{"id":853,"date":"2012-07-08T21:05:25","date_gmt":"2012-07-08T20:05:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.petersphotogallery.com\/rodneyandlaura\/?p=853"},"modified":"2025-11-23T06:13:42","modified_gmt":"2025-11-23T06:13:42","slug":"flying-above-grindelwald","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.petersphotogallery.com\/rodneyandlaura\/2012\/07\/08\/flying-above-grindelwald\/","title":{"rendered":"Flying Above Grindelwald"},"content":{"rendered":"

Rodney woke early and took a photo from our bed of the sunrise just catching the tip of the Eiger.<\/p>\n

\"\"
Sunrise on the Eiger<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Then while cooking and eating poached eggs on toast we watched the sun, the clouds, the showers, a little bit of everything, moving around the majestic mountains.\u00a0 We saw the gondola move slowly up to Pfingstegg, the top of the small peak next to us, then Rodney spotted the train trudging up to the Eiger viewpoint at Kleine Scheidegg. Inspired to get going, we took the 15 minute, very steep, footpath up to the village.\u00a0 Rodney managed to get a free bike tyre dust cap to replace the one he left in the lay-by yesterday and then we strolled on down through Grindelwald.<\/p>\n

\"\"
Grindelwald chalets<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

As the day was becoming sunnier and the clouds were small and white with no threat of rain, we took the aerial gondola up to the top of First, which means ridge, not the position that comes before second. The views up there, at 2,168m, were breathtaking in every direction; we were surrounded by some of the highest mountains in Switzerland.\u00a0 I could have stayed up there all day, just breathing in the amazing sights.<\/p>\n

\"\"
The Eiger from First<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"\"
Wetterhorn and Ober Grindelwald Glacier<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

We had paid to come back down to Grindelwald by a more interesting route.\u00a0 The first segment we rode on the First Flieger.\u00a0 The brochure description was correct \u2013 it\u2019s an exhilarating ride of 800m attached to a cable on which you literally fly down to the Schreckfeld station at 1,955m.\u00a0 Setting off was really quite scary, but watching the beautiful scenery fly past you, takes your breath away, more than the fear.\u00a0 As the wind whistles past your ears at 80kmph, the only other sound you can hear is the bells on the cows below.\u00a0 I hit the bottom first and yelped as the giant spring-brake kicked in; I think that was the worst bit, but we all made it down in one piece.<\/p>\n

\"\"
The First Flieger<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n

My dodgy knee then opted to take the rest of me on a\u00a0ten minute gondola ride down the next stage to the Bort station at 1,570m, while super-fit Rodney jogged below.\u00a0 It took him about\u00a0twenty minutes, not bad considering he had a heavy pack on his back.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"\"
The Ober Grindelwald Glacier<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

We stopped at the caf\u00e9 and ate a plate of frites and drank iced teas in the sunshine before picking up to two Trottibikes. These are basically a scooter bike, with no seat and, unlike Rodney’s bike, no punctured tyres.\u00a0 We shot down the very steep 4.5kms with the brakes on most of the way.\u00a0 By the time we reached Grindelwald our hands hurt from squeezing the brakes and the fear of falling off on to the gravel was more unnerving than the First Flieger!!!<\/p>\n

\"\"
Rodney on the Trottibike<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Safely back down in the village, Rodney already had the next part of the day planned.\u00a0 It was 3:15pm and the Wimbledon final had just started, so we found a sports bar and settled in to watch England v Switzerland, Andy Murray v Roger Federer; somehow appropriate given where we are.\u00a0 The sets were long and when the rain delayed play, I wondered how many drinks we were going to be buying in the Sportspub Bar in Grindelwald, but we gave up waiting and toddled back to Eileen to cook up frankfurters and veggies whilst keeping an eye on the score via the computer.\u00a0 So sad that Andy Murray didn\u2019t win, but the Swiss around here are very happy.<\/p>\n

The sunset isn\u2019t as spectacular this evening, but hopefully tomorrow will be another fine day, so that we can go get up another mountain and enjoy more of this awesome scenery.<\/p>\n

Guten nacht.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Rodney woke early and took a photo from our bed of the sunrise just catching the tip of the Eiger. Then while cooking and eating poached eggs on toast we watched the sun, the clouds, the showers, a little bit of everything, moving around the majestic mountains.\u00a0 We saw the gondola move slowly up to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":855,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-853","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-europe"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.petersphotogallery.com\/rodneyandlaura\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/853","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.petersphotogallery.com\/rodneyandlaura\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.petersphotogallery.com\/rodneyandlaura\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.petersphotogallery.com\/rodneyandlaura\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.petersphotogallery.com\/rodneyandlaura\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=853"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.petersphotogallery.com\/rodneyandlaura\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/853\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8174,"href":"https:\/\/www.petersphotogallery.com\/rodneyandlaura\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/853\/revisions\/8174"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.petersphotogallery.com\/rodneyandlaura\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/855"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.petersphotogallery.com\/rodneyandlaura\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=853"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.petersphotogallery.com\/rodneyandlaura\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=853"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.petersphotogallery.com\/rodneyandlaura\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=853"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}