This morning we woke early again to check the weather. We really want to visit Jungfraujock and we had been advised to get up there as early as possible. The weather was spectacular with wall to wall sunshine and only a few clouds in the valleys. So up at 6:30, organized and ready for breakfast by 7:30 and by 7:50 we are on our walk to the railway station. The route up to Jungfraujock is done by train for the first part and then by cog trains for the rest since the grade is too steep. We transferred trains four times to get from Interlaken West.
As we left the valley we enjoyed views of the Swiss Alps that really were everything we could have imagined. We passed through villages along the side of the mountains with little houses with the unique Swiss appearance. Along the sides of the tracks and up the hillsides we saw bright green grass with animals grazing in an unconcerned and casual manner. Behind all this there is a backdrop of steep rocky mountains with snow ridges and rocky faces. Behind this bright blue skies with very few clouds. Our decision yesterday to delay our journey up to the Jungfraujock was justified.
We climbed up from the valley on our route to Grindelwald which is a picturesque village. At this point we got to view our first cog train. This train has a cog gear underneath that literally rolls along a matching cog rail between the two main rails pulling the train up the steep grades. There is a bit more noise than usual on the train but the ride does not seem to be affected.
I must say the Swiss have engineered their mountains very well. After the last transfer at Kleine Scheidegg we entered into a tunnel they have built inside the Eiger mountain. They have two stops inside the mountain where you can get out and look at the view from the Eiger's very steep North face. The cog railway terminates inside a small peak in the col between Jungfrau and Monch called the Sphinx. They have honeycombed this peak with tunnels.
We took an elevator up to the observation deck for spectacular views of the Aletsh Glacier; which is the longest ice stream in the Alps at 24 kms. We also had great views of Jungfrau and Monc. From this vantage point we are able to watch the skiers below (yep skiing on the glacier is happening!) and a few tour groups heading off in different directions up the sides of the mountains beside us. From here (and during other vantage points) we watched climbers going up Jungfrau - there was a long line of them going up the glacier one after another. We saw several skiers coming down from Jungfrau. No skiers on Monch, but a string of climbers could be seen there as well. We remember Sigi telling me about how many climbers there are in Europe and how crowded it is and now we have seen it with our own eyes.
We then walked out on the glacier about a kilometer to Monchsjochhutte - a three story climbing hut with a cafeteria where we had soup for lunch. Junfraujock is 11,333 ft (3454 meters). To get to the hut we climbed another 650ft which I believe is the highest we have ever been. At the base of the Sphinx, on which the observation deck was built, is a tunnel with a “cave like opening” to the trail that leads across the glacier to Monchsjochhutte. This trail is well maintained but it is snow and ice so walking had to be done carefully. The steady uphill grind at the 11,000 ft elevation definitely was an experience and we did not break any speed records. I did note that no one passed us and we did enjoy meeting and chatting with a couple from Austria on holidays. We sat together over lunch. One interesting fact we learned today is that in Feb 2008 Ueli Steck climbed the North Face of the Eiger in 2 hours and 21 minutes setting a new record.
They have also made an Ice Palace by creating corridors within the glacier that stands next to the Sphinx. Inside we walked the ice corridors to little alcoves with ice sculptures: eagles, Eskimo's and seals, and penguins. As we wondered through the corridors admiring the ice sculptures we worked hard not to slip on the icy floor. I am happy to report we managed. What is amazing is the Ice Palace is entirely carved out of the inside of a glacier. By the way, we found the acorn-loving saber-toothed squirrel named Scrat that starred in the movie “Ice Age” sealed in the wall of one of the corridors.
We finished our visit to the Jungfraujock by walking up to the ‘Plateau’ which is outside at the top of one of the shoulders of the Glacier. Again we had wonderful views but did not observe anything that we had not seen from the other observation locations we had visited.
We decided by 2:30 that it was time to start the trek homeward so we returned to the train and rode the first leg back to Kleinne Scheidegg. However this time we took the alternate route back by going down to Lauterbrunnen which took us through a second valley from the one we came up on in the morning. At Lauterbrunnen we changed trains again leaving behind the cog trains and returned to the regular train to Interlaken Ost where we once again changed to the train to Interlaken West (a 5 minute ride). We finished the travel by 5:30 in time for dinner and a walk back to the hotel. This has been a long day but it was so beautiful. We did spend a quite a bit of time sorting out the 202 pictures we took today and managed to reduce that to a mere 70. This blog only has 11 collages so you can imagine how difficult it is to sort, organize and filter – but it is worth it. Hope you enjoy the pictures too.
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