EINE ÜBERRASCHUNG (SURPRISE!)

THE HOTEL HAS A TENNIS COURT just below the room, and it's fun to watch parents play patball with their youngsters, or more adept adults volleying with impressive slice and placement.  But an unusual crowd had gathered on the court one day, with tennis shoes but no rackets -- and using no hands at all.

There were eight of them -- four to a side -- and an onlooker who we believe was the coach. We found out later they were the Swiss ski team, who had practiced on the glacier at Klein Matterhorn in the morning, and were now in town playing a little "football" over the net. Perhaps not at a World Cup pace, but with an impressive array of head, chest and knee shots, they set up the ball and found ways get it over the net for the highest-scoring soccer match we're ever likely to see. 

PS: That's the Vispa river, which runs through town and collects all the snowmelt -- starting from Zermatt's 4000-meter peaks and tumbling down the valley to the Rhone River some 23 miles away and two miles lower in altitude. The Vispa alone generates vast amounts of low-cost power. It also provides a comforting white noise (which rises occasionally to a menacing roar) as it passes the hotel.

WATER FALLING

THIS COULD BE THE TITLE for the entire series of posts this year.  However, it's certainly apt for the trail we found recently, on a day when it just didn't make sense to hike too high. 

We had lunch at the usually reliable restaurant La Bosca at Rifflealp stop of the Gornergratbahn. (Zermatt has more than 50 mountain restaurants, with most open in the summer as well as winter.)

After lunch, though the weather threatened, we decided to take a short walk out a single-file trail toward Gletschergarten (Glaciergarden) and explore the "bowl" below us.  We found a mountain that exuded water from every rock and pore, and  collected in noisy stream beds.  Perhaps the most fun was a waterfall that poured over a rock face right next to the trail.

As you can see from the brief panoramic shot that follows the look at the waterfall, there's still more water above us -- getting collected to douse us again in the late afternoon and evening. Each day is a race back to town before the rain arrives.

HERE’S LOOKING AT YOU, ZMUTT

ANOTHER DAY, ANOTHER TRAIL – this one looks back across the valley to the places we visited yesterday.  The trip begins at the newest lift in town: the refurbished Sunnegga underground funicular.

Back in the day a simple chairlift carried you up the hill; in the 1970s it was replaced with an underground funicular that tunneled inside the mountain, with protection from winter storms.  However, by the first decade of this century, the train needed either a makeover or a complete replacement. Zermatt elected to replace: they improved the roadbed, upgraded the carriages, and sped up the ride.  In 2014 you walk through a high-tech, carpeted tunnel with dazzling graphic panels where once a grey, gunnite-like cement coated the hollowed-out rock. A nonstop series of overhead flat screens beam slick  commercials as you march along.

The new ride is smoother, faster (from 1600 to 2288 meters in about 3 minutes) and safer. Families, dogs, bikes, and strollers crowd into the cars; an electronic voice warns, “Bitte, ansteigen…”; the safety gates lock; and up we go.

Sunnegga

Sunnegga (“the sunny corner”) has been called “the Riviera of Zermatt” because it often provides a sunny “hole” in a town that knows the meaning of cloud cover.  This sunny spot deserves includes a small lake and beach known as Leisee, which has earned local fame as a recreation center.

Leisee beach publicity photo (© Portman from the official Zermatt site) 

Heading down past Leisee, we wander through more incredible flowered meadows to find a lunch at Findeln.

  

Findeln

Findeln – an ancient summer grazing hamlet just below Sunnegga – deserves a blog post of its own. As it has evolved into a premium dining center,  Findeln has inspired the Tourist Office to invent a new name for the path: the Gourmetweg. This calorie-laden trek winds past a string of mountain restaurants and leads eventually back into Zermatt.

Photo from the Chez Vrony website

The most sought-out watering hole in Findeln (and perhaps in Zermatt) is the world-famous Chez Vrony, where proprietors Vrony and Max Cotting-Julen raise their own cattle to produce their personal version of the Valais’ famed dried beef (as well as the hamburgers). Between seasons, they also make their own cheese in the cellar.  Or you can select a fresh mountain trout from the restaurant’s holding tank. Summer or winter, it’s a memorable chance to lunch-and-lounge on a sheepskin-covered chaise in the sun and enjoy an incomparable view. 

