Following our trek on the Haute Route from Chamonix to Zermatt, Margaret and I spent 3 days hiking and exploring the mountains around Zermatt as well as one day in Geneva before flying home. Zermatt is a destination ski resort town nestled at the end of a beautiful valley with some of the most outrageous mountain scenery I have ever seen. The Matterhorn dominates many views, but other peaks such as Monte Rosa, Breithorn, Rimpfschorn, Strahlhorn, Ober Gabelhorn, and Zinalrothorn are in full view. Even in summer, several gondolas, cable cars and even a high mountain train take visitors high up the slopes of these mountains. Many trails crisscross the slopes making for some excellent hiking with amazing scenery.
Day 1 - Gornergrat Bahn railway
Built in 1896, this electric cogwheel train rises 5200 feet from the valley floor to an observatory overlooking 29 peaks over 4000m (13,123'). It reaches the summit of Gornergrat at 10,135', the start of many great hikes. For us, this was a "rest" day, so we set off just to meander down some trails and pickup the train lower down at one of the many stops it makes along the way.
The train arrives at the summit of Gornergrat where there is an observatory, restaurant and of course, gift shop. We quickly used the facilities and made our way down the trail, fleeing the gawking crowds clicking photos and being solicited by photographers charging them to pose with large St. Bernard dogs wearing small casks of whiskey strapped to their necks.
I'm getting better at the one-handed self portrait shots. I did bring a small tripod, but as usual, never used it.
We had great views of Monte Rosa, which is the highest mountain in Switzerland and the second-highest in both the Alps and western Europe. The main summit, known as the Dufourspitze 4,634 m (15,203 ft)), is the culminating point of the Pennine Alps. Although its main peak is located within Switzerland, the Monte Rosa Massif sits on the border of Italy, and is the second-highest massif in Italy.
From the Monte Rosa massif flows the Gorner glacier, the second longest glacier in the Alps. In the center right of this photo is the Breithorn, which is actually slightly lower than Monte Rosa (far left).
The trail winds around the hillside and affords great views of the Matterhorn, along with many small tarns to catch it's reflection.
At this small tarn, we ran into our friends Mike and Val, so we posed for one of the few photos we got of each other during the trip.
Here you can look down to the town of Zermatt from high above. Out toward the horizon is the Rhone Valley and the Bernese Alps beyond.
Our trail wandered through the small village of Rifflealp with it's 5 star hotel, restaurant and even a micro gauge train to bring you and your luggage over from the train stop 1/4 mile away.
After ordering a delicious desert at the outdoor restaurant, we walked down to the train stop and took it back down into Zermatt. In retrospect, we should have just purchased a one-way ticket and planned on walking all the way down into Zermatt from the top. It would have saved us some cash, the train tickets are $40 chf per person, each way!
Day 2 - Hornlihutte on The Matterhorn
Since we had a day off from "real" hiking, I convinced Margaret that we should hike 1/3 up the Matterhorn to the first of 2 climbers huts called the Hornlihutte. It sits on the Hornli ridge at 10,700', built by the Swiss Alpine Club in 1880. This is one of the most popular and direct climbing routes up the Matternorn, and as it turned out, quite a few day hikers make this trek.
Schwarzsee Lake with with it's chapel Maria zum Schnee.
As we approached the base of the peak, some stairs and ramps have been installed to provide accessibility to average folk. I was a bit disappointed by all this.
The final approach before the steep switchbacks up to the hut.
You can see the hut at the top center of this shot, with the trail switchbacking steeply up the rock face in the foreground.
From above the Hornlihutte looking back at Monte Rosa and The Breithorn.
The steep rock face directly above the "no camping" sign is where the roped climbing begins.
We followed a group of 4 German climbers right up to the wall, and here they are starting to ascend the fixed lines. To the left are several plaques cemented to the rock with scripture verses.
This is a far up the Matterhorn as I got. Maybe next time...
Back down at the hut, the mobs have arrived. Time to head down.
We decided to hike over and through all the lakes we saw from the top. This turned out to be an established route called the Matterhorn Glacier Trail, complete with interpretive signs along the way describing how glaciers carved the peaks and valleys.
Margaret looking for souvenir rocks.
One of each color.
Day 3 - Gorner Gorge and surrounding hamlets
The Matterhorn is so photogenic, it's tough not to keep taking photos at every turn.
From our hotel in Zermatt, we walked up valley, through some smaller hamlets and soon came to the Gorner Gorge. A series of wooden balconies and pathways wind through the gorge, high above the cascading river below. Very cool but not for anyone with vertigo.
The Swiss are very proud of their flower boxes.
All the traditional buildings are made of rough hewn wood, treated with some sort of dark stain which preserves the wood very well. The roofs are all made of very thick overlapping slate, which looks like it would last forever.
Most all older buildings are built up off their foundations and on each post is a very large piece of slate separating the building from the foundations. We finally found out that these pieces of slate prevent rats and other rodents from getting into the building. Evidently they can't cling to the bottom of the slate and crawl around them to the top.
The trail crossed a large suspension bridge, which Margaret crossed very quickly.
The Swiss Valais Blacknose sheep with so much hair in their faces, it's hard to understand how they can see.
Back down in Zermatt, there was a music festival going on all week. These are the traditional Alphorns that have been used in Switzerland since the 1500's. It sounded like a quartet of mellow trombones.
Last day in Geneva
We took the train from Zermatt to Geneva on our last day. We arrived in Geneva around noon, so we had half a day to explore around on foot. We ended up spending most of the day at St. Pierre Cathedral and the Reformation Wall.
St. Pierre Cathedral is part of the Swiss Reformed Church and is best known as the home of John Calvin. The current building was built in the 12th century, although the site had 2 other cathedrals built on it in early Roman times, dating back to the 8th century.
We were able to climb up into two towers, through narrow spiral stone staircases to look out over the city and also into the bell towers.
In the Reformation Park, one of several open air giant chess matches.
This is the giant Reformation Wall with it's huge bas-relief carvings of the early church reformers including John Knox, John Calvin, Oliver Cromwell and others. The Wall is in the grounds of the University of Geneva, which was founded by John Calvin, and was built to commemorate the 400th anniversary of Calvin's birth and the 350th anniversary of the university's establishment. It is built into the old city walls of Geneva, and the monument's location there is designed to represent the fortifications', and therefore the city of Geneva's, integral importance to the Reformation.
On the flight home over Greenland
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