Kaiseregg – Ritxlialp Traverse
2nd August 2007
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I wanted to make this route for a little while. It starts off at Schwarzsee a small village with a ski station that I’ve skied and hiked around before. Kaiseregg is the local peak at 2185m and offers some great views over this side of the alpes and Bernese Oberland. Yesterday, August 1st, was a public holiday in Switzerland for Swiss National day. The last time we went round here was a few weeks back when we got as far as the car park at which point it started some torrential rain and we withdrew. This time we had clear skies and sunshine.
We took the ski lift from the lake up to 1480m and had a coffee at the restaurant before making the climb to Salxmatt at 1637m (above), you can drive up to here and a lot of people had. You also get the first full view of Kaiseregg which is the peak on the far right of the picture. It’s then a climb up to the Kaisereggpass where we paused for a drink and to admire the scenery.
I’ve stored the track in my GPS and you can see it in Google Earth :
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It’s pretty busy at Kaisereggpass and this is obviously a popular way to spend National day locally. After a short while we turn and head up to Kaiseregg itself.
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And up at the top it’s crowded almost ! We arrive in time for lunch and find a spot to eat our sandwiches and enjoy the view. It’s a clear day and we can see the Jura in one direction and views over the Alpes including the Eiger, Matterhorn, Weisshorn, Dent Blanche and Mont Blanc.
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After finishing lunch we turn and head back down to Kaisereggpass and here it’s decision time. The choice is to decsend the same way or to make the traverse and descend to Ritxlialp. We take the second option and start to traverse. Immediately the track worsens but we expect this as we’re now on a full blown mountain route and of course we now have the track to ourselves apart from a group we’d seen way ahead of us.
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The track gets pretty interesting now, it’s along a knife edge ridge in places and turns from a walk into a scramble as we climb short sections to the summit (above left). It’s fairly safe in the fine dry conditions but it’s exhilarating stuff!
The ridge traverse was pretty serious in places but really excellent, a classic Alpine traverse with stunning views.
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In fact, we saved the worst until last. As we descend from the summit we pass first a steep grassy slope with a thin and precarious path before hitting the refuge at Golmly under the impressive Chällihorn (above right). From here the going gets pretty tough, we finished our drinks at the refuge and headed down into the gully. This was scrambling down rocky paths for most of the way and very tiring indeed. By the time we got to the bottom the farm selling beer was one of the most welcoming things I’ve seen for a long time.
After a very refreshing beer we made our way down to Schawarzsee along a track I’ve skied a couple of times off-piste in the winter. My memory was of something short and fairly flat but of course on foot it seems longer and steeper and something that I’d do in a few minutes on skis took an hour or so.
This was probably slightly longer than the “let’s take a look at Kaiseregg” walk that I’d lured Julie along to enjoy though!
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