Day 35 -- Part 2 -- Zermatt and the Matterhorn -- Wednesday, July 18th

Daddy went alone to go see the Matterhorn today because we felt the journey would be wasted on the girls. The round trip by train was 7 hours. You can see how much farther Zermatt is from where we are staying in Kandersteg than the Jungfrau was from Interlaken which we did the day before.

I've seen the Matterhorn before. That's me in 1986 with my beautiful new Raichle hiking boots -- the first pair of good shoes I'd ever worn. I had just turned 17 but could barely keep up with my 29-year-old new Swiss stepmother, who had us do a long hike that day. I'll never forget lying down in a field of wildflowers, utterly exhausted, and having dozens of butterflies tickling my face as they licked the salty perspiration from my skin. I knew I couldn't top that day, so I was fine to keep that memory and not return today.

The rest of this blog post is taken directly from Daddy's journal, along with the photos he took:

I took the bus into Kandersteg and then got on a train bound for Brig, where I would transfer to a train that would take me to Zermatt. Right after leaving the surface south of Kandersteg, the train entered a very long tunnel. At full speed it took probably 15 minutes to get through the tunnel. It must have been many miles long. We had seen train cars loaded with cars, trucks, and even tour buses going into the tunnel. We found out that this was a common way of avoiding an otherwise 3.5 hour or more drive around this particular group of mountains.

The trip to Brig took about 50 minutes, then a short layover before the 1.5 hour trip to Zermatt. From the train station in Zermatt you just cross the street to the terminus of the Gornergrat cog railway, which takes you up the mountain, another 1/2 hour or so.

The town of Zermatt is pedestrian only (no cars), except for very small electric buses run by various hotels, and a few horse drawn carriages.

The cog railway ride was equally impressive to the one up the Jungfrau, with occasional glimpses of the Matterhorn.

It was a beautiful day -- clear blue sky with only the tiniest of clouds.

The area where the train lets you out was not snow-covered as the Jungfrau had been, presumably because this was at a lower elevation.

At the top, there was a large visitor center with restaurants with outdoor seating looking out over the matterhorn and a number of other mountains and glaciers.

I opted for lunch before looking around. I had a huge piece of vegetarian pizza and a Heineken beer and ate outside. There was a large black crow-like bird that would come right down onto the table and chairs looking for something to eat.

There was a rocky trail away from the visitor center that I hiked along. I was glad to have brought the trekking poles.

Amazing views out over the nearby glaciers. I spent a lot of time just looking.

Spring Gentian wildflowers

Purple Saxifrage wildflowers

People had built numerous cairns out of the flat rocks that were lying loose everywhere. I stopped and added a few more to one of the larger cairns.

In all I spent about 2 hours at the top, then boarded the train for the ride back down. The cog railway train arrival time was 13:39, the same time as the departure time for the train to Brig, so even though the stations were adjacent, I missed the connection. The next train wasn't for about 40 minutes, so I walked around Zermatt, looking in shops and trying to dodge the throngs of tourists.

Beautiful town, but very, very touristy.

The trip back to Kandersteg seemed a lot longer than the trip to Zermatt in the morning. The train made a lot of stops not at stations, and no one in my car seemed to want the windows open. It was like an oven, and was sweating profusely. Once in Brig, I knew I would be too late for the dinner hour at camp, so I bought a sandwich and a beer in a small cafe in the terminal. I also bought a small basket of local apricots from a vendor outside the station.

When I got back to Kandersteg the bus had just left, so I had to walk 30 minutes back to the Scout center. I was exhausted when I got back, but glad that we hadn't taken the girls. I don't think they would have been very happy with the long time on the train for the short time at the destination.