Davos Vampires Sip Rare Wine

[Joanne98]

Jan. 27 (Bloomberg) -- Ernst Wyrsch, whose Davos hotel serves as party central at the World Economic Forum’s annual jamboree, says the Swiss ski resort is enjoying the good times while it can.

“Sometimes I think that before the crisis arrives in Davos everyone wants to spend the money they have,” said Wyrsch, manager of the Steigenberger Grandhotel Belvedere. He’s already almost run out of the rare wine he ordered for this season, like a 1971 Chateau Petrus premier cru that sells for $1,700. “Of course, we’re not blind. It wouldn’t be serious to say that this will go on, that the crisis will not hit us at all.”

Cushioned by a blanket of snow and early hotel bookings, Davos has so far been protected from the market turmoil that caused $62 billion in writedowns and more than 16,000 job cuts at the two largest Swiss banks alone. As the annual conference rolls into town tomorrow to discuss the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression, locals wonder when the slump will hit.

“January and February are great but we’re worried about March,” said Nicoletta Mueller, director of the Schatzalp Hotel, a former sanatorium perched 300 meters above the town that German writer Thomas Mann visited before writing his 1924 novel “The Magic Mountain.”

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601109&sid=atlz1sgIup8Q&refer=home

I want to see the menus. Does anyone have a link?