I finally got around to ticking off a tour that had been on the “to-do” list for quite some time. The Scalettapass/Kesch hut tour is one I’ve read quite a lot about in various places and always found it described starting in Davos heading up the Dischma valley to Scalettepass and then continuing to Kesch hut before descending to Bergun.
From Davos Platz train station we headed for the Dischma valley. At first we climbed a non technical single which started just over the golf course and then followed the right hand side of the Dischmabach towards Teufi. Shortly after Teufi we crossed the stream and then followed the paved road up to Dürrboden.
After Dürrboden the way once again becomes unpaved and quite steep with some small technical features (at least when going uphill) in the trail. The gradient between here and the pass remains consistently steep (over 20% gradient in places) and only the fittest of riders will be able to ride the whole way to the pass.
Shortly after passing the top of the pass the trail splits and leaves two options to ride towards Kesch hut. The right hand split is a traversing trail which follows the 2500m contour on the north side of Val Funtauna while the staying straight brings you down to Alp Funtauna. We chose to stay straight and descend to the Alp. This was a really fun 400m alpine descent with a great mixture of flowing single trail, technical features and even a few switchbacks thrown in for good measure.
From the Alp the trail starts to climb at first gently and then later on quite steep towards Kesch hut. Those who like their uphill single track will like this trail, but personally I had the feeling it would be much more fun to ride down than up. It’s 400m vertical from the Alp to the hut but you end up only ascending about 100m in the first 3km and then 300m in the last 2km with the trail getting ever steeper the closer you get to the hut. Again only the very fittest will manage to stay in the saddle the whole way to the hut.
From the hut there are great views of the surrounding mountains and the Porchabella glacier. The hut also offers some well deserved food and drinks.
From Kesch hut quite a wide trail (borderline fire road) descends towards Chants. At point 2520 a single trail splits off to the right and rejoins the main route down again at Chants. We chose the single trail which started off really fun, but ended up being interspersed with some extremely technical sections that only the most confident mountain bikers will be able to ride. Not wanting to risk anything and with tiredness well and truly setting in at the end of the day we didn’t risk much and chose to get off the bikes relatively often rather than risking anything on a few of the more tricky features. For fresh riders who are technically VERY good this trail should be ridable in it’s entirety.
From Chants it is possible to either follow the fire road down towards Bergun or keep following the wanderweg signs to get a few extra sections of very fun single trail in.
The route is described in a number of different places going this direction around. Having done it I feel it would provide more single track fun to start from either Bergun or get the Post Auto up to Chants (not 100% sure if it has bike racks!) and then climb from there to Kesch hut. This climb should be doable in a few hours and is possibly ridable the whole way up. By going this way you would get a long section of single trail descent from the Hut to Alp Funtauna but then have a 400m hike a bike up to Scaletta pass before once again having a single trail descent to Dürrboden. From Dürrboden it’s an easy cruise down into Davos.
No matter which way you do the tour expect it to be physical and extremely beautiful. It’s a great day out and if you just want to do it for the experience it probably doesn’t matter which way you ride it. If you want to ride it and maximise your single trail enjoyment then I suggest trying it from the Bergun side.
