Nights | Reading Rooms, the Vesserand Quarter & the Adults-Only Salon

Evenings inside the lodge

Most nights here are quiet by design. Dinner ends around half past nine and the building divides itself: some guests take the reading room and its fire, others the terrace with a blanket from the basket by the door, and a few disappear up the west stair to bed with the shutters open.

The reading room keeps two hundred books about this valley, a wall of walking maps going back to 1908, chess and backgammon boards, and the visitors’ log that guests have been writing in for a century. The bar in the corner serves until 23:30 and there is always a pot of the house tisane going. In the courtyard a small refracting telescope is set out on clear nights — on a moonless week at this altitude the band of the Milky Way is genuinely visible from the porch steps, and the porter will point you at Saturn if it is up.

Twice a month a valley trio plays in the reading room after dinner: fiddle, accordion and double bass, an hour, no amplification. It is announced on the board by the desk rather than sold as an event.

Down in the Vesserand quarter

Nine minutes down a gritted, lit footpath is the entertainment quarter: a stone-fronted arcade of about forty premises around a bandstand square. There is a small theatre with a repertory programme, two decent wine rooms, a late bakery that opens at 22:00 for the shift workers, an ice rink that runs from December to March, and the funicular that lifts you back up to the pass road if the path feels like too much at midnight.

The quarter also holds the district’s licensed gaming venues, which are independent businesses with their own rules, hours and door policies. We are not connected to any of them, we cannot reserve tables at them, and we will not recommend one over another. What the desk will do is tell you which streets are quiet on a Saturday, when the theatre lets out, and how late the funicular runs.

The annexe, across the courtyard

The adults-only gaming salon

A single panelled room in a detached building, with sixty seats, no windows onto the residence floors and no internal door to the rest of the lodge. Photographic identification is checked at every entry, every time, with no exceptions.

Age: 18 or local legal ageWhichever is higher. Minors are never admitted, accompanied or otherwise.
Identification: Every entryPassport or national card. A room number is not identification.
Hours: 19:00–01:00Closed Mondays and for the whole of the November maintenance fortnight.
Dress: Smart after 19:00Collared shirt or equivalent. No outdoor boots, no bathrobes.
Access: Courtyard door onlyStep-free from the porch. No route through the residences or the table.
Online play: NoneNo wagering, staking or play of any kind is offered on this website.

What the room is like

Green baize, brass lamps on adjustable arms, a long service counter with coffee and water, and a card room off to one side with four tables for guests who would rather play among themselves. It was fitted out in 1963 and refurbished with the same fabrics in 2019. Attendants are trained in the house rules and in recognising when someone should be encouraged to stop.

The tone is closer to a members’ library than a floor of machines. Conversation is expected to stay low, telephones are left at the counter, and photography is not permitted anywhere inside.

What we will never tell you

That outcomes can be predicted. That a session is likely to be profitable. That a system, a seat or a time of night improves your position. None of that is true, and any venue that suggests otherwise is not being straight with you. Gaming here is an entertainment with a cost, exactly like a theatre ticket, except the cost is not known in advance.

Attendants will refuse service to anyone who appears intoxicated or distressed, will honour a self-exclusion request immediately and permanently, and will never chase a guest to return. Our responsible play page sets out the tools available and the local support services.

A structural point

Why the salon is a separate building

When the annexe was converted in 1963 the family who ran the lodge insisted on three conditions, and they still hold. First, no route between the salon and the sleeping, dining or bathing areas — you leave the main house, cross the open courtyard and are checked at a door. Second, no gaming equipment, screens or advertising anywhere in the main building, which is why you will not find a single machine in our corridors. Third, no guest is ever encouraged towards the annexe: it is not mentioned at check-in, there is no leaflet in the rooms, and the staff will only discuss it if you ask.

The practical effect is that a family can spend a week here in the school holidays without their children ever seeing a card table, while a couple in the Cabinet suite can spend two hours at the baize after dinner. Both stays are normal here. Neither one interferes with the other.

Read the route book Responsible play