Things to do in Alta Badia: sledges, sleighs and a frozen lake
Slow, outdoor and spread across the villages, with a good deal of it free: a toboggan run above La Val that needs no ticket, more than 70 km of winter walking, and the Foram run at San Cassiano for anyone with a pass. For somebody not skiing, the sleigh from La Villa is the one to do, and Boulder Center Corvara covers a bad weather day.
Alta Badia is a valley of small villages rather than one resort, and what there is to do off the skis is shared out between them: San Cassiano has the night sledding and the museum, La Villa the sleighs, Corvara the climbing wall, La Val the toboggan run you walk up to. It is a place for taking things slowly, and families do well here.
Start with the free things, because there are plenty. The Rit to Biei run above La Val needs no ticket of any kind: roughly an hour's walk up, 1.8 km of sledging down, and the winter hike to the Rit meadows heads the same way, so make it one outing. The Foram run at San Cassiano is bigger and costs nothing beyond the ride up, which a ski pass covers. Before anybody books, ask whether the hotel or apartment belongs to the Alta Badia tourist association. If it does, the South Tyrol Guest Pass is issued free on arrival.
For somebody not skiing, the sleigh from La Villa is the gentle answer, and the drivers will make it shorter for small children. A confident non skier should spend a guided half day on the frozen waterfalls above Colfosco, which will outlast the week's skiing in the memory. When the weather shuts the top, Boulder Center Corvara is indoors and open all day, and the cave bear museum in San Cassiano is a small, fully wheelchair accessible hour.
Evenings are calm, and the best of them are outdoors. The Foram run is floodlit after dark, with the Piz Sorega lift taking sledgers back up, and Lake Sompunt at Badia is skated in the evening as well as by day. In the run up to Christmas the World Cup on the Gran Risa is free to watch from the piste: go for the night race. Ring for the sleigh and book the guides early in the week.
Free, and worth knowing
Two toboggan runs, a valley of marked walking, the Moviment parks, a treasure hunt for children, and one pass that is worth asking the accommodation about before anybody books.
The Moviment parks, free once somebody holds a pass
Moviment is the joint operation of the Alta Badia lift companies and its own site is unambiguous about the money. The parks and the equipment are completely free of charge and open to everybody. You need a lift pass to ride up to them and nothing at all once you are there.
Five of them across the valley. Snowpark Ciampai on the Corvara side, the Funslope and the Funcross on the Biok and La Para slopes at La Villa, the Kidsslope on Pralongia I above Corvara, and the Movi Challenge, a set of slalom courses and speed traps reached from Col Alt at Corvara or Piz Sorega at San Cassiano.
The Rit to Biei toboggan run, La Val
The one piece of sledging in this valley that needs no ticket of any kind. You walk up from the centre of La Val on trail number 6, roughly an hour, past the church of Santa Barbara and then left through the hamlets of Ciablun, Runch and Biei. The run starts at Rit lake and comes down 1.8 km to Biei, and the tourist board calls it quite easy and suitable for families.
La Val
The Tru dla liosa Foram run, San Cassiano
The bigger of the two toboggan runs, and the run itself costs nothing. What you pay for is the Piz Sorega gondola up to the start at 2,003 m, from where it drops around 466 m back into San Cassiano at 1,537 m. Anybody in the group already holding a ski pass rides up on it for nothing extra.
Piz Sorega gondola, San Cassiano
Seventy kilometres of winter walking trails
The tourist board puts it at more than seventy kilometres of well marked trail for winter walking and snowshoeing, free to walk and spread across all six villages. One route to know by name is the winter hike from La Val up to the Rit meadows, which heads the same way as the free toboggan run and can be done as one outing with it.
The South Tyrol Guest Pass
The single biggest free thing a guest here will hold, and it arrives with the accommodation rather than with the lift pass. If the hotel or apartment belongs to the Alta Badia tourist association it is issued free on arrival, and it covers every bus on the Alta Badia network and the area around it, explicitly including the ski buses in winter, plus the regional trains between Brennero, Bolzano, Fortezza and San Candido.
Worth asking about before anybody books, because the fallback is not free. If the accommodation is outside the scheme, the Mobilcard covers the whole South Tyrol network instead and has to be bought and then validated before each journey.
Ala descurida dl paisc, the treasure hunt in La Val
A treasure hunt around La Val, with clues hidden about the village and a prize at the end of it, and the whole thing is set up by ringing the La Val tourist office rather than booking anything. It is aimed squarely at a family with children who have had enough of the snow for one afternoon.
La Val
The World Cup on the Gran Risa, La Villa
The Gran Risa is one of the proper giant slalom hills on the circuit and it drops straight into La Villa, so the racing is watchable from the side of the piste for nothing. A giant slalom and a night slalom across one weekend in the run up to Christmas, and the night race under the lights is the one to aim for.
Gran Risa, La Villa
On the mountain
Sledging after dark at San Cassiano, a sleigh between the villages, and three frozen waterfalls above Colfosco for a confident non skier who wants a story to take home.
Not dla liosa, night sledding at San Cassiano
The Foram run is floodlit for the evening and the Piz Sorega cable car runs from half past seven until half past ten to put people back at the top. You buy either single ascents or a six ride or ten ride card at the cable car ticket office, and sledge hire is a separate transaction at the rental shops around the valley. The meeting point is Str. Sorega 10 in San Cassiano.
Price on request · Str. Sorega 10, San Cassiano
Horse drawn sleigh rides from La Villa
Two drivers, Erich and Florian, work out of Str. Altin in La Villa through the winter. The standard runs are La Villa to Corvara and back and La Villa to Pedraces and back, and they will do something shorter if there are small children in the sleigh. You ring the driver directly rather than a booking office, which is why the number matters more than the website.
Price on request · Str. Altin, La Villa
Ice climbing above Colfosco
Three named frozen waterfalls sit above Colfosco and get climbed every winter: Lujanta, Brivido Sottile and Spada di Damocle. It is guided work through the Alta Badia Guides rather than something anybody wanders off and does, and it is the sort of half day a confident non skier will remember longer than the week's skiing.
Price on request · Above Colfosco
In the village
The bad weather answers, a climbing wall in Corvara and a small museum in San Cassiano, and a natural lake at Badia to skate on.
Boulder Center Corvara
Indoor climbing and bouldering on Str. Burje in Corvara, open from half past seven in the morning until ten at night, seven days a week. At eleven euros for an adult day ticket, it is the obvious answer to a day when the weather has shut the top of the mountain.
Under 20 euros · Str. Burje 5, Corvara · Their page
Museum Ladin Ursus ladinicus, San Cassiano
A museum built around the cave bear of the Dolomites, on Str. Micura de Ru in the middle of San Cassiano. It is small, it is fully wheelchair accessible, and six euros for an adult makes it the cheapest indoor hour in the valley. There is a combined ticket with the second Museum Ladin further down the valley for anybody going that way.
Under 20 euros · Str. Micura de Ru 26, San Cassiano · Their page
Skating and curling on Lake Sompunt
A natural lake at Badia that freezes hard enough to skate on, by day and again in the evening, and both the skates and the curling stones are hired at the lake side rather than in the village. It is the prettiest of the three ice options in the valley and the only one that is outdoors.
Price on request · Str. Sompunt 36, Badia
These are our own picks, not paid placements. Prices and opening times change, so it is always worth checking before you set off.