Susan Peters (Board Member and 2008 Youth Cup Leader) has direct experience with the venue for the 2009 World Chamionships. Susan offers the following tips.

As you plan your summer, remember that the World Championships will take place in Brunnadern, Switzerland during the first week of August (August 3-9 2009). The website for the event is www.islandpferde-wm.ch. Tickets are available at www.starticket.ch. I attended the Youth Cup this past summer that took place at the same site where the World Championships will take place. It is a beautiful spot located in a valley between two small mountains. I have a few thoughts on how to maximize your experience:

• Weather: Weather can be highly variable; we experienced torrential downpours, hot sun, cold days, warm and cool evenings and everything in between, so you should be prepared for a variety of weather.
• Brunnadern: It is a beautiful small town. As far as I could tell, there are two roads that flow through the town, both of which are two lane roads. While I am sure that they will have lots of parking, my recommendation would be to either find a place in Brunnadern or in one of the towns that are easily accessible by railway. St. Gallen is a nearby small city that has a number of very good hotels and trains go to and from St Gallen very frequently. To get to Zurich, you take a train to St Gallen and then take a train to Zurich. The thought that I had about Brunnadern generally is that a large influx of cars will put a lot of stress on those small roads and I would recommend either staying right in Brunnadern or choosing a hotel in nearby St Gallen and taking the train into Brunnadern. The WC site is within walking distance of the train (an invigorating uphill hike!).
• Places to stay: The WC website contains information regarding campsites and "sport accommodation" which is dormitory style sleeping arrangements where they provide a mattress and you provide a sleeping bag. There is also a link where you can register for bed and breakfast accommodation. Otherwise, look at the www.myswissalps.com website where there are links to hotels.
• Trains: Look at www.myswissalps.com for train information, rail passes and the like.
• Group tickets: The WC tries to group attendees by country. The US contingent is usually small but it is a lot of fun to sit together. If you would like to be part of the group, please contact me at susan.peters@gmail.com and we will secure tickets so that we can all sit together. If you have any questions I will be happy to try to answer them or point you in a direction that might be helpful.