Hiking the Männlichen Summit

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View from Männlichen into the Grindelwald valley

In German, the word for hiking is wandern, and can be expanded to mean anything from migrating, journeying and wandering. And indeed, you can do quite a lot of hiking in Switzerland simply by wandering from signpost to signpost on the country’s 50,000 km of marked trails. Even the smallest mountain outposts are easily found via an intricate system of wanderwege routes (marked by yellow signs) found between lakes, valleys and towns, higher altitude bergwege mountain paths (marked by white-red-white blazes), and rugged alpine routen trails (marked by white & blue blazes) that can include steep drop-offs and sections with cables or handholds.

Since the phrase “relaxing vacation” is not in our vocabulary, Britton and I spent our last day in Berner-Oberland hiking. The guide at Balmer’s suggested taking the train from Interlaken to Wengen (with a train transfer at Lauterbrunnen). Round-trip tickets for this cost about CHF 25. From Wengen (1,274 m), we would hike the route to In Gassen and Männlichen (2,227 m), then walk along the mountain ridge to Kleine Scheidegg (2,061 m), and finally trek downhill from Kleine Scheidegg toward Wengernalp back to Wengen.  On the Jungfraubahnen Wandern map, that would be routes 46, 33 and 41.

The morning was marked with a heavy downpour and ominously thick cloud cover, and I silently fretted about what we were going to do if the rain didn’t ease. Fortunately, the skies cleared at about 10:30 am, and we set off with backpacks full of bread, cheese, salame and light clothing. Personally, I think that hiking in sneakers is often safer than using thick-soled hiking boots because you will have a better feel for the terrain. Besides, hiking boots are heavy, and that extra weight goes a long way when you are scaling a mountain. The same goes for hiking poles; they can be helpful if you’re going downhill, but for the most part, you’re better off using your hands for balance and feet to feel the ground. I had to laugh at the hikers decked out in shiny layers of North Face and poles on flat sections of trail. Newbs.
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Swiss Eats: Cheese, Chocolate and…Pasta?

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Clockwise: Beef carpaccio and Swiss cheese rolls with olive oil and rösti from the Cafe de Paris (Interlaken); luxemburgerli from Confiserie Sprüngli; raclette with potatoes, pickles and pickled onions; confections to celebrate Swiss National Day (Aug 1)

“I might be done with cheese after this week in Switzerland,” I joked to the waitress. She looked at me with consternation. “Oh no, I could never be done with cheese!”

From soft to extra-hard, holey to solid, in all shades of white, amber and yellow, the Swiss love their cheese and produce about 450 different varieties of it. Whether melted in fondue pots or simply sliced in thin sheets and eaten atop bread, cheese is ubiquitous on menus and the core of most traditional Swiss dishes. Fondue is fairly common in the US so I bypassed that, but for a (relatively) less intense cheese option, you can order raclette, which is both a type of cheese and a dish featuring this cheese. The cheese round is heated, then scraped (from French racler, meaning “to scrape”) onto the diner’s plate, and usually served with boiled potatoes, pickles and pickled onions. Another popular Swiss dish is rösti, or grated, fried potatoes similar to hash browns. Be warned that if you order rösti, you will often get an entire plateful of potatoes, in the shape of the frying pan. The rösti can come topped with cheese, speck, onions or other condiments.

For those craving a sugar high, Switzerland’s other strong suit is their chocolates and sweets. If you are traveling in Zürich, be sure to grab some luxemburgerli, a confection produced exclusively by Confiserie Sprüngli. The luxemburgerli are delightfully airy, and look like miniature macarons about 1″ in diameter, with a sugar-based biscuit top and bottom, and creamy filling in the center. Traditional flavors include chocolate, vanilla, champagne and cappucino, and you can also get seasonal variations like lemon and raspberry. I tried the hazelnut and cassis (currant), and both were delicate flavor bombs, chock full of fresh, natural ingredients. Confiserie Sprüngli also produces fine chocolate products; don’t forget to try the Truffes du Jour.
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Questionable Life Choices: Canyoning the Grimsel Pass

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[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PC9VPAcIskU&hl=en_US&fs=1] YouTube

Frothy water churned beneath me as I teetered at the edge of a rain-slicked ravine, inspecting the rocky canyon walls below. “I can do this. I can do this.” I mumbled to myself. “Wait, why am I jumping off of a perfectly good ledge?” The guide gave me a look and gently said, “Why don’t you take your hand off the rope first? All right, 3…2…1…JUMP!” I closed my eyes, tucked in my knees and threw myself into the water. It was just a bit after 9 am.

