Although I managed to fit in a few very pleasant walks while I was in England in July, it’s been a long time since I’ve done what I’d call a proper hike. The main reason has been the heat: exerting myself when it’s already difficult just to be outside isn’t my idea of fun.
Today, though, the temperatures were only in the mid-twenties and there was a pleasantly cool breeze. After putting some effort into training at the gym recently, I wanted to take the opportunity to see how my fitness was coming along.
I considered a few different places, but rather than deliberately choosing a steep and challenging route, I decided to head to the far end of the Lauterbrunnen valley. There are paths leading up from the little village of Stechelberg which you can follow for as far as you feel like. For the exceptionally fit, the routes continue high into the mountains, but there are also a couple of mountain guest houses at more realistic distances.
As I only had the afternoon available, I knew I wasn’t going to contemplate reaching the second or third of them at Tschingelhorn and Obersteinberg. The first, at Trachsellauenen, seemed comfortably within reach. One of the advantages of this route is that there’s no real commitment: you can simply walk until you’ve had enough and then turn around. My walk today covered around 6 kilometres and 330 metres of ascent and descent.
I’d been up to this secluded part of the famous valley a few years ago, although on that occasion I’d decided that I couldn’t be bothered continuing further along the valley. I hadn’t done enough research beforehand to know what lay ahead, so I turned off onto another path that time, and climbed fairly steeply for ten minutes or so to a viewpoint at Schwendi, looking back down the valley, before continuing around to a steep, zig-zagged and uninspiring path through the forest.
I didn’t want to repeat that walk today. The idea was to go somewhere new, enjoy an afternoon outside and take some photographs with my proper camera for the first time in weeks. Getting there involved cautiously making my way by car through Lauterbrunnen itself, which is always something of a nightmare at this time of year. There are so many tourists, and people have a habit of stepping off the pavement to walk around one another even where the road is already very narrow. August — particularly a Saturday afternoon in August — isn’t the ideal time to visit. Still, I was determined to get to a quieter destination, and I know the valley well enough that heading well away from the main tourist attractions, railway stations and cable cars, seemed a fairly safe bet.
Even so, I probably passed a couple of dozen people coming back down the path as I walked up. That was slightly surprising, although not really a problem. Presumably some had stayed overnight at one of the mountain huts, while others had simply started much earlier in the day and were making their way back as I was only just setting off.
The gravelled path itself isn’t too difficult. It climbs more or less continuously, with only three sections steep enough to make you lean properly into the slope, and no stepped sections. I deliberately took my time: I wanted to pay attention to the details of the landscape, rather than simply ploughing onwards. Although a gravelled private road leads less steeply to my goal, I wanted to take the slightly steeper route and see how strong my legs were.
Once you leave the valley floor behind, the mountains begin to crowd around you and feel enormously high. Years of erosion have carved deep channels into the rock, with huge waterfalls pouring down the cliffs in places. Higher still, glaciers cling to some of the upper reaches of the surrounding mountains.
As you gain height, the Breithorn becomes an increasingly dominant feature. It’s already one of the most prominent mountains when you look towards the head of the valley, but further up the path it becomes even more dramatic, particularly where a huge waterfall—the Schmadribachfall—appears directly in front of it.
When I reached the guest house, I found a place beside the river and sat there for a good twenty minutes. The cascades were right beside me and there was a magnificent view towards the great mountains at the very head of the valley. It was wonderfully peaceful. There were probably a dozen people sitting outside on the terrace of the Berghaus, but the noise of the river drowned them out completely and I felt almost as though I had the place to myself.
After a break and something to eat from my rucksack, I started back down. Rather than following the same path all the way to the car, though, I branched off onto a much more secluded path, with the intention of reaching the viewpoint at Schwendi I’d visited a few years earlier but without the thigh-killing path I’d used before.
Although the path is clearly marked on the map and red-white markers confirmed that I was heading in the right direction, it felt surprisingly little used. There were a couple of uncharacteristically rickety gates on the path, and only the faintest of tracks through the grass until I reached the woods. A fairly new bench stood incongruously in the silence as I passed.
Inside the forest, the path rose and fell gently and crossed several little footbridges, which looked as though they’d been made roughly using timber from the surrounding trees. There were small cascades hidden amongst the trees, and having the entire path to myself made the walk particularly peaceful.
One thing I’ve noticed here before is how little wildlife there seems to be in these woods. Between the rushing water and my tinnitus, I probably wouldn’t have heard many birds even if they had been around, but I remember thinking the same thing the last time I walked here. In most woodland I know, there’s almost always the sound of small birds flitting around somewhere out of sight. Here, the forest seems unusually quiet.
I eventually reached the viewpoint, but by then the light had already disappeared from the valley below. Rather than lingering, I turned back and dropped down to the lower path again.
From there, it was another half an hour or so back to the car. I took it fairly slowly as my legs were beginning to tire, but I was pleased with how I felt overall.
The walk came to around six kilometres, with roughly 330 metres of ascent and descent. That might not sound especially dramatic, but for me it was a reassuring sign that my fitness has improved considerably since the beginning of the year.
Cycling to work more often and spending time on the fitness machines at the gym seem to be having exactly the effect I’d hoped for. If I can keep progressing at roughly this pace, I should be in much better shape the next time we head away for a proper hiking trip.
Leave a Reply