Switzerland by Train and foot- Part 1

Switzerland by Train and foot

-By Robert Fullarton

Copyright 2015

 1.

I travelled to Switzerland this June with my aunt, whose husband had recently passed away.
She has and always probably will be for me one of the most humble people I have ever known.
She offered to pay for my expenses on an otherwise truly expensive holiday to the beautiful mountain village of Wengen- in the Bernese Oberland. I in return promised to do some gardening and painting for her in gratitude. Switzerland for me has been one of the most orderly, synchronised and affluent of places that I have ever been before.

Switzerland is a hub for modern industry, finance, trade, tourism and produce, internationally known for its cheese, chocolate, watches and army knives. The wealthy Victorians - particularly Thomas Cooke the founder of the lucrative travel agency and tour operators- with an eye for natural beauty, a heart for winter sports and raw natural exploits came in numbers to the lakes and mountains of southern Switzerland. This country offers a refined form of tourism for those who can afford the high costs of living- especially travel expenses and those for food and drink (eating out is a costly ordeal for a main course or even a beverage). Thrill seekers and adrenaline junkies love to go to the southern Alpine regions for base jumping, para-gliding and winter skiing on black runs and will pay the extra costs for such extreme sports. I spoke with an English couple at our hotel, who informed me that the Swiss tourist board are advertising and promoting the country as a tourist hub for rich Asians, particularly rich Japanese and Indian tourists- who from my experience have come in multitudes from far and wide to see the natural beauty of the Alps (particularly they pay a fortune just to get the Jungfraubahn train to the Jungfraujoch train station to enjoy the summit of the Jungfrau with the panorama of the Aletsch glacier bellow). From what I have heard, many Europeans have been finding Switzerland to be costly in these recessionary times and so Europeans have optioned for less expensive destinations.

From Zurich airport's Bahnhof we departed for the train to Bern, passing the industrial centres of Switzerland, past high rised, graffiti scrawled concrete, past a Nuclear power station and the train tracks that jutted out into a junction like arteries of industrial ugliness beside many vacant carriages and apparently derelict buildings. I however do not advise anyone - and I say this rather comically- to take these industrial and suburban zones to be the real face and heart of Switzerland. The eyesoars pass once you venture out into the rural heartlands of the country. All the cliches of an apparently "perfect" country await the bedazzled and bewitched tourist.

The Swiss Transport system is highly functional- the trains are spacious and usually punctual, they offer the enjoyable vistas and panoramas of the Swiss countryside, with green pastoral meadows, rolling hills touched by encroaching mountains and always graced with raptors that soar and scoop the immaculately tilled land. For me, Switzerland has been the most visually aesthetic country I have ever been to with its range of landscapes- with quaintly cultivated lowlands, aquamarine lakeside vistas, cobbled old towns and further south one comes to the fringes of the Alps and is taken sheer celestial heights of beauty. The train journey from Interlaken to Lauterbrunnen for me was the most enjoyable part of the "ride" to Wengen, it was like a trip through Yukon territory in North America, surrounded by extreme, raw nature, with larch forests on either side, the mountain train curved and bended by a snaking, milky white river -the white Lütschine . The passengers "awed" and "oohed" and cameras came out to film this dramatic landscape in style. We rode first class all the way, on all four trains, enjoying the spacious carriages, the extra leg room and a pleasurable sense of inner excitement. The Bernese Alps are said to offer the most rewarding views to any tourist -more so than the Tyrolean Alps- but much money has to be doled out for the expensive train passes which do at least make train travel hassle free. From the quaint village of Lauterbrunnen we caught our fourth and final train to Wengen.

The this little yellow mountain train slowly chugged up steep climbs to offer spectacular views of the Lauterbrunnen valley, the famous Trummelbach and Staubach waterfalls that plunge night and day from karst mountains with ferocity, like a natural pulse that never stops, but rages on. Right through the train journey there are little mountain streams and waterfalls plunging on either side of the train, in close proximity to the window. Patches of Gentian, honey suckle, fox glove, thistle and wild poppies colour the meadows that carpet the slopes by the train tracks. When the sun shines, the valley bellow is illuminated and the vermillion grass almost sparkles with the dew drops of the morning rain, where the colours of the wild flowers beam through. It is no wonder that writer's such as Goethe, Byron and Tolkien were heavily inspired to either pen poetry or forge mythology with such a region of utmost aesthetic delight- as Tolkien was reputedly inspired on his hike from Interlaken to Lauterbrunnen to create the celestial otherworldly land of Rivendell.

Our hotel overlooking the village of Wengen on a height, is an old late Victorian gem, giving a traditional, antiquated feel of nostalgia to it's guests. It does indeed date back to 1895 apparently and has been owned by the same family since it was founded. We were immediately greeted by an eccentric Englishman -who was covering for the receptionist- wearing loose shorts, with his socks pulled up, baring his bandy long legs and welcoming us with his old English charm and respectability. He seemed to remind me of a retired colonial officer, spending his time sitting on armchairs telling stories or merely pottering about in the hotel garden. His wife was an old sullen faced woman who never smiled nor greeted us, but merely frowned when we said hello- we were informed later to compliment the woman on her brilliant embroidery to get a response out of her deep reservations about people. There were characters about in this antique hotel, with its wooden interiors, grand piano, paraffin oil lamps, and fin de siecle dining hall. Most of the guests were English retirees- amicable, polite and ready to share their stories and daily outings with us.I once sensed that the old time period of the Victorian tourist - from the old Mittleuropa of Central Europe- bore a resemblance to this place, when tourists came for treatment for their tuberculosis or for spa treatments and plenty of fresh Alpine air.

From my balcony window on the fourth floor, I could see the vapour rising from the Trummelbach waterfall in the valley bellow. I could see the Jungfrau and the Silberhorn lit up aglow in evening light and just before twilight there was a pinkish hue upon the snow capped peaks. It was a beautiful sight to see the wooden chalets of the village bellow me, with flower boxes in the windows and from these inspirations I wrote my travel diary. In the Alps with the mountain fogs and weather conditions -there is indeed a microclimate differing on each elevation- the village may be apparently devoured by fog and reappear in glittering light come twenty minutes later. The weather can be unpredictable it can go from a torrent of rain to fabulous sun drenched conditions within an hour and change back again- it makes the meteorology reports often greatly inaccurate (as they were for our ten day forecast over the region).

The German dialect in Switzerland is very different -especially when spoken by locals (the ordinary Low German, spoken throughout Germany and Austria may be commonly used for grammatical purposes but orally among locals they speak Schweiz Deutsche and this too can be separated minutely by regional words, expressions and accents. The German spoken around Wengen however is the highest form of Alemannic German -almost akin to the dialect spoken by Alsatian Germans- it is called the Walser dialect spoken by the mountain people and very different to say that spoken by those from the flatlands of northern Germany. The locals sound distinctly different to Germans and Austrians, I often find the accent to remind of something Dutch or Frisian it sounds slightly comical but always a fascination to an ignorant tourist such as myself trying to find out more about new places and new people. When me and my aunt Rena were after buying fruit in the local supermarket, we would hear locals often say "Grüezi " as a greeting instead of "guten tag" or "morgen" and after awhile i began to say it to fellow hikers out on there day strolls, to old men in shops and friendly waitresses. I did even practice my greatly limited knowledge of German when out ordering food in a self-service restaurant in Lucerne- but aside from that I tried to use German for greetings, for ordering a cup of tea with milk and sugar on the train bound to Lucerne and for simple requests in supermarkets).