Schilthorn (9/5/1981)

Saturday, September 5, 1981

Awoke early to catch the 7:52 train to Interlaken. The train seemed longer than usual and more cars were added at Bern. At Bern there was another train to Interlaken that appeared to be fully reserved, and many of the cars were German. I think there are extra trains and cars because of the Unspunnenfest/Festival in Interlaken. This festival is held every 12 years. Unusually, the trains left Bern 15 minutes late. We were late out of Thun and outside Interlaken we had to stop to wait for passing trains. We arrived at Interlaken Ost/East at 9:50 and my train to Lauterbrunnen was to leave at 9:51! I still had to buy my half-price round-trip ticket to Schilthorn for 27 CHF/$13.50. Fortunately this narrow gauge train also left late and was very crowded. The conductor unlocked a reserved car for me, since I was on the special tour to Schilthorn with a guide. The guide spoke English and handed out brochures about Schilthorn. She also sold tickets for the optional side trip to Trümmelbach Falls, and I bought the last one.

At Wilderswil, the guide could not even readily identify Jungfrau. In Wilderswil, two giggling school girls boarded our reserved car and spoke loudly amongst all us foreign tourists. We arrived in Lauterbrunnen at 10:30 and followed the guide across the street to the incline plane/funicular. I was one of the first to board but chose to stand. When an old lady tugged my sleeve to indicate an empty seat, I left it for other old ladies. Arrived in Grütschalp at about 11:00. Here the guide pointed out the Eiger and its Wand/wall, Mönch, and Jungfrau as we waited for the narrow gauge Mürrenbahn/Mürren Railway.

Eiger, Mönch, and Jungfrau from Grütschalp

Mürrenbahn/Mürren Railway

This one-car train wound along the mountainside, taking us to Mürren. Here we could see the Eiger and Mönch, but the Jungfrau was hidden behind the Schwarzmönchwand/Black Monk Wall.

Eiger and Mönch from Mürren

A plaque behind the station commemorated the Englishman Arnold Lunn, who founded the Kandahar Ski Club here in 1924. We hiked through the ski resort town of Mürren to the Schilthornbahn, an aerial cable car.

Schilthornbahn with Birg station at top

Schilthornbahn

At 11:45 we left to ride up to the Birg station, and continued to Piz Gloria at the top of Schilthorn at 2970 m/9744'. Piz Gloria has a revolving restaurant with outdoor observation platforms. It was cold, but not freezing. There was snow all around the immediate area, and light clouds hovering around the mountain peaks. Here and there were bare rocky patches, so it was not ski-able.

Schilthornbahn from Piz Gloria

View from Piz Gloria

Eiger, Mönch, and Jungfrau from Piz Gloria

The restaurant revolves once per 50 minutes. It didn’t have any of the charm or elegance I remembered from the James Bond movie “On Her Majesty’s Secret Service” that was filmed here. I left the guide and started on my way back down.

Eiger, Mönch, and Jungfrau from Birg

Towards Mürren from Birg

Looking back at Piz Gloria from Birg

In Mürren I saw people taking photos of a quaint old house with flowerboxes and a garden, so I took one, too!

Flower bedecked chalet

Mürren

I took a lunch break; my plastic canteen still leaked, but now I keep it in a plastic bag. Many of the Mürren chalets had covered garages, probably because of the snow in winter. I hiked up along the Mürrenbahn to get photos.

Mürrenbahn

Mürrenbahn

Went back down to cross town to the Allmendhubel funicular.

Allmendhubelbahn

Eiger and Mönch from Mürren

Schwarzmönchwand/Black Monk Wall

Here also I hiked up along side the track to get photos, except I was among the chalets. A guy was suntanning on one of the chalet balconies, but we pretended not to notice each other. I finally stopped climbing when I thought I was close enough, and when I was out of breath!

Allmendhubelbahn

Allmendhubelbahn car

After taking photos, I went back down to the Schilthornbahn station. Going downhill was easier, but you felt as if you went too fast you would not be able to stop. I made it in time for the 14:00 aerial cable car going down to Grimmelwald. The conductor wanted to be sure I had already been up to Schilthorn. The cable car swung downward and after my brisk walk my legs felt especially weak and wobbly.

At Grimmelwald we had to change cars, and the lower line came up at less than a 45 degree angle. Grimmelwald was a collection of Alpine farms and there were a lot of white goats.

White goat and chalets

The next cable car took us down to Stechelberg, which appeared to be just the station and a parking lot!

