A walk in Switzerland

25 August 2007

Still stuck in Europe and it looks like my journey to Japan next week will be cancelled yet again.

Last weekend I went for a hike on the edge of the Bernese Oberland in Switzerland. I wanted to get right up on a glacier to check out some big mountain faces for the last time but due to some tough going had to settle for camping at the glacier snout. The upside was the pretty view and the thick soft moss that was growing on the glacial till. What a mattress!

My objective was to get far up the rock covered glacier on the right hand side of the picture. I down hiked from this peak to the head of the muddy glacial lake taking a route via the viewer’s left hand bank. It was steep going and crowded with dense vegetation. There was no lake shore to walk along as the land just plunged directly into the water.

The snout of the glacier covered in rocks.

Bright fresh sunlight the next morning. Looking up the glacier in the back ground.

Looking down the lake.  I had to climb back up everything I had laboured through the previous day.

I wanted to return this weekend but 40cm of snow has made the crevasses a little unsafe.