July 19, 2023
Zermatt -> Brigerbad
Bonus elevation to Moosalp
I woke up this morning in the same Zermatt hostel, but a different room. This time to a stranger's alarm at 6:00am. I slept poorly that night, because even with ear plugs, the woman at the far end of the room snored so incredibly loud, I had a hard time believing the sound was coming from a 5' tall human. She was also sick and hacking lugees into the sink all night. Unbelievable.
Anyway, once I was awake, I had an hour to kill before breakfast was served. I started googling information about the activities I wanted to do: The glacier palance, and glacier skiing. Unfortunately, these activities are both weather dependent. As I was googling, a bright flash of lightning and loud boom of thunder ripped across the sky and echoed off the canyon walls. Within a few minutes of that, the Matterhorn app was showing all glacier lifts and gondolas as closed for the day due to weather.
I showered, and headed down to breakfast. As I was eating, it began raining and thunderstorming more heavily. Yesterday morning, the weather forecast had shown today as sunny. The manager at the front desk said it happens a lot in summer, and the lifts on the glacier are often shut down. I asked if he thought the lifts would open tomorrow, and he said I wouldn't count on it.
So plan B it was. I decided to leave Zermatt and continue my tour. I went on PJAMM and saw if there were any cool road climbs I could do on my way out of Zermatt. I found a nice loop route from Stalden, up to Moosalp and then down to Visp. About 4000 feet of elevation, but a gentle grade. I then searched for places to stay in the Rhone valley east of Visp, and found a hot spring resort in Brigerbad that had campsites available. The plan was settled. By the time I ate breakfast, packed up, made my plans, and left it was about 10:00am.
On my way out of Zermatt, I stopped in the historic old town called "Hinterdorf Strasse". Here stands buildings as old as 500 years old. They are build on granite slabs and are amazingly well preserved.
I then made my descent down to Stalden. Once I was in Stalden, I got some brunch at a gas station. From Stalden, the climb began toward Moosalp. The first town I hit, about half way up was Toerbel. I stopped at a restaurant and filled up my water bladder in a sink. It was just me and the owner there, and I felt bad for leaving without buying anything, so I bought a bowl of goulash. It was delicious, and the view I had while eating it was amazing.
I continued my climb for about another hour, stopping once to oil the jockey wheels on my derailleur when they started squealing, before making it to the summit of Moosalp. At the top of the pass were two restaurants, but they looked way too fancy. I continued down the other side of the pass about a half mile where I found the Panorama restaurant, with better menu prices and better views. I ordered a schnitzelbroet with racclette cheese on top, a beer, and a home made apricot schnitte for dessert. It was all great. Side note: I judge how good my German is by how long it takes the people the people I interact with to switch to English when talking to me. At the panorama restaraunt, I made it through the entire ordering process in German. The server spoke good hochdeutsch, but when the cook came out and started talking with me, he was speaking some sort of schweitzerdeutsch that I could not understand. My cover was blown, we switched to English. Oh well.
The rest of the descent down the mountain was probably the most fun descent I've had since Norway. Nothing by smooth roads and switchbacks all the way to Visp. From Visp it was only a short ride to the hot spring camp. I paid 35 francs for a campsite, and 18 to access the hotspring pool. It felt good to soak my sore legs. Thankfully, it is hot and windy today, so all my clothes dried almost instantly.
Today's ride: 43 miles (69 km)
Total: 1,269 miles (2,042 km)
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