Failure of the Swiss Winter Season

by Algernon Blackwood

This year we have enjoyed the unusual privilege of seeing bright green fields in mid-January at a height of three thousand five hundred feet above the sea, and people who came to meet the snow and ice have been picking primroses instead⁠—so several newspapers report⁠—upon the slopes about the Lake of Geneva. The winter has got lost somewhere, and the familiar phrase of the hotelier, “We never knew such weather before at this time of year,” has been really justified for once. All over Switzerland it has been the same, east and west, north and south⁠—warm winds from the Atlantic, rain, fog, thaw, and only just enough frost at the resorts that lie above five thousand feet to provide a little inferior skating.

The disappointment of many hundreds has been keen, and the loss to hotels and purveyors of winter-sport articles unquestionably very large. For the great holiday rush is over now, and hundreds never put on their ski at all. The sleighs have hardly dared to show their runners; the peasants are doing all their carting still on wheels. They are content, however. “Quel bel hiver!” they say, thus adding insult to injury. For the Basses Alpes, usually lying beneath ten feet of snow at this time, are green and full of hints of spring flowers⁠—a condition unknown in January for very many years. The hares are running over the upper pastures, fat and well fed. They may be puzzled, but they like it as much as the peasants do. And all the summits of the Jura Mountains, usually crested and heavily “corniced” with creamy white, lie at this moment bare aud green, as one knows them in the beginning of April. Yesterday I picked a large blue gentian at a height of four thousand five hundred feet above the sea. There are patches of snow, and drifts and occasional little fields of it, but all growing daily smaller. The very torrents are the torrents one knows, swollen and turbid, after the first spring thaws.

With the exception of a fairly heavy fall just before Christmas everything that has since fallen from the sky⁠—below four thousand feet⁠—has been rain, or rainy sleet with a few flakes of snow mixed here and there in midair, enough to permit hope though hope as yet unfulfilled. Although a sprinkling of visions come out at the end of November and early in December expecting to find the winter already in full sway, the majority know that the real snow hardly comes before the New Year. Christmas Week usually sees it, and by the time the great tourist army with two weeks at their disposal has arrived, there has been time for it to “settle,” freeze into powdery crystals and get generally into good condition. Each fresh fall then adds to its perfection. But this year all these secondary falls have been rain or sleet. There was an early “chute” in November, very heavy, though quickly disappearing; and since then there have been, in the Jura at least, a favourite skiing ground, as many as nine other falls, each one melting quicker than its predecessor. For the prevailing winds have been west and southwest, and the frost has been barely enough to keep the few available northern slopes (where the sun cannot reach them during the day) in dry condition, even for the slowest skiing. The consequence is that the second instalment of visitors, who come for February, have been frightened away. The Jura hotels, usually crowded at this time, are fast emptying, and the carriages meet empty trains. The season, already half over, has been a very disappointing one⁠—the worst for many years. Moreover, coming on the heels of two other indifferent ones, it has done Switzerland much harm. Her reputation is in danger. On every side one hears men saying, “Next year I shan’t risk it again. I shall go to Norway.” In Norway there is good skiing up to the close of April, and in some places even into May. The journey is longer, the sea portion is a nuisance to most, but the prices en pension compare favourably with Swiss hotel prices, and are even less, and a skier gets his money’s worth, at any rate. Now, at this very moment, writing in these last days of January at a height not far from four thousand feet, the sun blazes in a cloudless sky upon green fields and pine woods untouched by white, birds are singing, there are summery fleecy clouds just visible upon the distant Alps, and a mild southwest wind brings thoughts and feelings that belong to April. Spring is in the air. It seems absurd to talk of ski at all. And every morning the hotelier wrings his hands and taps the weatherglass and looks morbidly at the soppy rink. “It will come, yes, it will come,” he says, though with less conviction daily; “it will come in February. The winter is later than usual, that’s all. We always get it in the end!” Probably, too, he is right.

Like last year, there may be heavy snow⁠—the heaviest of the year⁠—in March. But no one will be here to see it. After mid-February, besides, the heat of the sun is such that the surface of the snow melts rapidly between eleven and three o’clock, and, freezing again at night, offers a crust of icy hardness on which turning is difficult, skidding incessant and tumbling a dangerous and serious matter altogether. It is not ski-able snow. The Skiing, Jumping Meeting, held annually at Ste. Croiz in the Jura vaudois, and a meeting of recognised importance, has already been postponed three times. It is usually held the first week in January. This year it may possibly not take place at all.

If Switzerland wishes to win back its character, hotels must be built higher up the mountains⁠—a couple of thousand feet or more. At a certain height, of course, there is bound to be snow and frost. Yet that means higher pension terms at the same time, for provisions have further to come. It also involves questions of inaccessibility. The Christmas rush of people with a limited time at their disposal dislike an extra day added to their journey at each end. It makes a difference when a man has only two weeks to deal with.

Reports from Eastern Switzerland have been slightly better, perhaps. The prevailing westerly winds that come from the Atlantic have passed across the great central glacier systems before they reach the Engadine and the Tyrol. They have been thoroughly cooled, whereas Western Switzerland receives their load of ocean moisture straight from the coast. No mountains lie between. The Jura undoubtedly suffers in this respect; and many experienced people begin their winter seas east of Lucerne, and end it in the Jura on the way back to England. This year, however, they are going home direct. Reports have frightened them. And the crowds of foreigners waiting in Lausanne, Geneva, Montreux, Vevey and the numerous places along the shores of the lake have simply not come further. The mountain hotels have lost thousands in this way. The towns offer some attractions, at any rate; that a winter-sport hotel when there is no winter sport is one of the most dismal things one can well imagine. The proprietor has a very severe time of it. All blame him, directly or indirectly, for the bad conditions. “As if I could help it, or change the weather!” he apologises every few minutes. “You might have told us,” is the illogical reply; “at least you might have warned us!” And he adds, “It is the same everywhere. All Switzerland is the same. Such a year has never before been known!” For the favourable reports one reads in certain newspapers are a snare and a delusion. It may be noted that they are invariably undated.

But, when the worst is said, it must be remembered that the winter is not yet over. Also⁠—it is thoroughly ashamed of itself. It may make a violent effort to retrieve itself, and probably it will. There are still hundreds of hopeful men and women who are waiting for that effort. “For when it comes,” they say, “it will be terrible, and worth waiting for!”