One Of Many Swiss Alpine Gems: Gstaad — LeCircles

Gstaad is always a good idea! Didn’t know that?! I mean this luxury alpine resort has a lot of competition when it comes to wonderful and top-notch ski resort in Switzerland. Places such as Verbier, Sankt-Moritz or most famous Zermatt all compete with Gstaad in canton Bern, Switzerland. However, the latter has its unique authenticity to it. Moreover, you’ll be all ears to know that the great Michael Jackson even had tried to purchase the Gstaad Palace because he had fallen in love with the Palace located in the upscale resort.

*Gstaad Palace Hotel, Main Entrance, Gstaad Bern(BE), Switzerland*. ©LeCircles

Some would tell you that there are only two ways to get to Gstaad — by limousine or by helicopter. An epicurean with time on his/her side would retort that there is a third way: by train. Either the GoldenPass Classic — a miniature replica of the Orient Express — or the GoldenPass Panoramic, with its large windows reflecting the Alps and its wooden hangers on which skiers hang their snowy anoraks. An hour and a quarter of pure bliss that starts in Montreux and ends on the platform of the Gstaad train station. There, the doorman of the Gstaad Palace, in a grey uniform, is waiting for you. No slate with your name on it, discretion requires, a glance is enough. Gstaad is definitely a mystery that is worth being discover in total privacy.

*GoldenPass MOB Belle Epoque Train, Car, Montreux(VD) - Gstaad Bern(BE), Switzerland*. ©LeCircles

Gstaad is a village of a few thousand inhabitants, dominated since 1913 by the medieval silhouette of the wonderful Gstaad Palace. It is a place of calm and opulence, but also with some edge to it. I am referring to the kind of "terror-tinged tranquility" that ancestors felt when they saw a mountain landscape for the first time. Unlike more modern resorts, such as Aspen or Courchevel, Gstaad has retained that mysterious aura of early tourism. A hundred years before the hype of the Côte d'Azur, the Brits were already flocking to the region, attracted by the torrents, the glaciers, the inaccessible peaks, all that "delightful horror" described by Edmund Burke in 1757 in his theorization of the "sublime". It was here, in the Bernese Oberland, in the 18th century, that the romantic vogue for the mountains was born and keeps charming every single tourist.

If you don’t believe us — let LeCircles share with you its magic and you will know. By the way, you might perhaps meet “The Gstaadguy” at his favorite Loro Piana store in the village.