Travelling with Stabilo #4: Destination - Bernese Oberland , Day 1
We arrived at our hostel in Lauterbrunnen just after midday. We have been in Switzerland for a few days now, for the next few days, we would be basing ourselves here, to explore the Alpine landscape of the Bernese Oberland region. Just as we were discussing what we should do for the rest of the afternoon, the hostel host said to us,
“It’s perfect weather today to go up the Jungfraujoch, if you hurry and catch that last train leaving in 30 minutes…”
We hurriedly grabbed our ski jacket and rush to the Lauterbrunnen station, where the train to Kleine Scheidegg departs.
Jungfraujoch is a saddle point on the Bernese Alps between two peaks – Jungfrau and Mönch, both above 4000m. It is the perfect viewing point for the Alps and it is home to a tourist centre known as the “Top of Europe”. The only way to get to Jungfraujoch is via the Jungfraubahn cog railway, which runs from Kleine Scheidegg, a small camp 2000 meters above sea level, directly to the Jungfraujoch summit station. During summer, Kleine Scheidegg is the base for a number of beautiful hiking tracks, including the famous Eiger Trail. In winter, however, it becomes the base of a large number of ski fields in the region.
The train to Kleine Schedidegg took us through a number of mountain towns, following its winding tracks up the mountain. The carriage that we were on was full of skiers and snowboarders, all geared up for a fun day in the snow. There were even 6 and 7 years old kids all by themselves without any supervision, holding up skis and snowboards that were twice their size, ready to hit the slope. We felt out of place as it looked like we were the only ones who weren’t doing any snow sports.
Once we reached Kleine Schedidegg we had to wait for about 15 minutes for the Jungfrau cog rail to arrive, so there was some time to explore, except really, there wasn’t much to explore. Kleine Schedidegg really was just a base with a railway station and nothing more. There were people who literally just hopped off the train and skied down the mountain side. Most skiers headed towards their respective cable cars further ahead to get to the higher parts of the slopes. The scenery though was amazing, surrounded by mountains, everything was covered in snow. I could image how different but beautiful it would be in summer when the mountain slope would be covered with lush grass and wild flowers instead of an all blanketing white. There was a restaurant standing in the middle of the area, but we didn’t have much time to explore that before the cog rail arrived.
The cog rail started its ascend as soon as we boarded. Unlike the mountain train we were on before, the cog rail did not go along winding tracks but instead a slowly go up the mountain in a straight line through a number of tunnels. There were viewpoints and platforms during the ascend, some of which we had to get off for them to make mechanical changes to the cog rail in order for it to climb further up.
About 35 minutes later, we reached the Jungfraujoch submit station, just below the “Top of Europe” complex. The complex hosted a café, a souvenir shop, an indoor viewing area, and access to the outdoor viewing area upstairs, just below the Sphinx Observatories, one of the highest observatories in Europe. Hunger for the view, we went straight for the outdoor viewing area where we got an uninterrupted view of the Bernese Alps. The Jungfrau was on one side, and Mönch on the other, with an opening between the two that offered the view to the rest of the Alps. We were also totally unprepared for the -24°C cold outside. It was annoying, because we actually had gear that could stand this in our luggage, we just forgot to bring it. We took unrecognisable selfies as our faces was fully covered with our jacket and scarf.
By the time we got back inside, our hands and feet were numb from the freezing cold. I was also feeling dizzy and my lips were turning blue. I was suffering from a mild case of altitude sickness. It was over 3500 m above sea level after all. Lucky, it wasn’t too bad, and we hurried back down the mountain via the last cog rail of the day. We headed back to our hostel and made a big bowl of soup and noodles to chase away the cold. We were too tired to really do anything after dinner, so we just slumped into bed and fell straight asleep.