The Top of Europe

8th Sep 18

Early start for the big day ahead. Well, early for us.

Tried to catch the No. 21 bus to the station but discovered there were no buses for the next hour due to the Jungfrau marathon starting on the main street. Described as “The most beautiful marathon of the world”, not only do competitors have to travel the usual 26 and a bit miles, but they also have to cope with a 5960ft climb before they collapse in Kleine Scheidegg. We headed off on foot towards the station but paused briefly to watch the actual start with the obligatory “The Final Countdown” blasting out across the valley.

Bought tickets for The Jungfraujoch (The Top of Europe) for £171 after our discounts and hoped it would be worth it. Caught the 9.05 from Interlaken Ost and climbed steadily up a typical alpine valley towards Grindelwald catching sight of a few of the faster marathon runners as we stopped in a station.

We then changed to the cog railway which took us higher up to Kleine Scheidegg as the scenery just got better and better. We could now see what were distant snow capped peaks including The Eiger as though we could reach out and touch them. The final leg of the journey involved taking the Jungfraujoch train which tunnelled into the mountain itself before pausing at a viewing point so we could disembark and peer out of a window at the peaks of snow and ice around us. A few quick selfies and oohs and aahs later we were back on board for the brief journey to the highest railway station on the continent (3454m).

Jungfrau Glacier

We had read that the best thing to do on arrival was to ignore the lure of the tour for a while and head straight for the coffee shop to wait for the initial rush of visitors move on and for you to acclimatise to the thin air. We need little persuasion to visit a coffee shop on the high street, so one situated 3.5km above sea level was easy, and the view of the glacier out of the window didn’t hurt either.

Although the air was thin we did feel a little better after a short rest (it’s not like we did much work to get up here). We found a door out to a viewing platform just near the toilets and went out into the bright warm sunshine. High altitude, surrounded by snow and ice but it was really quite warm and the views of the glacier were fantastic. There was a bunch of crows which seemed to have cottoned onto the fact that a lots of visitors led to a lot of scraps, and would even feed from the hand.

We climbed into a lift to be whisked even higher onto the Sphinx. More viewing platforms in the beautiful clear air gave further outstanding views of snowy peaks, glaciers, crows, and seemingly a view over the rest of the continent. We could see people walking and skiing down on the glacier, and shortly afterwards we walked down a very cold corridor which led out onto the snow and the warm sunshine.

The tour continued with a 360 degree cinematic experience showing the beauty of the Jungfrau region, and then onto the ice palace. The corridors made of ice (including the floor) led to numerous ice sculptures, and a fair few annoying tourists who wanted Michelle to act as their personal photographer. We even saw the “Ice age squirrel” with his acorn.

We finished the 3 1/2 hour visit with souvenir shopping and chocolate shopping before catching the train back down to Kleine Scheidegg. Beautiful green alpine meadows surrounded by rocky peaks covered in snow and ice - but also on the day we were there, the finishing point for the Jungfrau marathon. There were thousands of people there, eating and drinking from the various bars and makeshift stalls, and celebrating what was an incredible achievement.

Kleine Scheidegg

We joined in for a while (No, not the running!), and had a hot dog with a rather spicy mustard topping before heading to catch the next train. Unfortunately because of the marathon lots of other people wanted to catch the train down at the same time and we ended up queueing in the hot sun for 45 minutes before we could get on the train. Went down via Lauterbrennan for a change of scenery and eventually reached Interlaken.

Hopped from Swiss bar, to a salsa bar, to our hotel bar to finish off a long but spectacular day.