Just a couple days before, Britton had been clamoring about going hang gliding in Interlaken. Waving a fistful of brochures for the dozens of extreme sports agencies in the area, she wanted to follow up her skydiving experience from two weeks earlier with hang gliding in the Alps. You can also do things like parasailing (flying with a parachute rather than rigid wings), whitewater rafting and even zorbing (rolling down a hill in a giant plastic ball – no joke). Then we stumbled upon the sport of canyoning, where you have to get through a whitewater filled canyon using a variety of climbing, jumping and swimming techniques. Without thinking about it for too long, I agreed to sign up, and soon we were carted off to the Grimsel canyon, about an hour southeast of Interlaken.

At the foot of the mountain, we changed into wetsuits, boots, jackets, life vests and helmets. Outdoor Interlaken kindly labels all of their helmets, so that you can distinguish people from each other. Mine was labeled a fairly innocuous “Digi-Bo,” but Britton’s was labeled “Stu Pitt,” and the other labels included “Harry Balzac,” “Master Bates” and “Ewok.” Our band of intrepid adventurers included about ten Americans and That Guy with Dreadlocks who hailed from New Zealand.
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Mountain Biking the Lauterbrunnen Valley

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View of the Lauterbrunnen valley on the way to Stechelberg

For CHF 35, you can rent mountain bikes from Balmer’s hostel, which is a decent deal for a full day of biking. (Hint: we were later informed by other travelers that you can go around the corner to rent bikes for just CHF 20.) Armed with a map of the Jungfrau region, the activities guide at Balmer’s suggested biking to Wildersil, through Zweilutschinen to Lauterbrunnen, where we could stop for lunch. From Lauterbrunnen, you can bike to Stechelberg, take the gondola up to Murren, then bike down the mountain back to Lauterbrunnen and Interlaken. The route is mostly gravel, with some short sections of dirt and pavement.

The trek from Interlaken (567 m) to Wildersil is flat and fast, about 15 minutes or so of biking. Once you pass Wildersil though, everything goes rapidly uphill. The toughest ascent of the route is a bit outside of Wildersil. Remember, there is no shame in getting off your bike to walk up the hill, unless your other friend is leaving you in the dust.
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Interlaken: Jungfrau’s Cosmopolitan Hotspot

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Interlaken is an unusual confluence of college-age backpackers, international tourists, avid nature lovers and extreme sports enthusiasts. Strolling around the town’s grassy quadrangle, it is not unusual to see American frat boys, veiled Muslim women and Korean photographers, all gathered to take in the beauty of the Jungfrau peak of the Berner-Oberlander region, while sipping a beer at Hooters. Due to the town’s central location and diverse amenities, Interlaken is well-known globally as a tourist hotspot. English-speaking travelers should have no trouble navigating the town, given that there is signage and menus written in languages from French to Korean. On the downside, the town does have quite a few tourist trap restaurants and probably more souvenir shops per capita than any other town I have seen. The best meal I had in Interlaken was at the Cafe de Paris, just a block north of the main drag, with reasonably priced entrees (~20 CHF) and excellent food. The beer of choice here is Rugenbräu, which unfortunately reminds me a lot of Bud Light. For better alternatives, I recommend Buddy’s Pub, which also has Feldschlösschen Hopfenperle and Dunkle Perle on tap.

Interlaken is situated between two lakes (hence the name), at a relatively low elevation of 567 m. So, you will not see a lot of the Alps directly from Interlaken, but it is convenient to take trains further up, to the Lauterbrunnen or Grindelwald valleys. You could pick a smaller town higher up as a base, however there will be far more limited options at night in terms of restaurants and nightlife.
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Zurich: Financial Centre with an Edge

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Limmat River cuts through Zurich and is crisscrossed by many bridges. You can see the twin towers of the Grossmünster church on the right, and the tower of St. Peterskirche on the left, which boasts the largest church clock face in Europe.

Let’s throw this out there first: Zurich is expensive. And not in the same way as other purportedly expensive cities I have traveled in (Tokyo, NYC), where there is a large range in prices, and some goods are nosebleeding pricey but you can find deals if you look in the right places. Instead, Zurich seems to have uniformly leveled all of its prices about $10-20 up from what you might expect. Strolling through downtown Zurich, it is usual to see coffee for CHF 7 and Chinese take-out for CHF 16. (Right now, CHF 1 = $0.96.) Even the “dollar” menu at McDonald’s has been replaced with burgers for CHF 2.50 and a side salad for CHF 3. A small size meal with an “NYC Crispy” burger costs CHF 12.30. An 800 meter cab ride from the main train station sets you back CHF 26 and dinner at an average restaurant runs about CHF 35. Even Swiss products that I have bought in the US (Victorinox knives, Sigg water bottles) cost more in Switzerland. I am scratching my head as to why there isn’t more cross-border arbitrage.
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