Andermatt, Alpine Hiking, and Other Awesomeness

  Andermatt, Switzerland
Saturday, July 14, 2007

Yesterday morning, we left Lauterbrunnen for Andermatt, a little town in the alps which lies at the junction of several major and spectacular mountain passes, twisting roads hugging the mountainside with hairpin turns at every bend and snow-covered peaks looming above steep valleys dotted with villages and church spires.   Andermatt itself is a lovely, tiny little town with narrow cobbled streets, lupins on the hillsides and a beautifully decorated church from the late 1800s covered with brightly painted frescoes on the interior.

Generic Alpine Scenery

This morning, we drove the Furka Pass out of Andermatt, with amazing views and more winding mountain roads.  Partway through the pass, we stopped at a hotel and gift shop/restaurant type place situated at the top of what was once a massive glacier, now melted away from its former glory but still fairly big, with millenia worth of compressed ice feeding down into a river into the valley below.  It turned out that you could actually take a short walk through a tunnel cut into the  glacier and into an ice cave, so we headed down the rocky slope where the glacier had retreated, and over a wobbly wooden boardwalk into the frigid heart of the glacier.  It was eerily beautiful, with the light filtering through the ice to turn everything an otherworldly shade of blue.  It was freezing cold, but just spectacular, and we braved the dripping, chilly interior for as long as we could before heading back out into the sunshine.

Gabrielle in the Glacier

Mike, Marla and Nathan decided to keep going on the alpine passes with the motorbikes, but we opted to head back to Andermatt, and spent the afternoon hiking on a beautiful path in the mountains behind Andermatt.  It was a bit like stepping back in time, with all the stone farm buildings and farmers cutting their hay by hand in the fields.  Tomorrow we head on to the eastern edge of Switzerland and the resort towns around St Moritz - it all sounds a bit fancy for us, I hope the dress code includes hiking boots and ragged t-shirts!

Dan's Mighty Snowman

All our best from Switzerland,

Dan and Gabrielle