Things to do in Gstaad: a full week off the skis
A full week without skis, and a good part of it free: the car free Promenade, a hundred and sixty two kilometres of marked winter walking and a free ride up the Eggli gondola on night skiing evenings. Sledging is the strongest card, with eight published runs, and Fondueland, a fondue carried out to a giant wooden pot on the hill, is the most distinctive thing the resort does.
A week in Gstaad without skis is a full week, not a consolation. The village is unhurried, its centre is closed to cars, and much of what is worth doing off the snow is on foot from the Promenade or a short ride along the valley railway. It suits families and couples, and anybody who would rather spend the afternoon in the village than on the hill.
Start on the Promenade, because it costs nothing and it begins outside the station: a single street of timber chalets, galleries and watchmakers, with horse drawn carriages in the snow. A hundred and sixty two kilometres of winter walking spread across the Saanenland, waymarked in pink. And from your first night, in any participating accommodation, second class train and bus travel across the whole holiday region comes free with the Gstaad Card, which makes Saanen, Schonried and Rougemont part of the week rather than names on a timetable.
For anybody not skiing, sledging is the thing to build the week around. Eight runs are published one by one: the Eggli is the easy one with the view and the family choice, the Wispile the long one, eight point two kilometres down to the edge of the village. Give one settled morning to Glacier 3000 and the Peak Walk, and go early. If the weather closes in, the Palace takes outside bookings for its restaurants and spa treatments.
Evenings are quiet by design, and a good deal of the week is built around cheese. Fondueland is the most distinctive thing Gstaad does: collect a fondue rucksack from a village dairy, then walk, sledge or ski out to one of the giant wooden caquelons on the hill. The Rinderberg at Zweisimmen carries people on foot up to its fondue dinner, so nobody has to ski to join in. Book the fondue nights early, and know that the Palace shuts for the season in early March.
Free, and worth knowing
The street non skiers choose Gstaad for, the marked winter paths across the valley, and an evening gondola ride up the Eggli for somebody who is not skiing.
The Gstaad Promenade
The best free thing in the resort and the reason a non skier stays here rather than somewhere else. The centre of Gstaad is closed to cars: one street of wooden chalets holding cafes, galleries, watchmakers, ski shops and the international luxury houses, with horse drawn carriages working it in the snow. You can walk it end to end, look at all of it and spend nothing, and it starts straight out of the railway station, so it is the first thing anybody arriving by train sees.
Gstaad, straight out of the MOB railway station
Free train and bus with the Gstaad Card
From your first night, in any participating accommodation, second class train and bus travel across the whole holiday region comes free with the Gstaad Card. It is automatic, it is funded out of the resort tax that is on the bill anyway, and since 1 May 2024 it has covered arrival and departure days as well.
The reach is genuinely wide. Grubenwald and Zweisimmen down to Rougemont, out to Lauenen and the Lauenensee, up the Turbach, up to the Col du Pillon for Glacier 3000, over via Ablandschen as far as the Jaun Bergbahnen, and the upper Simmental from Zweisimmen to Lenk. That is what makes the balloon festival and the glacier bus viable at all from here.
The whole holiday region, and your arrival and departure journeys
A hundred and sixty two kilometres of winter walking
The tourist office's headline is a hundred and sixty two kilometres of prepared winter walking path across the Saanenland, waymarked in pink so they are easy to pick out from the ski signage. The one route published with numbers against it is the Eggli circular from the top of the gondola, three point one kilometres and an hour and a quarter with a hundred and seventy eight metres of climb, graded moderate. Snowshoes can be hired locally for anybody who wants to get off the prepared paths.
Throughout the Saanenland
A free evening ride on the Eggli gondola
Buried in the listing for the Eggli Night Vibes evenings is one line worth having: the gondola ride is free from half past seven. So on any Thursday between 31 December 2026 and 25 February 2027 somebody who is not skiing can ride the Eggli gondola up and down for nothing after 19:30, eat at the Berghaus or not, and come back.
Eggli gondola, Gstaad
On the mountain
Eight toboggan runs with the Eggli the family one, a fondue carried out onto the hill, and a lit evening at the Rinderberg for anybody going up only to eat.
The eight toboggan runs
Sledging is the strongest non skiing card this resort holds, and unusually all eight runs are published individually with their length, time, drop and grade. The long one is the Wispile at eight point two kilometres and seven hundred and twenty nine metres of descent, coming down to the edge of Gstaad itself. The Eggli at six point four kilometres is graded easy and is the one described as having the view, which makes it the family choice.
Price on request · Wispile and Eggli from Gstaad, Saanersloch and Hornberg from Saanenmoser, Horneggli from Schonried, Sparenmoos from Zweisimmen · Their page
Fondueland Gstaad
The most distinctive thing Gstaad does, and it is a genuine winter product rather than a summer one dressed up. Oversized wooden fondue caquelons are set out in the landscape, you book one, and you walk, sledge or ski to it carrying a fondue rucksack collected from a village dairy with everything in it. One of the caquelons sits at Vorderi Wispile. The rucksacks come from the Molkerei in Gstaad, Schonried or Zweisimmen.
Price on request · Gstaad, Schonried and Zweisimmen dairies, with the caquelons out on the mountain · Their page
Rinderberg Snow Night at Zweisimmen
The Friday equivalent over at Zweisimmen: floodlit skiing from the mid station down to the valley and a three course fondue at the Rinderberg Lodge. Pedestrians are carried on the cable car, and the operator says so in as many words, so this works for somebody going up only to eat. Zweisimmen is about twenty minutes from Gstaad on the train and the train is free with the guest card.
CHF 20 to 50 · Rinderberg cable car at Zweisimmen, about 20 minutes from Gstaad on the MOB · Their page
In the village
A public rink with skates to hire, and the Palace, whose restaurants, spa and club take people who are not staying there.
Kunsteisbahn Gstaad, the ice rink
The public ice rink at the Gstaad sports centre, and by a distance the cheapest organised thing to do in the resort. Eight francs fifty for an adult and six for a child, skates another eight and five, so a family of four is on the ice for well under fifty. Public skating, ice hockey and stick and puck sessions, with sticks and pucks for hire and blade sharpening on site.
Under CHF 20 · Sportzentrum Gstaad, in the village · Their page
The Gstaad Palace
The landmark hotel above the promenade, and the honest answer to what a non resident can actually book here is the restaurants and the club. The Palace runs six restaurants and four bars, and Le Grand, Le Grill, Gildo's, Gildo's al Fresco and La Fromagerie all take outside reservations through the hotel's own booking route, as does the spa for treatments.
Price on request · Palacestrasse 28, above the Promenade · Their page
Nearby
The high day out, on the PostBus from Gstaad station to the Col du Pillon, and the one to save for a settled morning.
Glacier 3000, as a day out
The high alpine day out from Gstaad, and it wants writing as exactly that, a day out. A cable car climbs from the Col du Pillon at 1,546 m to Scex Rouge at just under three thousand metres on the Tsanfleuron glacier. At the top are the Peak Walk by Tissot, the only suspension bridge in the world joining two summits, the Ice Express chairlift, the Glacier Walk, a snow fun park and a Botta designed restaurant.
Over CHF 50 · Col du Pillon, Route du Pillon 253, Les Diablerets, on PostBus 182 from Gstaad railway station · Their page
These are our own picks, not paid placements. Prices and opening times change, so it is always worth checking before you set off.