Alpinist & the Goat — Restaurant in Telluride

My first impression of the Alpinist and the Ghost was of its (rather narrow) entry hallway. This was because, while we had a reservation for 7:30 PM, we were not seated until more than an hour later. The group next to us, who also had a reservation and were forced to wait nearly an hour, could not fit into the hallway with us. Once we were finally seated, we found that, implausibly, the dining room itself was even smaller than the hallway. The décor of our room (there were two in the restaurant) could best be described as effortless, in the sense that clearly, zero effort was put into it. It was seemingly also used for storage; its corners were filled with extra chairs, extra fondue machines, extra coat hangers. The room was so cramped that our waiters physically could not serve the people seated at the back half of our table.

Notice the plural use of “waiters”—this is because there were three kind but extraordinarily confused waiters working our table tonight, all three of whom arrived at our table at different times to repeatedly offer us menus, food, and the check in a kind of Groundhog-day-like cycle. The waiters’ confusion extended to the menu, too; when we ordered the salmon salad, we were told confidently that the salmon salad was not on the menu. When we showed our waitress that the salmon salad was indeed on the menu, she remained clearly unconvinced, but acquiesced: “Okay, I’ll put it down, then.” After an extensive wait time, we were served a plain salad instead.

After a string of mishaps—dishes ordered but forgotten, incorrect dishes served and wait times that rivaled the hour it took us to even get seated, our correct food finally arrived. It was at this point that we realized how misleading the menu really was: an over-70-dollar fondue only included bread, apples, and cheese. You had to pay an extra $56 for a side of meat. The other dishes were similarly sparse and incredibly mediocre, especially for their offensively inflated prices.

By the time our second waiter offered us the check for the second time, we were tired, unsatisfied, and ready to leave. It took a mysteriously long time for our credit card to be swiped (upwards of 15 minutes) even though the restaurant was otherwise completely empty. This allowed us plenty of time to reflect on our dining experience, which we couldn’t help but laugh at, if only because it seemed like a heavy-handed parody of what a bad restaurant should be.

In conclusion: within the Alpinist and the Ghost, laws of time, space, and civility were obsolete. Only Murphy’s Law remained: anything that could go wrong, invariably did go wrong.

Joking aside, though, the meal was close to $80 a head (we didn’t drink; we should have), no efforts were made to truly apologize for how late we were seated despite our 7:30P reservation nor for the string of mistakes made. The best we got was “it’s crowded” and “this is out of our control”. The other family waiting in the hallway next to us included an older woman who clearly had Parkinsons and had been waiting close to 40 minutes by the time we started chatting (commiserating) together. Our family goes on a ski vacation once a year. We work hard all year to have a nice vacation, and nice meals on our vacation. To say our experience was mediocre is an overstatement; that the dinner was almost $400 adds...

Weirdest place ever. You can tell by the other reviews here and I have to agree this is truly the Alpinist and the Ghost. The experience was peculiar to say the least… upon coming in no one helped us until we asked them where to sit. Then about half way through our dinner they asked us for the name on our reservation… not sure why that matters halfway through the meal but okay. Also the place was literally empty so not sure why we even needed a reservation. As for the servers, they were physically present but aloof — basically I don’t know if they knew they existed.

As for the food… most mediocre fondue ever! Not to mention they were also out of half of the sides and cheeses. Then for the dessert they were also out of strawberries. They served us chocolate fondue with pound cake and cookies which they literally opened out of a plastic wrap right next to us and put on the plate. Not to say it was inedible but they charge you some very steep prices considering the quality of the food and service.

The restaurant as a whole was a weird vibe. They were blasting the strangest music ever. Bathroom is a mess with a bucket in the middle of the floor catching the leaks from the ceiling. Only highlight is that my family cannot stop laughing about this comedy of errors.

Can’t forget that two days later they call us and say they have an open tab and demand we pay. We paid the night of the dinner and trust we were not going to pay again for this. Just when we thought we escaped the ghost...

We are from Switzerland, worse fondue ever in our life. What's wrong - everything. We get the point the owner is from New York and created his own cheese fondue, but than they should not call it Fondue (the entire place calls to be great in Fondue). The Traditional/classic fondue in Aplinist & Goat is with Emmi cheese, sounds good but they use Emmentaler cheese, never heard someone makes a fondue with 100% Emmentaler cheese, Chardonnay wine and roasted bread in oil. The classic traditional/classic Fondue is made out of four ingredients: cheese (50% Gruyere and 50% Vacherin), white wine (Fendant (dry wine/Chaselas grape)), garlic (in peaces and squeezed in pot), white bread in cuts (no oil, hot or whatever, just pure cut a baguette). The mix starter platter was also max 2 stars. Everything came together, starter, fondue and salat. After 45 mins we were out. I write very rarely recessions, but see my first sentence. To the owner: in principal its a good idea to have fondue in the mountains, I know you are nicely booked out, but you should serve a good to great fondue. Get the point the American taste might be a bit different, but try the simple recipe out as above. You can add it to your list and call it classic Swiss fondue. PS: Reviewed the five star reviews, all from people they gave five stars to other places, shops etc. Looks so they used some people to give five stars reviews. I'm not using...