I grew up in Switzerland (Zurich area) and started climbing as a teenager in 1988 with my dad, who introduced me to glacier hikes, and with some friends, who took me out rock climbing. I joined the Swiss Alpine Club the following year, and participated on countless trips, mostly locally but also in Austria, Italy and France. In Switzerland climbing is an all-year activity, and we would typically focus on rock climbing in spring and autumn, do higher peaks in the summer (pure rock, mixed routes and/or glacier peaks), and ski randonnée (also with snowboards) in winter up until spring.

Some favourites, all from the Swiss Alps: Rock climbing: Bergseeschijen (various routes), Salbitschijen S-ridge; Spazzacaldeira (various routes), Piz Badile (N-ridge), Grimsel Eldorado (Septumania). Mixed: Piz Roseg (Esel ridge), Piz Bernina (Bianco ridge); Allalinhorn (NE-ridge); Tödi (SW face); Clariden (N-face); Ski randonée/snowboard: Blüemberg (favourite day trip close to my parents’ place); Sulzfluh; Kandersteg area (Altels, Balmhorn, Rinderhorn); Alphubel and Strahlhorn (Valais).

I used to hold some leader qualifications within the Swiss Sports Programme (Jeunesse et Sport) for summer (rock & mountaineering) and winter (ski randonnée) (they’re expired by now as I have not done any refresher courses for the last 10 years), and ran the youth section of my local club for about 5 years. I organized about a dozen week-long trips in summer and winter (in winter typically accompanied by a professional mountain guide because of the avalanche risk).

I haven’t done much climbing since moving to Denmark in 2006 but am keen to get back into the groove, and have started practising again (mostly on local climbing walls but also on some sea cliffs in Sweden). I would love to try out some more climbing in the UK (studied one year in Aberdeen and did some rock climbing there at the time), and I am particularly keen to do more climbing ‘back home’ in Switzerland, and will gladly organize summer trips for those interested. My favourite time is early summer (late June/early July) when glaciers are still well-covered, days are long, huts are relatively empty, and routes are not too busy.