Bernese Oberland – from Schynige Platte to First via Faulhorn

This year I’m really lucky and get to do quite some business travel. Two weeks ago I was in Zurich for a training and used the opportunity to visit an old friend in Bern.

The weather was perfect. We left Bern (actually Muri bei Bern) early Saturday morning, drove past the Thuner See to Gsteig. In Gsteig we boarded an old cog railroad which took us up to Schynige Platte.

The hike itself was easy and right from the start we saw why it was supposed to be one of the most beautiful hikes in the Alps. The awesome panorama of Eiger, Mönch and Jungfrau in the south and the views down towards Interlaken were reasons enough to come here.

We slowly walked towards the Faulhorn. The path was good enough that I did not regret wearing my new Vibram Five Fingers. This was the first time I wore them on a hike (just bought them 3 days earlier) and I wasn’t sure how much my feet could handle. But even the sharp edged rocks were no problem for the VFF, walking pseudo-barefoot gave me a foot massage every few steps.

To be on the safe side I switched back to my inov-8 boots when we reached the restaurant on top of the Faulhorn. Here we had a nice long lunch break (Röstie, very yummy). During that time some clouds moved in so we decided to hurry up a little.

After we took some pictures on the summit (just a few meters away from the restaurant) we continued the hike towards First. The first few meters down were poison for my knees but fortunately the trail leveled soon.

In the distance the trail passed a small lake and again the view was beautiful. We were a lot faster going downhill and quickly reached First.

Surprisingly the weather was still OK when we reached the upper station of the cable car so there was enough time for us to get a beer (Thomas, Alex) or ice cream (me, driver ).