If you can’t get a seat at Vrony’s, there’s the newer Restaurant Paradies at the top of the hamlet with a small menu that’s elegantly prepared. Chef Gaston Zeiter puts his own stamp on delicious classics such as Zermatt’s famous Kaeseschnitte – adding fresh herbs, cubing fresh-baked bread, and stirring in a superb blend of local cheese and ham. Since it’s the topmost site in town, it offers unequalled views of the Matterhorn and the Zmutt valley to its right.  As we dine, we point to the living map below us, remembering yesterday's walk.

DIE BERGLUFT ALS MEDIZIN (Mountain Air as Medicine)

WEATHER WAS GOOD -- a perfect day to enjoy people out in the healthy mountain air. Starting at the top of the Furi gondola, we found a mountain restaurant in full swing, with hiking families, bicyclists, and folks dining and relaxing in the mid-day sun.

 

Following the sound of a chain saw, we ambled around to the side of the building, where a woodcarver was finishing off an eagle for display in a mountain garden.  

Walking out into the valley, we passed mountain farms with well tended vegetable gardens

and quintessential Swiss window boxes hanging from the balcony.

Climbing higher, we caught a view of Zermatt down in the valley, with stalks of  purple fireweed in the foreground.

Next we passed through a shady forest carpeted with a beautiful weed -- would love some help identifying it!

Our destination was the hamlet of Zmutt, which is perched on a cliff overhanging a deep cleft created by centuries of snowmelt (the Zmuttbach or stream) flowing down from above.

Farmers were out in the fields above, making a second cutting of hay. If you look carefully, you can find hikers along an upper trail and see a few brown specks that are cows in the fields beyond the trail. In the mountains, you hear the belled cows long before you see them.

The flower-filled meadows frustrate our attempts to capture them, and the walk home takes us past barns and sheds, in endless Alpine pastures. 

BLUMEN CARPETS

ALL THAT MOISTURE is fodder to the flowers. When the sun came out on July 31, we took the smooth new Sunneggabahn underground funicular (more on that another day), which tunnels up inside the mountain and lifts you more than 2000 feet in about 4 minutes. Then we switched to a gondola to lift us quickly up to Blauherd, where the best flowers grow. And the vantage points abound.

Flowered carpets everywhere



I've always been a fan of the millefleurs type of tapestries and carpets, and am forever seeking them among the rocks. 



We spent some time trying to capture the colors, but cameras cannot give the closeup and the panorama at the same time as well as the human eye/brain can do. Immense drifts of yellow flowers surrounded us, but defied our efforts to capture them on film. It was easier to home in on some of the colored quilts shown here.

Seriously seeking edelweiss

Thanks to some helpful botanical posters the Tourist Office has posted along the route, we've learned that edelweiss grow naturally among the violet Alpine asters,  and have learned to search carefully in those patches.  Sure enough, we soon found a trio of the "noble whites" dancing among the asters. 

All this and the Matterhorn, too!

Meanwhile, we discovered a bigger stand of about half a dozen edelweiss near a rock, with the Matterhorn enticingly positioned (about four miles) in the background. Jack's favorite quest is the "meadow flowers with Matterhorn" motif, and this occasion was no exception. 

I couldn't resist taking a photo of the photographer. (Can you spot the stand of edelweiss just to the right and slightly below the brown rocks?)

But sometimes it's tough to get low enough to make the flowers "pop" above the horizon.  In this shot, the edelweiss is taller than the other plants in front of the brown rocks, but it's still elusive.  The Matterhorn, more than 7.5 miles away, is hard to miss. The green grass, by the way, is very unusual for this time of year. By now it's usually brown.

Finding the Blau in Blauherd

As we wound down the mountain road, we were startled by a last blast of purple gentian, shown alongside the road, then in closeup detail. In the road shot, note the immense glacial bowl at the end of the road; it's called the Wellenkuppe, and it's actually more than 5 miles away, across the valley.

The gentians change color as the light comes and goes....

It's hard to call it a day when you're wandering through such Alpine glory.