Hostellerie du Pas de l'Ours – a Valais chalet run by one family since 1994

Halfway up the slope that gives Crans-Montana its view south across the Rhône valley, the Hostellerie du Pas de l'Ours rises like a vast chalet built with the proportions of a small château, timber walls set against raw stone facades. At Rue du Pas de l'Ours 41, a few hundred metres from the Cry d'Er cable car, this fifteen-room Relais & Châteaux house carries Two MICHELIN Keys, the guide's rating for an exceptional stay. It opened in 1994, run from the start by Séverine Bestenheider, one of the four daughters of the family that built Crans-Montana's hotel dynasty, and her husband Franck Reynaud, who took the stoves at opening and earned the restaurant its first MICHELIN star three years later. Two kitchens still carry his name today: the one-star L'Ours and the more relaxed Bistrot des Ours.

01The house

The hotel's roots lie a short walk away, at the Hôtel Aïda, which Armand Bestenheider – born into a modest Montana family – took over in 1962 and built with his wife Christiane and their four daughters into the base of a family hotel business. Séverine, their daughter, was handed the new Pas de l'Ours to run at just 22, and still runs it today, nearly thirty years on. The group now also includes the Aïda Hôtel & Spa and the Hôtel de l'Etrier, the latter linked to the Hostellerie by an underground passage shared between their restaurants.

From outside, the building keeps faith with Valais tradition: old timber cladding over a stone base, the kind of construction that has defined this resort for a century. Inside, the aged wood and natural stone are offset with granite, slate, exposed beams and fur fabrics, gathered around a large central fireplace in the lounge, where crackling larch logs are as much a part of the welcome as the staff.

02Rooms and suites

Fifteen rooms and suites fill the house, climbing from the Cosy Classic Room through the Junior Suite, Open Suite, Loft Suite, Family Suite "Le Sommet", Suite "Ours Blanc" and a connecting Polar Suite to the Chalet Suite and, at the top, the Bear Suite – a 200 sqm, three-bedroom apartment for up to six people with its own terrace and hot tub facing the Alps. Most rooms keep an open fireplace, a whirlpool bath and a south-facing balcony over the Valais peaks.

Insider tip

Closed in May and November; L'Ours reopens for winter on 11 December 2026.

Rates run from around CHF 490 for a classic room to several thousand francs for the Bear Suite. The whole house – three rooms, eleven suites and the Bear Suite together – can also be booked privately, for a family gathering or a celebration that takes over the building.

03Where to eat

Franck Reynaud arrived in Crans-Montana in 1991 for a single winter season at the Hôtel Aïda, where he met Séverine Bestenheider; two years later, at 24, the couple opened the gourmet restaurant together. L'Ours has kept its MICHELIN star ever since and now holds 18 points in Gault&Millau, the score that makes Reynaud the guide's top-rated chef in the Valais; Gault&Millau named him Chef of the Year in 2018, and in 2023 he received the Swiss Culinary Merit.

His cooking keeps its Provençal accent – olive oil, bouillabaisse, a produce list that runs from vineyards above the Rhône valley to a favourite egg sourced five kilometres away in Icogne – worked through seasonal discovery menus of five to eight courses, priced between CHF 180 and 240, with dishes such as foie gras marinated in Armagnac or bass fillet in a bouillabaisse reduction. A carnotzet, the traditional Valais wine cellar, lets guests work through bottles from vineyards said to be among the highest in Europe.

One floor down, the Bistrot des Ours serves the same kitchen's more informal, produce-driven cooking – creative, gourmet plates built around local suppliers and Reynaud's Provençal roots – in a timber-lined dining room.

04Spa and wellbeing

Spa L'Alpage, developed with the Swiss skincare house Hormeta, keeps to the chalet mood: an indoor pool that opens to the mountain air in good weather, a sauna, a hammam and a fitness area, with a second pool outside for summer use. It runs from 8am to 8pm, and its therapists build each visit around a personalised ritual rather than a fixed treatment card.

05The neighbourhood

The Cry d'Er cable car is barely 500 metres from the front door, and the Golf Club Crans-sur-Sierre is a kilometre away – reason enough for the hotel's free transfers to both the lifts and the courses. Higher still, at 2,200 metres, Reynaud runs La Cabane des Violettes with mountain guide Pierre-Olivier Bagnoud, a 360-degree mountain restaurant that works as the Pas de l'Ours' summer and ski-season outpost above the resort.

06Making the most of a stay

The hotel closes each year in May and in November; for 2026 the gourmet restaurant L'Ours reopens for the winter season on 11 December. The house belongs to Relais & Châteaux and to Les Grandes Tables de Suisse, the country's circle of chef-led addresses. Guests planning a longer or larger stay can also take the Hostellerie privately, or look at its separate Private Chalet nearby.

For a weekend. For a lifetime.