raclette: new potatoes tiny pickles and white onions covered with melted cheese scraped from a huge wheel by the fire washed down with a fruity-drFendant from Scion in the valley While I was there a band from y remote Appenzell warbled folk tunes accompanying themselves on accordion bass and traditional Hackbrett hammerboard Each man wore an Appenzeller red felt vest a gold ring in his right ear and silver buckles on his shoes Their anachronistic dress reflected a culture still insulated from the 20th century Appenzell still has not voted for women's suffrage Perhaps the most revered citizens of Zermatt are the mountain guides After skiing 1 walked from my hotel — everything is within walking distance — to the Alpines Museum off the main Bahnhofstrasse surrounded by its little garden Inside I found the frayed broken end of Edward Whymper's rope symbolizing the triumph and tragedy of the Matterhorn's first successful ascent After years of failure the Englishman finally made the summit on July 14 1865 only to suffer the broken rope and the awful deaths of three Swiss companions on the way g y Swiss-hillbill- down Outside under the eaves modern-daguides of all ages talk and smoke their faces weathered and stubborn Every year they lead hundreds of tourists up Europe's most romantic peak and every year some of their charges die en route Sometimes the guide dies with them The marked on the in the cemetery never say they were mountain instead they use the word "pent" or perished as if the mountain with which their lives are so linked has swallowed up one of its own In the evening pure voices soared from the Katholische Kirche where a late mass filled the pews and hallelujahs washed back and forth against the walls Parishioners passed holy water from fingertip to fingertip down the rows An almost tangible sense of community filled the air as I imagined it had since the Middle Ages — certainly since 1618 when the 182 original Zermatter families were freed from serfdom Outside it was snowing You could hear avalanches rumbling off the cliffs north of town Tomorrow the road See 1-Column 1 y 2 360101TAIT9091 lomord loussoliintogo look photo The were a child's game For him it was he flowed over the snow the way water seeks its path brooding obelisk of the Matterhorn pierces sky above Gornergrat train station t ---- r----- -'-M 'tt m ! 416A011—odkeleatiam41 v liwookqe"00044000notkAON44 |
