The (Accidental) Train to Montreux and the Matterhorn

This morning is finally clear, our first in days, so we were up early having breakfast at our hotel (well, I did, anyway). Derek had seen the top of the Eiger from our hotel's patio and was outside shooting pics and video until his fingers went numb. Don't worry, the 7 lb bucket of Nutella lured him back inside.

We hopped on a train heading to Zermatt where the Matterhorn is, noting that if we have only one day to view the summit, we'd rather see it than the Eiger, but when we got on the waiting train and it pulled away earlier than it should, we realized we'd gotten on the wrong one. Two stops later, we disembarked, grabbing the correct one right behind it, but when we got off at the end of the line, we were surprised to find that we were nowhere near Zermatt - we were supposed to have transferred much earlier, and I hadn't marked it when we'd had wifi.

Travel Tip: Switzerland's wifi is not awesome. When they have it, which is actually fairly often, they make you register your phone number nearly every time, and will text you a code to get on. The problem is, if you don't have an international phone plan, you can't GET the text they send you, so you end up SOL. If you're desperate, as I was, just have your company pay for your phone plan and use your roaming to get critical info before you end up literally going to France on accident.

The conductor we'd asked about it mentioned that we'd have to travel all the way back, or thanks to the fact that we had unlimited train use passes, we could get on the special Golden Pass line with the others heading to Montreux, and transfer there. We had already gone nearly 2 hours out of the way, so with little time to decide, we hopped on the Golden Pass. Thank goodness for low expectations and flexible planning! It was a nice day to see the country, and the train stuck to the beautiful countryside and still-green hills, climbing into the mountains. We decended on Montreaux, an incredibly beautiful traditional resort town right on Lake Geneva, complete with its own medieval island castle, Château de Chillon, right offshore.

Unfortunately, we had a short stopover, which we spent in a lovely little cafe at the station, once again indulging in Switzerland's finest cold milk and pastries before boarding the train heading east again. This second leg was less beautiful (it was no Golden Pass line, I'll tell you that), but it went through the agricultural areas where they grow grapes, apples, apricots and grains among other things. We spotted some sheep, but no cows, which was slightly disappointing given how much dairy comes out of this country. I may have shed some tears in my distress that we'd gone 4 full hours out of our way in the end, finally reaching Zermatt right before sunset and risking our opportunity to see it in the light.

But then there we were, finally, boarding a slow train (Europe's highest cogwheel railway) up the mountain from Zermatt to Gornergrat, a peak overlooking the Matterhorn. This was the second place we had to pay for our train tickets, but we received a discount with our rail passes. There are two ways to ascend and see the peak, with the other being Matterhorn Glacier Paradise, but that one is a hike into town and more expensive, so given our time constraints, we went with this one and were not disappointed.

Because it's a cogwheel railway system, our ascent was slow, which would have been lovely if not for our 4 hour delay on the train. Derek was getting antsy as the sun got lower, nearly jumping out of his seat in anticipating of not sitting on a train any longer. We could see the massive peak from the moment we got off in Zermatt, and as we got closer to it, had beautiful views from the train of the peak itself, back lit by the sun, and the skiers who were enjoying their day on the mountain.

When we arrived, it was absolutely frigid - our fingers were going numb as we fiddled with our video camera and phones for pictures, running around and fumbling as we tried to capture the view before things became too dark. Derek ran to the top of the lookout to do a time lapse, and it was so cold that we thought the poor device would just shut itself down. Even as warmly as we were dressed wasn't really adequate, and we gawked at skiers who must only be alive thanks to their constant movement.

Inside, we attempted to grab dinner at the Restaurant vis-à-vis, but were turned away because we weren't hotel guests and it was after 4 pm - this doesn't appear to be advertised in any official capacity, as their website says they have open dining until 8 pm and the train down runs much later than 4, so I don't know what it is with the Swiss and their close-the-door-in-your-face mentality with restaurants. Just take my money! And yes, before ranting I did say that there is a hotel on the top of this peak too, so we're going to have to come back and stay on the TOP of these epic mountains next time.

We grabbed a snack in the self service cafeteria, then realizing it was truly getting dark, decided to grab the train down, only to realize we'd missed it by a literal minute and had to wait another hour to descend. This is the part where I failed myself and got emotional at all the missteps I'd made in planning that day, and the part where my husband is equally awesome, pointing out all of the positive things we got to see and do, and reminding me that even your second choice in Switzerland is pretty freaking fabulous. So what if we had to stare at the Matterhorn in the waning twilight a little longer? Oh darn! Ok, he had a point.

At this point, of course, the self service cafeteria had also closed (and didn't even have full meal options when we came in at 4 anyway), so once we were finally down, we hurried to the Coop grocery store at the base (they're everywhere) to grab "dinner" for the trip home. We ate our bircher museli, banana, bread and milk on the packed train filled with skiers returning from their day. There were a surprising number of kids, all carrying their own gear, and none of whom ever complained that I heard. It's really nice, frankly, to not hear all the chatting in English, because you can completely zone it out, and Derek was soon asleep. Three transfers and a very expensive taxi ride later (buses apparently stopped running by 8 to our part of town...just insane for a high-traffic tourist area), to get our things and transfer to our new hotel, Hotel Post-Hardermannli, because rooms were full at our previous one. Beausite had held our bags all day for us and graciously called Post-Hardermannli to ensure we could still check in after 9, since it was barely past that time and they list a cut off (what you're supposed to do after the cutoff isn't clear at all).

We were rushed through the check in process by a man who was smoking outside when we arrived and in the blink of an eye, we were in bed, trying to keep our eyes open for 5 minutes to minimally plan our last day, which would, weather permitting, allow us to see the Eiger up close and personally.