Alternative winter trips
Escape the crowds and head out into lesser-visited wintery realms, says Jasper Spires
A Swedish city break
Sweden’s second city, Gothenburg, is “incredibly beautiful” in the winter, says Esther Marshall in the Sunday Express. Its canals call to mind Amsterdam, as do its “chilled atmosphere” and “cultural hotspots”. The city’s Palmhuset gardens is a pleasure to visit whatever the weather and, despite it being almost freezing outside, the palm house was “warm and packed with a huge range of plants and flowers”. The Konstmuseum is also worth seeing for its impressive collecting of paintings. As for the children, they will be drawn to Liseberg, Scandinavia’s biggest theme park.
Then walk across the road to Gothia Towers and take the glass lift to the top, says Danielle Hallock for Thrillist. Here, you will find Upper House, where the views from the bedrooms “make for spectacular… sunsets”. The spa, with its sauna and pool, is also “jaw-dropping”. From around £200, en.upperhouse.se
Take in Norway by train
The colour of the sky above Oslo is indigo in the pre-dawn light, says Monisha Rajesh in The Guardian. That’s when the commuter train starts its seven-hour journey towards Bergen on the west coast of Norway. “Soon, the city is gone and lakes emerge like mirrors, with armies of snow-dusted spruce lining their banks.” The tracks follow the River Drammenselva upstream, curving alongside Lake Tyrifjorden and on to the town of Hønefoss. “From here the buildings begin to thin out, with wilderness between each tiny village cluster. Through blizzards, it’s just possible to make out ski runs worming down mountain sides, and cabins so deeply buried [in the snow] that only a spiral of smoke betrays their existence.” By all means, meditate on the calm along the way, but do keep an eye our for “the flash of red and roe deer darting for cover” as the train crosses the Hardangervidda National Park. Once in Bergen, visit the medieval harbour of Bryggen. Around £22 one way, visit vy.no/en
Off-piste skiing
“After a wallet-squeezing couple of years, increasingly unpredictable snow conditions and a desire to avoid long lift queues, skiers are looking for alternative resorts away from the tried-and-tested favourites,” says Abigail Butcher in The Telegraph. For example, Engelberg in Switzerland, “with its towering jagged peaks, 12th-century Benedictine monastery, grand hotels… and one of the biggest runs in the world (2,000m vertical)”, gives popular French resort Chamonix “quite a run for its money”. True, Engelberg’s mighty Titlis mountain, at 3,238 metres, might not be quite up there with Chamonix’s Aiguille du Midi (3,842 metres). But its “‘Big Five’ offpiste runs are [a must] for all self-respecting freeride skiers and snowboarders”.
Beginners and intermediate skiers can find an ideal ski area on the “sunny pastures” of Brunni, “on the opposite side of town… dotted with huts providing welcome refreshments”, says Sophie Butler for the same paper. Visitors to Engelberg will also enjoy the “stupendous views” from the resort’s rotating cable car to Titlis. From £723pp for three nights, inghams.co.uk