At least one positive thing I can take away from the corona crisis is that it allows me to discover Switzerland intensively. Even if I can't travel far, I can at least work through my list of pending hiking destinations. And every time I am thrilled again how beautiful our country actually is (I guess I write this in every blog, sorry if I bore you with it!) So here is another, quite enthusiastic post about my hiking weekend in the Bernese Oberland last week, which I did with 2 friends.
Lauterbrunnen is a place I did not know before, but I had heard a lot about it. Embarrassingly mostly from foreign friends. I knew that the area is a Mecca for outdoor enthusiasts (especially for base jumpers), starting point for many trips to the Jungfrau region and that it inspired J.R. Tolkien for his "Lord of the Rings" books. So it was high time to explore the area!
We had 2 days to explore Lauterbrunnen area and started our first hike in Mürren, a beautiful village that you can only reach by cable car. From there, we hiked up to the Rotstockhütte. It took us about 2h to reach the hut. Although beautiful weather had been predicted for this day, we could only guess at the mountain panorama. It was still quite cloudy, only from time to time a little mountain or snow flashed out.
Well saturated we started the way back towards Mürren. Pretty knocked out from a rather exhausting hike, we were all glad to jump under the shower and enjoy the evening in beautiful Mürren.
In the evening we saw the mountains for which some people come to Mürren - Eiger, Mönch and Jungfrau. Well, or at least a little bit of them.
We were lucky and the next day there was hardly a cloud in the sky. From the breakfast table we already had a fantastic view of the mountains, which seemed to be so close - and therefore not so high anymore.
On this day a longer hike was planned, one that is often undertaken as a 2-day hike. With the gondola, we went down to Gimmelwald and started there our hiking tour in direction to the Oberhornsee.
The hike demanded a lot from us and we were glad to have started so early in the morning when it was not so hot yet. 1300 m uphill, 1700 m downhill, but well distracted by a wonderful area with glaciers, mountain streams and waterfalls (there are actually 72 of them in this area!).
Our first stop was at the Obersteinberg hut, a guest house with no electricity and therefore also called "candle hotel". We would have stayed there immediately, it looked so cozy!
We were rewarded for our efforts when we reached the Oberhornsee - a turquoise-blue, icy cold lake surrounded by an incredible panorama.
Strengthened by the cold water and our picnic, the descent into the valley began, which was no less tough. But also here the wonderful panorama and the surroundings (by the way UNESCO world heritage!) let us forget everything and just enjoy!
Pretty tired, sweaty and with knees that would soon have been suitable as castanets, we arrived in Stechelberg and started our way home. What a great hike! The Lauterbrunnen region is really worth a recommendation - it is not for nothing that it is part of the UNESCO world heritage and attracts so many visitors every year!
Here are the most important information about our hikes, in case the post office inspired you a little bit:
- the hike from Mürren to the Rotstockhütte takes about 2.5h and another 2.5 h back to Mürren.
- the hike from Gimmelwald to Oberhornsee and back to Stechelberg takes about 8h and is 7.5 km long. It is quite exhausting, but full of highlights. If you want to take it easier, I would recommend you to stay at Hotel Obersteinberg, the candle hotel. I would have loved to spend a night there! :-) More information about the hike you can find here, about the nice hotel