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Day 8 Eurotrip 2015 | Gimmewald - The Schilthorn Experience



Today's my 3rd and last day in Switzerland. I woke up early and took the 30 minute walk up to Murren to buy my tickets at the cable car station up to the top of Schilthorn where one of the 007 James Bond movie was filmed. Inside the cable car station, there is a live stream of Schilthorn so that you can check the visibility and weather before you buy your tickets (This is highly recommended, as the visibility at Schilthorn can sometimes be quite low due to weather and you end up wasting your time and money going up).

Now the tickets itself to the Schilthorn aren't cheap, but by leveraging the half fare card, the early bird special, and the breakfast combo, the cost of going to the Schilthorn is a little less painful :).

The wait for the cable car didn't take long, and before I know it I am on my way up to Schilthorn (after passing through the Birg station). Upon exiting the cable car station at Schilthorn, I was met with breathtaking and simply stunning 360 degree views of the swiss alps (I'll let the photos below show the beauty of this place). This is definitely a can't miss experience if you are in the Berner Oberland region.






I then took a break by enjoying a buffet breakfast inside the revolving restaurant in Schilthorn. The breakfast itself was pretty good, but really what makes the restaurant so memorable is the views with which you can enjoy whilst having breakfast (imagine your view changing as the restaurant revolves slowly around it's axis).



Having filled myself up, I ventured outside to soak in some more of the swiss alps. The two photos below and this post's cover photo were taken at the entrance to Schilthorn from the hiking trail. For those who are a little more experienced with hiking, you can save yourself a lot of money from the cable cars (and enjoy brilliant views) by taking the roughly half day hike up from Gimmelwald. 

Check out my 3D Panorama here.




I finished the Schilthorn trip by dropping by the 007 museum at Schilthorn (somewhat interesting side trip but certainly not the primary reason to go to Schilthorn for),  Birg Station and then returned back to Murren.





Mannlichen Kleine Scheidegg Hike

For the second half of the day, I decided to go to the Mannlichen Kleine Scheidegg Hike which I heard great things about. This hike is known as being a stunning, easy and family friendly hiking trail.

Getting to Mannlichen from Murren is also not cheap as it involves riding a combination of cable cars, bus and train to reach the destination. However, other than Schilthorn, this is also one of my favourite experience in Berner Oberland. 

The 1 hour plus hike from Mannlichen to Kleine Scheidegg takes you past some great alpine views and it also has a rest stop midway through where you can picnic among some great views.

Check out my 3D Panorama here.












Having reached Kleine Scheidegg, I was surprised to see large crowds gathered in the town. It turns out that the Jungfrau-Marathon was also being held during that time and Kleine Scheidegg was the finish line.  Taking the train back to Lauterbrunnen from Kleine Scheidegg proved more challenging than I anticipated due to the large numbers of runners who were returning home. 

It is during this time (whilst waiting for the train back to Lauterbrunnen) that I experienced and witnessed another disgusting aspect of human behaviour. In this case, due to the large number of runners trying to get home (about 4000 runners were registered for the marathon), getting onto a train proved quite challenging as the runners from the marathon were physically pushing other people (including me) out of the way in order to get into the train. This bullying behaviour certainly from a large number of people caught me by surprise as I would have expected greater camaraderie or at least some form of orderly between these runners as opposed to acting like barbarians trying to escape from a burning building. From my entire trip in Europe of taking trains, this was my first and only time seeing such rude and bullying behaviours in a public transportation (or anywhere else for that matter)

In retrospect, Berner Oberland was perhaps the most contrasting experience in my euro trip. It had incredible highs in the form of friendly people and incredible natural landscapes, but it also surprisingly showed me more than it's fair share of the ugly nature of this human race (the last place in my trip that I expected to witness). Like Paris, Berner Oberland is certainly one of the places that leaves me hanging out for more. 

Check out the rest of my Eurotrip 2015 trip journals below:
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Location: 3826 Gimmelwald, Switzerland

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