OtR: Beatenberg to Mürren

“Earthquake! Magnitude 4.2!”

Checking the Swiss Meteo app for the weather forecast for today’s destination, I came across a notification about an earthquake in the Gimmelwald/Mürren area …two days ago. No damage … just frayed nerves. Frankly, I don’t associate Switzerland with earthquakes, so the news came as a surprise. And it led me down the rabbit hole of research to find out if the Alps are still growing. The short answer is, yes. The Alps are continuing to get taller. Not uniformly, however. Some parts are losing ground due to erosion.

Anyway, moving on … not just from the earthquake, but literally as well. Today we would be partly OtR … still in the Bernese Oberland. The time had come to leave Beatenberg for our next stop … a two-nighter in Mürren. Technically, we could have gone there on a day trip from Beatenberg. However, Mui wanted to reminisce; and I wanted to see for myself what he had said was one of the highlights of the trip he took to Switzerland in 2015 with his mother and sister.

Mürren is an alpine village at 5,400 feet (1,650m) … situated at the base of the Schilthorn, a high summit in the Bernese Oberland. It sits more or less across the valley from what some refer to as the ‘Swiss Summit Skyline’ … the triumvirate of the Eiger, the Mönch, and the Jungfrau.

Like so many other villages in the area, this one is also car-free (though there is a road for essential vehicles). We drove through the Lauterbrunnen Valley to Stechelberg — where the road ends — and parked the car at the cable car station. The drive to Stechelberg was a familiar one, so we did not dally along the way.

As Mui had done in 2015, we had reserved our room at the Hotel Alpenruh as a package that included our cable car tickets to and from Mürren. It was a good deal … even with the SHFC, we could not have beat the price of the tickets, which included a roundtrip ride up to the summit of the Schilthorn as well. All we had to do when we got to the station was to give our names to the ticket agent. He looked us up on his computer and printed out the tickets for our ride up the mountain.

The 4-minute ride was scenic, the cable car running parallel to the Mürrenbachfall. At 1,368 feet (417m), this waterfall is the highest in Switzerland. On this day, the flow was a mere trickle of what it is after the spring snow melt. By 11:25a, we were at the Mürren Cable Car Station. Five minutes thereafter we were ringing the bell at the check-in counter at Hotel Alpenruh.

Our “Time for Two” package called for a superior room with a balcony and mountain views. None were ready yet as check-in wasn’t until 2:00p. Expecting that to be the case, we just wanted to drop off our bags and go get a bite to eat. Bags secured, we strolled along the main street, looking at menus along the way. We noticed that the village was crowded with day-trippers. We knew that would change by late afternoon, however, so we left our sightseeing until later. Nonetheless, I could not resist snapping a few shots along the way.

The restaurants and cafés were doing a booming business; empty tables were few and far between. We eventually settled on Café Liv for a light lunch … with the Eiger keeping an eye on us from a distance.

Tummies sated, we strolled back to the Alpenruh. The concierge greeted us with the news that our room was ready. Excellent. As promised, we were given a room with mountain views … including the Eiger and a bit of the Mönch, and several others that I have yet to identify. Bonus? Village views off to one side. Taking advantage of the lovely afternoon, we sat on the balcony for a little while after settling into our room … watching the cable car traveling up and down, and the paragliders soaring in the sky. Didn’t dally long, however. We wanted to hike down to another village and now was the time to do it. Czytaj więcej