Train ride to the top in Switzerland

By PATRICK GOWER


It would be a fair guess that there is some good scenery at the top of Europe. There is. And the best part is that you don't have to be any kind of rock climber to get up there, thanks to a railway track set up by the Swiss.

At 3454m, Jungfraujoch Top of Europe is the Continent's highest altitude railway station.

And the easy ride doesn't stop there; a lift at the station whisks you another 117m if you want that better view.

It is white as far as you can see in any direction. It is crisp, clear; you can walk outside, have a coffee or make a snowman. And, like all those before you, try to come up with words to describe the glaciers around you.

I settled for "bloody good" rather than the "Virgin mountain, a white-hooded maiden, is gently leaning over and ever confessing to the attendant Monk, standing by her side", which an earlier writer came out with.

Height-wise, it is within a stone's throw of the summit of New Zealand's highest, Mt Cook, but you can get here in jeans and sneakers. The Swiss have civilised the wilderness.

The railway has been coming up here for the best part of a century and Interlaken, the town where my three-countries-in-10-days bus tour has stopped over, has been serving tourists in this part of the Swiss Alps since the 1700s.

And you can tell. It is not one of Switzerland's quaint little villages. There are hundreds of hotels, all your major chains (a Hooters bar), a casino, shopping for Swiss Army Knives and chocolate until midnight every night.

And there are very few Swiss people about. We had our traditional fondue meal at a Filipino-run restaurant (they did pull out a Swiss horn).

Once on the train, it doesn't take long to slip out of the neighbourhood and into the Lauterbrunnen valley.

During the 2 1/2-hour journey - as it weaved its way up surrounded by classic scenery - I had only one thought: it reminded me of one of Mum's jigsaw puzzles.

We went through your forests, across your glacial rivers and past your misty waterfalls. There were your cute hillside homes with their snowcapped roofs (why do they live up there?) and the hiking, walking-stick-wielding octogenarians who made you feel like you were cheating.

The train ride cost about $160 and brought out all the predictable calls from those on the tour with me; unreal, amazing, like a postcard, like a painting, once-in-a-lifetime, I can't believe it is real, it's like something out of the movies, this is much better than watching the webcam.

But it was a Queenslander who, despite a crook neck, managed to swing his head and the entire cabin with it when he called out like a rugby league commentator at a State of Origin game: "Look out. Valley. Big-time valley. Valley. Biiiig-time valley."

As the ride got steeper, the realisation that this railway was some feat of engineering became greater.

It took 16 years to build and six men lost their lives in the process.

It seems the people of these valleys didn't want the railway at all, believing its tracks would make a mess of their meadows and the trains would frighten their cattle.

As we got closer to the top, the train left those valleys for a 7km tunnel through to the summit.

The spaceship-like observation tower is full of cafes, shops and souvenirs. There is some sort of ice palace, a post office, a scientific research centre and probably a whole lot else, but I just wanted to get outside.

We were there at the end of summer and had a nice clear day.

They say you can sometimes see beyond Switzerland's borders to France's Vosges mountain range and the Black Forest in Germany, but I can only remember seeing white. And amidst that white there is Europe's largest glacier and a range of features such as U-shaped valleys, cirques, horn peaks and moraines.

That was what struck me when we went outside on the platform, at the top of the lift - the whiteness of it all.

It was not as cold as you would expect, either. Plenty of time for the obligatory "Kiwis on the top of the world" photo. It was only the altitude that forced people back down; it sucked the pressure out of everything.

It left one of our group gasping for oxygen on the floor of the train and although it made many lethargic, it made me giddy to the point of drunkenness.

The train has enough stops on the way down for a walk through one of the valleys or some further sightseeing at some of the glacial waterfalls.

I didn't really get my second wind, and barely had the energy to bend over and fill my empty bottle with fresh river water.

To get the most out of the area it would be best to have a few days to hike around, but we had other parts of Europe to hit.

What energy I did have left was well and truly sapped by the time I got back to franchise-ridden Interlaken.

So I paid to use a public toilet, and with another fondue-eating and Swiss-horn-blowing evening not appealing, I decided to find my own entertainment in town.

Getting there

The trip up to Jungfraujoch was one stop on the Kumuka Expeditions' London to Rome European Escapade, a 10-day hotel and luxury bus tour through France, Switzerland and Italy.

What it costs

The tour price is $2310, which includes a high-speed Eurostar train through the Chunnel from London; accommodation in Paris, Interlaken, Annecy, Nice, Florence and Rome; a night cruise on the Seine; walking tours of Florence and Rome as well as nine breakfasts and five dinners.

The price does not include return flights from New Zealand. Other tours are available.

Contact: 0800 440499 for a copy of the new brochure.

Where you stay

Kumuka is a British-based tour company that has been running group trips on the Continent since the 1980s.

While its better-known overland adventure trucks take on Africa and South America, the European trips are known for four-star hotels.

At least one person on the trip chose to pay extra to have their own hotel room rather than share with a fellow traveller.

Things to do

This tour is also noted for its free time: one travel day is usually followed by a day of rest. This allows the chance to do your own thing.

For some, this means speeding off in squadrons to tick off as many of the major sights as possible in a day; for others it involves going in quiet cliques to museums and art galleries.

As well as the Jungfraujoch ascent, and without rushing, I was able to squeeze in: the Eiffel Tower, a cruise on the River Seine, Arc de Triomphe, Grace Kelly's grave and the Monte Carlo casino, the Leaning Tower of Pisa, Michelangelo's statue of David and the Campanile di Giotto bell tower in Florence.

* Patrick Gower was a guest of Kumuka Expeditions.


Find more information at kumuka and Switzerland tourism.