About Mountain Bike Trails on the Swiss Side of Portes du Soleil

Morgins
Morgins is reached from the Mossettes lift out of Linderets via a super long 4x track. This is most definitely not as simple as it sounds, with lots of opportunities for the more experienced rider to follow the various cut-throughs to the next hairpin of the 4-track. Some of the latter is super fast with natural drop offs, berms and kickers should you wish to utilise them. Morgins sports the Freeride Xtreme downhill/northshore combo - definitely for experts only. Check it out from the lift accessing Champoussin - absolutely terrifying. You'll definitely find a variety of well maintained trails here, from fast and flowy to steep and technical, with a nice helping of wide smiles and great views to boot.

Champoussin
Champoussin links Morgins and Les Crosets on the Passport du Soleil route. The traverse over to the top of Les Crosets is very spectacular with the Dents Du Midi to your left. This is a technical single track trail slightly climbing for a while followed by a big and very entertaining drop into Les Crosets itself. Access is via the Aiguille des Champeys télésiège and a short but steep climb up to the trail start.

Les Crosets
Les Crosets offers downhill courses, the Grande Conche and Crosets, the latter is a blue and perfectly suited to a Freeride/All Mountain style bike whereas the former is black and more suited to a downhill rig. Take the Crosets II chairlift to access this excellent run or alternatively drop down to Champery via the old Freeraid route. This is an excellent single track trail through the meadows, negotiating roller coaster styles and intransigent cows (and their deposits) along the way. To negotiate your way back to Morzine try the Mossettes lift, followed by ‘Puncture Alley’ all the way into Linderets itself. This is a steep rocky and very fast four track road with many a rain bar to impede the progress of the unwary by way of its moniker. Alternatively head to Les La Pissas and onwards to the infamous Col du Cou. This is a real test of a rider's uphill ability. Very few can ride it all the way without a rest stop. But at worst it will take 30 minutes to walk and push your bike. The reward is the super long decent into Morzine centre ville. This has everything from fast rutted sections, big drop offs, rocky rooty sections and finally super fast gravely four track. In addition Les Crosets has the best four-cross course in the area with some pretty scary near vertical drops and the usual assortment of kicker, table tops and berms.

Champery
Champery is accessed via a number of routes from Les Crosets, all equally entertaining, no need for a downhill rig here all though plenty of riders use one. The trails are more technical single track of varying difficulty but without the super steep gradient of the specific downhill courses. There are ‘secret’ trails out there for the hard core freeride enthusiast but these are definitely more hospital inducing unless your top rider. There is a great bike park area in Champery below the téléphérique for testing out and developing those essential skills. The trip up the cable car is a spectacular part of the day and brings you out above Les Crosets, perhaps another run down the red downhill course?

Find trail maps here.