Journey discovering Switzerland's mountain paradise

Nestled high in the Swiss Alps, Alp Grüm offers an experience that feels almost otherworldly.

While Switzerland is dotted with Alpine huts and remote hotels, Alp Grüm stands out as a unique mountain retreat, Caliber.Az reports via foreign media.

“Happily, there are no roads here—just nature. Sunrises, sunsets, and tranquility. Nothing more,” said Primo Semadeni, the 57-year-old manager of the Alp Grüm hotel in Graubünden, as we gazed over a high-altitude pass blanketed in permanent snow. The serene soundtrack included the whisper of the wind, the songs of birds, and the rush of water as a river cascaded down the valley. “Look around; we have mountains and glaciers, far removed from everyday life. This presents a challenge but also a blessing.”

Difficult-to-access hotels and huts are a hallmark of Switzerland, with many preserved as tributes to Alpine history. The Jungfrau Region, nestled within the snow-capped Bernese Alps, features lofty accommodations in car-free villages like Mürren, Wengen, and Kleine Scheidegg, where access is limited to ski lifts, cable cars, or cogwheel trains. These places encourage reflection, where hikers roam and thoughts can settle. There are also numerous stunning refuges hidden in the mountains, from the Appenzell Alps to Zermatt. A notable example is the Great St Bernard Hospice in Valais, which can only be reached by snowshoe in winter or via a high-altitude road that opens to traffic only after the snow melts.

The story of Alp Grüm began in 1906 with the Bernina-Bahngesellschaft, an innovative rail company that introduced a bold plan for an electrified train linking Switzerland to Italy through a stunning landscape of mountains and glaciers. What made this project remarkable was its designation as the highest rail crossing in the Alps, opening the region to tourism while significantly reducing travel time for traders. Back then, it took horse-mounted messengers nine hours to navigate the perilous route between Samedan and Tirano, a challenge exacerbated by winter avalanches and heavy snowfall. Switzerland had a history of ambitious engineering projects. Thirty years earlier, in 1888, Dutch hotelier Willem Jan Holsboer established the nearby Landquart-Davos narrow-gauge railway. 

Although Davos is now famous for hosting the World Economic Forum, it originally gained prominence as a spa town, and Holsboer’s railway brought more visitors than horse-drawn carriages could. Before that, the Gotthard Railway opened in 1882, featuring the world’s longest rail tunnel at that time. On a sunny July day in 1910, the Bernina Line officially opened, and Alp Grüm began its journey—not as the stone-built, 10-room hotel and waiting area it is today, but as a simple wooden cabin where the station chief could oversee the tracks each morning. The Rhaetian Railway took over the Bernina Line in 1943, and according to company spokesperson Camille Härdi, it was initially envisioned as "just a rest stop"—a concept that seems hard to believe now. 

The reception area also serves as a traditional train station café-bar, complete with a counter for quick coffee and schnapps, alongside tables for enjoying hot snacks and Swiss-Italian dishes. A side door in the dining room leads to a staircase that ascends to the bedrooms, situated above the station’s waiting area. 

The ten en-suite rooms, furnished with simple wooden decor and cozy textiles, offer breathtaking glacier views and profound silence after nightfall. The original vision behind building Alp Grüm endures strongly. The stunning geometry of the glaciers and lakes remains breathtaking, and upon my arrival, I was captivated by the Palü Glacier and the striking blue-green Lago Palü at its base. Above, Ospizio Bernina stands as the highest rail crossing in the Alps at 2,253 meters. Below, the tracks wind down the steep slope towards Valposchiavo in a serpentine curve. In the foreground, the station—remodeled in stone in 1923—appears beautifully isolated, resembling an Italian villa perched atop a mountain, with pizzoccheri (flat short buckwheat noodles) as the specialty at its platform restaurant. 

As Semadeni had said, there is only nature—stillness and nothing more. It was easy to understand what he meant.

By Naila Huseynova