Luxury escorts in Crans-Montana

Crans-Montana sits on a south-facing balcony a mile above the Rhône, and the view — from the Matterhorn round to Mont Blanc — is the resort's standing argument. The sun does the rest: the plateau records more clear days than anywhere comparable in the Alps, which is why the golf came (the Omega European Masters has been played here since the twenties) and why the season never entirely stops. Guests divide between the winter crowd — skiing the Plaine Morte glacier, lunching long at altitude — and the September crowd, for whom the Masters week is the social summit of the year.

Our companions on the plateau are booked to match: golf weeks and tournament dates go early, and the winter school holidays go earlier. The resort's pleasures are unhurried — the boutiques along the Rue du Prado, dinner at the Guarda Golf or the Crans Ambassador, the walk between the lakes at dusk — and the engagement takes its shape from them. Sierre and the Valais wine villages are twenty minutes down the funicular road, and a cellar afternoon among the Cornalin makes a fine second day.