Take the Last Train to Schilthorn

30th June was our last day here, so we decide to take a third and final ascent of the Schilthorn / Piz Gloria for another brekker with James Bond.

This time there is notably less snow on the tops – and they have removed the James B cutout figure ( or maybe he’s off on a mission to get the producers to include him in the next film instead of a real actor  – 2D, or not 2D , that’s the question…)

There’s an almost-classic tea provided for breakfast –

And out of the revolving window, I start to see how the whole edifice was constructed – it’s built on Faith !

They have now opened the top of the track from behind the helipad, so we nip down the scaffolding to walk some of the ridge.  Frightening drop off on both sides, but  amazingly some small pink flowers are growing up through the scree.

To get to a proper walk, we take the cable car back down to Birg and set off on a walk towards Mürren.

( actually we end up at  Gimmelwald –  where there is the deep joy of a proper pub serving proper beer !)

There were some extremely steep scrambles before we reached the valley proper, and clouds were gathering. We decided to extend the walk down to Gimmelwald as it’s a fair bit quieter than Mürren, plus it is the home of that rather nice “dark lager” I discovered earlier.

We sat on the terrace, admiring the Lauterbrunnen valley below over  2 large glasses of the Black Monk , (with  cheesy nachos – 😯 ) , until the rain kicked off, at which point we headed indoors. Lovely old building, makes us realise we have only seen these wooden chalets from the outside up to now. There is a brief power cut during the lightning storm , but hopes of a lock-in are dashed when lights come on . In the cable car down to Stechelberg I realise I left my trusty hat ( a Tilley original)  in the bar .  Head straight back up and, as I enter, a nice young man says “I saw you’d left your hat – I’ve put it here for you “.  Restores your faith . I’m increasingly attached to that hat – a boon for sun protection round neck / face / ears/ crown, and shading the eyes from glare ( I do seem to attract a lot of glares).

And then – our last evening here passes peacefully , and in the morning we are off up north. That’s IT.

Epilogue

So  – 25 days here in the Lauterbrunnen valley.  23 of them  featured at least SOME fine weather, most were clear and sunny , which meant that we ended up doing all of the routes and destinations that our rail pass covered, some of them 2 or 3 times, with variations.  Put like that, it sounds like an Alpine Kama Sutra – ” as much fun as you can have in Rohan clothing”. And it’s been highly satisfying to reach the peaks, repeatedly ( OK, we can leave the allusion there;   Ed. ) Even if, at this age, we did need mechanical assistance to get us up  (I’ve warned you ! ; Ed)

Snow-cap Re-Cap

We included this picture on the first posting about Jungfraujoch –

It’s interesting to zoom out , and see how much ground we eventually covered  –

So my  final thought is –

Thank You, Lianne ! – for persuading a tight Yorkshireman we should lash out on the Summer Rail Pass – it made the whole trip fantastic.