Schilthornbahn from Stechelberg

Schilthornbahn station

During my 50-minute wait for the postal bus, I wandered and saw the glacier green stream.

Glacier stream

As the bus left the parking lot, I saw a sign that Trümmelbach was only 2 km/1.2 miles away! I could have walked there in the time I waited!
So 5 minutes later we arrived in Trümmelbach, where I saw our Schilthorn guide. I had caught up with the tour after all. Trümmelbachfälle/Trümmelbach Falls was very commercialized. A souvenir stand outside a chain-link fence. After passing through a gate, we walked to the base of the cliff for the lift or tiny funicular. It was a platform with a small wooden structure in which passengers stood. Through the back window you could see the track and cable. After a short ride we still had to climb farther, partly through a fissure created by the falls themselves. This was the only outlet for melted water of the glacier behind the Eiger and Mönch. At the end of the path you got wet from the spray of the first of seven cascades which appeared to come through a hole at the top of the cliff. Two or three more cascades could be seen as you returned to the level of the lift.

Chute 6?

The water is moving too fast!

Even though I paid 4 CHF/$2 for a round trip on the lift, I decided to walk down. The path left the fissure and weaved back and forth through cool woods. It returned to the fissure and crossed on a bridge for a view of another cascade. At the bottom you could see two more cascades as they rushed down. The water really swirled and thundered, sounding quite powerful and making your spine tingle.

Chute 1?

I exited through the chain link fence, passing two young girls cutting and raking long grass for fodder. So it’s not just old men who do this!

Passed the group of four Asian Indians who had been on the Schilthorn tour, and we nodded at each other. It’s funny how one’s tour-group compadres quickly become one’s familiars, even though you may never speak to them. If you met them again in another place, they would be like old friends. We ended up on the same postal bus to Lauterbrunnen. The bus passed the Staubach Falls which fall 300 m/984’. The winding hilly road was crowded with tour buses, and following the rule of the road, the vehicle going up hill had to yield right of way to those going downhill. We were mostly going uphill, and just barely made it to the Lauterbrunnen train station. The Indian fellows nodded and smiled, and let me off first, and then onto the train first. They made no attempt to talk to me which was a refreshing change.

Lauterbrunnen Valley

We arrived in Interlaken Ost/East at 16:30 where the station was full of people, half in traditional dress. The Unspunnnenfest was in full swing. The main event is the tossing of the Unspunnen stone which is marked with the dates of 1805 when the first festival was held, and 1905 for the centenary. It weighs 83.5 kg/184.1 lb. The festival has been held every 12 years since 1946.

In town, there were many, many, many, many more tourists in traditional dress. The women had from simple pastel flowered peasant dresses to fancy black velvet skirts with lace and silver chains, and lacework hairdressings.

Women in traditional dress

The men had knickers and collarless overshirts or jackets, and a few had wooden sandals similar to those clopping around in the Wilhelm Tell play. There was a group marching down the street playing fifes and drums. A drummer and concertina player rode around town in a horse-drawn carriage.

I saw a man untangling his bicycle from a woman’s motor scooter, but they appeared unhurt. I later saw the man bicycling along. Hopefully the woman was scootering along. In the main square, the average person could try their luck at stone tossing, and a long line of guys waited their turn (no girls…). The guys were old, young, fat, thin, macho, hippy, etc. The stone appeared to be twice the size of an average head. The first couple of fellows I saw huffed and puffed before heaving the stone about halfway along in the sand pit. Then a tall skinny bearded guy took one deep breath, took a couple steps back, then gracefully threw the stone the length of the sand pit.

Stone tossing

Kids were selling programs and buttons. Grilled bratwurst was sold at sidewalk stands. A yodeling concert had finished in the Casino gardens.

I heard loud clanging that seemed too monotonous to be a steel drum band, but it turned out to be about eight men carrying a pair of large cow bells on a yoke across their shoulders. They made quite a racket.

Cow bells

Postal bus

So although I missed the main events of the fest, I felt like I got the flavor of it. Took the 18:16 train to Bern and changed for the 19:41 to Biel.

On the train from Interlaken, there was a young Canadian couple who were talking about having budgeted well enough to stay in Europe another couple months. The guy said if they didn’t find work before getting to Greece, they should head straight for Israel, because he wanted to spend the winter in a warm climate. I wondered what kind of work they were looking for, and I also decided that I wanted to go to Israel, just like that! I envied these wanderers!