St. Anton Travel Guide

Introduction

St. Anton, Sankt Anton am Arlberg in German, is Austria's premier ski-bum resort! It's actually a small village cum ski resort, but with huge notoriety as the domain of expert skiers and playground of the hard-driving party crowd. Here, in 1907, ski great Hannes Schneider first offered ski instruction as a guide at the Hotel Post, and subsequently developed the famous Arlberg style of skiing – also known as the "Arlberg technique" – moving from a snowplow turn into a feet-together "Stem Christie," which remains prevalent throughout the world. The resort village has produced legions of world-class ski instructors and champion ski racers in the intervening years, among them the likes of Karl Schranz and Marina Kiehl, and continues to offer such black-diamond expert terrain as the Mattun and Schindlerkar routes and the heart-stopping ski-run down the backside of Valluga, elevation 2,811 meters (9,222 feet), to Zürs at 1,717 meters (5,410 feet) – a drop of more than 3,800 feet! In 2001, St. Anton also hosted the Alpine World Ski Championships.

Location

St. Anton is situated on the Rosanna River in the Tyrol Alps, at the western end of Austria, at an elevation of 4,278 feet (1,304 m). It is 62 miles (100 km) west of Innsbruck, or 120 miles (192 km) east of Zürich.

• How to Get There

• Ski Area

• Sightseeing

• Neighborhoods

• How to Get Around

• Where to Stay

• Where to Eat

• Where to Party

• Essential Information

• Nearby Destinations

How to Get There

Ski Area

St. Anton's principal draw is of course its ski area, which is actually part of the Arlberg region of ski resorts that includes Lech and St. Christoph, among others, and collectively offers some 260 kilometers of groomed pistes and nearly 185 kilometers of deep-snow runs, served by more than 120 ski lifts and cable cars and accessed with a single lift pass that covers them all. In St. Anton, skiers can ride the Funitel gondola from the western edge of the village to the Galzig slopes and also connect with lifts to the Kapall, Schindler and Valluga peaks that offer roughly 4,900 vertical feet (1,500 m) of rip-roaring skiing. As a bonus, the 2,650-meter-high Valluga Summit offers spectacular, 360-degree panoramic views of the Alps, taking in the Lechtal Alps, the Zügspitze in Germany, Silvretta, and even the Subaital glaciers and Italy's Dolomites.

Sightseeing

In St. Anton itself, the main visitor attraction is the ski museum which chronicles the history and development of St. Anton as well as the local ski club, and is housed in the Arlberg Kandahar Haus chalet which, besides the museum exhibits, boasts a lovely interior. Another, the old, wooden Thöni Haus, which dates from the Middle Ages and is the oldest home in the area, can be found at Im Greis. As for the action in St. Anton, it is mainly centered on its pedestrian zone and Dorfstrasse which runs down the hill from the western end of town toward the adjoining village of Nasserein. There are 7 bars, 3 discothèques, and 15 cafés in the village. There are also several slope-side après-ski bars, mainly along the Steissbachtal trail, directly above St. Anton.

Main Neighborhoods

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How to Get Around

Where to Party

Where to Eat

Where to Stay

Know Before You Go

• Best Time to Visit:

• Cost Per Day: US$-US$ (-)

• Currency: (US$1 ~ )

• Electricity: 220-240V - 50Hz

• Phone Code: +43

• Population: 2,500

• Official Website:

Nearby Destinations

• Bregenz

• Innsbruck

• Ischgl

• Kitzbühel

• Salzburg

• Zürich

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