Don't Look Down - The Schilthorn

"I climbed the Schilthorn today," said my red-faced British hostel-mate, shaking as he put a pot of water on the stove. "Bollocks!" He muttered as he fumbled with the burner.

I asked him what he meant by "climbing," if it meant actually climbing, or hiking upwards. I'm familiar with the latter, and have done my fair share of such hiking, even in the hills of Minnesota. He said he meant hiking, no climbing gear. According to him, he made it up in three and a half hours, and then hiked down as well. From his condition, something in my brain - logic? fear? knowing my own limitations? - told me I wouldn't be doing that. For whatever reason, I forgot my own advice that next morning.

The Schilthorn is sort of billed as an alternative to the Jungfrau. While the Jungfrau is taller - "the top of Europe," they call it - the Schilthorn is cheaper to access by cable car and offers an amazing and unique 360 degree view of the Alps.

We had the whole day ahead of us, with plenty of trails to choose from. Since we wanted to get to the Schilthorn anyway, by cable car or otherwise, I thought it might be a suitable challenge to try to "climb" the Schilthorn ourselves, then take the cable car down. (After all, we got our downhill hiking experience from the trip the day before.) The sign that pointed the way said it would take about five and a half hours. Karina and I both figured the signs were generous, obviously metered for people at least twice our age. Shortly before 10am, with a lunch packed, water bottles filled, and sweaters attached to our bags, we were off.

From the get-go, it was a challenge. I had immediately hoped it wouldn't be this hard the whole way up, for over five hours. We criss-crossed the low hills of the trail, which were grazing hills for cows and goats. A dirt path one person-wide had us going to the right, then to the left, then to the right again, and back and forth until we'd reach a little bit of level ground, at which point we would sit down and rest, breathing heavily as we felt that familiar pain in our calves and thighs. I still had hope, and forced myself, and Karina, to believe it wouldn't be like this for five hours.

We rose above the grassy areas into something we were more familiar with: pine forests. A little less steep than before, and shaded from the sun, we thought this was more like what we'd be able to manage. We even saw a real toadstool mushroom! "Okay!"

When we exited the forest, the path got even easier, through a ski resort and small farm towns. Like our last hike, we walked through grazing cowherds. The sun was out, the air was getting pleasantly cooler, and we were passing by several groups of hikers from what sounded like Italy, the UK, and America.

We then saw a structure at the top of a peak. The Schilthorn! It's in plain sight! Sure, it's a speck, but at least we see our target. We decided to take a break and eat some food leftover from our picnic the day before.

Remember how I said I hoped it wouldn't be as hard as when we started? I was kind of right. After our lunch right outside of a town called Shiltalp, when we started on our way again, it wasn't as hard - it was significantly harder. The landscape changed suddenly from grassy hills to a steep boulders. Exhaustion breaks were needed much more frequently, sometimes after just a couple of minutes. To the right, then to the left, then back again, the trail sometimes took us next to cliffs with drop-offs of hundreds of feet.

We eventually stopped looking behind us, as it was just a fearful reminder that one misstep would mean an unpleasant tumble down the mountain. Looking up or to the side gave me vertigo, too, so I focused on my feet and my hands, sometimes literally climbing on all fours.

I'd be lying if I said we didn't think about how dangerous it was, and that we might want to turn back. But at three hours in, and the structure at the top of the peak getting ever so slightly larger, we felt we were at the point of no return. It would just be easier at this point to climb the rest and take the cable car down, than risk losing our balance on the way down. (At this point, Karina and I both mentioned how, even though it was very difficult, we were glad we were going up and not down, as that seemed more treacherous.)

That isn't to say there weren't points in the trail that forked off to towns that would lead us down the mountain. One such point came at a large boulder.

Here, we came across another couple who had been hiking down - from the Shilthorn, I assume - and had planned to go down the way we were coming up. After several tries by the husband to make the wife feel safe enough to head down, they eventually turned around and headed down the other path that looked less frightening. I don't blame them. Before we passed them completely, the man told us that we're almost through the treachery, but not before coming to a a slippery path next to a cliff where we would need to hold on to a rope to get around. Oh. Fun.

I had read that morning before the hike that the path was, for non-experienced hikers, a challenge, but "very doable." Pish-posh, BS, not true, lies lies lies. We don't see this stuff in Minnesota, and maybe we should have known better, but there were several "WTF are we doing" moments during the second half of the hike. It sounds silly, but when you're one footstep away from falling to your death, or your life changing forever, you wonder if you'll survive this "climb." Where we come from, the Midwest, there would probably be a railing all the way up, a few waivers to sign, and your very own strong German to ride. We were out of our league.

But then we reached a basin, where a stream of very blue water flowed into a reservoir of sorts. Maybe it was the altitude, but even though we weren't there yet, we were kind of ecstatic with smiles on our faces for the first time in hours. And that structure that had been our target the whole way up was almost within reach. We took a break at the reservoir to feel the water and take in the new orientation, not up, not down, just flat. I had never felt so happy to see flat. Plus, we were almost there.

Back on the trail, we looked at a new sign. It said, "Schilthorn 1 Std 30 Min." We also noticed that the sign was pointing in the opposite direction of the structure we had been looking at the whole time. How could it be an hour and a half in the other direction when we can clearly see the structure right over there? We looked in the direction of the sign, and saw, in the clouds, the real summit of the Schilthorn.

Our first reaction was to bail and go to the structure we had been looking at all the way up and take the cable car down from there, or even up to the actual summit - probably a 4 minute ride. And then we'd lie, of course, and tell everyone we did it, climbed to the Schilthorn, even though we hadn't. But when we thought of this option, we came to an agreement: No. We have to go on. Our shoulders hurt, our sweat is starting to freeze in the sub-freezing temps now, our blisters have popped and in their place have developed new blisters, and, at times, we felt so exhausted to the point of feeling faint, but we should go on, if only to say we did it.

The weather changed. We were up in the clouds that had been rolling in throughout the day. The landscape turned from big boulders with the occasional flora patch to absolutely desolate. Iron-ore colored rocks against gray clouds and snow mounds rendered our setting devoid of any color tones or hues. We passed a memorial for a girl who, in the late 19th century, had been struck by lightning near the summit. So, there's that to think about too, I guess.

More climbing, more resting, the occasional picture, the real summit as close as ever.

When we reached the last staircase, it was like reaching the stairs to heaven itself. Up in the clouds, exhausted, sore. Just about five and a half hours, just like that first sign said. I didn't care how much a beer cost at the Shilthorn restaurant; I wanted one.

The clouds had completely rolled in at this point, so unfortunately we weren't able to see much of the 360 degree view we had been told about. But I didn't care much; we did it, and had some great views on the way.

At the top, we shared a bowl of soup, some fries, and a couple beers at the rotating restaurant, looking out into solid gray. It then started to rain.

We took the cable car down, which took about 20 minutes. We arrived back at the Mountain Hostel in the evening, took showers, packed, did a little planning for our trip to Strasbourg, and then fell asleep because that was enough. When you cross "Climb the Schilthorn" off your To-Do list, you get to go to bed.