36 Hours in Zermatt

The next morning we left Zurich and took at three and a half hour train to Zermatt. Zermatt is a small town nestled in the foothills of Matterhorn. The Matterhorn is a mountain of the Alps, straddling the main watershed and border between Switzerland and Italy. It is a large, near-symmetric pyramidal peak.

This is not a route I would suggest. Going to Zurich mid trip was not ideal but was a must due to M's conference. Ideally we would have continued on to Zermatt from Interlaken.

We arrived in Zermatt in the late morning.. the last leg was a little tough as the train was so full we couldn't sit. Disembarking we found ourselves in the hustle and bustle of it's main street or bahnhofstrasse. It had a beautiful brown chalet aesthetic but was more lively than the sleep village vibe of Wengen. The town was car free and hella charming, the majestic Matterhorn looming in the distance.

Step one was to locate our hote, Hotel Jagerhof and check in. The room was not ready so we left our things with the hotel and headed out. We turned to the bahnhofstrasse in search for some lunch and decided to grab a pizza at Molina Pizzeria.

Then we took the Gornergrat Railway up to the top of Gornergrat Mountain, Matterhorn in our sights the entire journey. The Gornergrat Railway is a unique fully electrified eco-friendly open-air cog railway travelling over the mountain to an altitude of 3039 metres. The journey takes about 33 minutes.

At the Summit is the Kulm Hotel, which is the highest hotel in the Swiss Alps. There was a short scenic loops and a viewing platform nearby.

Oh the view! Matterhorn in the background. 

Now you can end the trip right here and take the same train back down or you can walk down some of the way. There are five stops to get back to Zermatt; Rotenboden - Riffelberg - Riffelboden - Riffelalp - Findelbach and lastly Zermatt.

  

We decided to hike down to Rotenboden to see the Riffelsee Lake. It took over an hour. The whole trail was a bit meh. Nothing compared to the Panorama Trail we had done earlier in Wengen. This was a bit dreary and gray.. the lake wasn't as pretty as the pictures promised and when we arrived we missed the train to Zermatt by a few minutes and had to wait another forty minutes for the next one.

So unless you are a person who loves to hike.. I wouldn't recommend it.

Eventually we found ourselves back in Zermatt and stopped to have dinner at Hornox. It too was less impressive. Nothing was wrong with the food perse just that we had had better during this trip so our expectations I suppose had gotten high.

That day was a special day though.. because that day our D became a teenager. A whole freaking 13 years old. And how could we not end the day with something sweet. All the bakeries were closed but thankfully our hotel had a small chocolate dessert.

The next morning we had a really nice breakfast at the hotel and then headed out to the Matterhorn Glacier Paradise.

Matterhorn Glacier Paradise is located on Klein Matterhorn, aka Little Matterhorn. Matterhorn Glacier Paradise is the highest cable car station in Europe. To get to Matterhorn Glacier Paradise you will ride a series of cable cars. The final leg of the journey, from Trockener Steg to the summit, is on a new cable car system that was completed in 2018. The only way to get to the summit is on these cable cars. There are no hiking trails since Klein Matterhorn is always covered in snow.

    

From Zermatt we took a cable car to Furi then Schwarzee to Trockener Steg and then we reach our destination of Matterhorn Glacier Paradise. You can get off at various stop for pictures but we chose to go all the way up.

On top there was a viewing platform.. you could stare at those mountains forever.. it was also a little chilly up here.. snow everywhere.. skiers and snow shoers.

Then we went down to the glacier paradise.

There was even a little ice tunnel you could slide down. While in the glacier tunnels you get so close to Italy our phones sent us Welcome to Italy texts.

Once we were done we headed back down to Zermatt. We had a quick and forgettable lunch and then stopped at the Petite Royal Cafe for coffee and cake.The carrot cake was so good.

Afterwards we grabbed a train and headed back to Zurich. We spent the night there.. in the morning we met up with a friend of M's he hadn't seen in 18 years.. had a delightful breakfast and headed to the airport..

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