While advanced skiers usually favour the larger Kleine Scheidegg - Männlichen ski area, skiers and snowboarders prefer to head over to the First area. The First’s White Elements Park has an outstanding reputation which goes far beyond the Swiss borders. The park is split into three subsections:
Beginners Snowpark on the Oberjoch
The Beginners Snowpark is located only a few meters below the mountain station of the Oberjoch chairlift at an altitude of almost 2,500 meters. Thanks to this altitude, the park is usually shaped and ready for action early in the season. The Oberjoch chairlift is always ready for carrying freestylers back to the top of the park for another run. The park is largely geared towards freestyle beginners and offers the following obstacles (as of March 2016):
- 2-3 small jumps (depending on conditions)
- 2-3 medium jumps (depending on conditions)
- a corner and hip kicker
- PE tube
- barrel
- flat-down box, downbox, mailbox and dance-floor box
Advanced terrain park at the Bärgelegg lift
A little lower down the mountain at around 1,800 meters above sea level is the Advanced Snowpark – one of Switzerland’s longest terrain parks at 650 meters in length. The jump lines can be combined with the jibs and rails at will. With the Bärgelegg lift, the park has its own lift which means that the breaks between airtime are as short as possible. A chairlift would of course be even better. The park is geared towards advanced riders and offers the following obstacles (as of March 2016):
- 3 medium-large jumps
- 1 big jump
- a corner and hip kicker
- downtube, donkey tube, elbow tube and rainbox tube
- 2 x downrails (short & log), double-kinked rail
- cannon
- stairset with downbox & double-kinked tube
- straightbox, A-frame-box and C-box
Halfpipe
And no visit to the advanced park would be complete with taking in the amazing 150m superpipe. In summer 2015, the ground here was dug deeper so that less snow is now required for shaping and the halfpipe can be opened earlier in the season.
Conclusion: It doesn’t get much better than this
The region Grindelwald-Wengen only just misses out on ten points in the freestyle category. The White Elements Snowpark is undoubtedly one of the most beautiful terrain parks in all of Switzerland. The only negatives here are that there isn’t a park to enjoy in the Kleine Scheidegg-Männlichen area, and that it would also be preferable if the Bärgelegg lift at the Advanced park was replaced with a chairlift.