This morning, I woke up at 7am after 4.5 hours of sleep last night. By 7:15 I was checked out of the hostel, had stored my luggage in the locker, and ate a continental breakfast in the lobby of the hostel.

I then proceeded to walk about a mile to the Harder Klum Trailhead. The Trailhead begins near the train station and climbs a couple thousand feet over about 2 miles. The trail is very steep, green, shaded, and wet.  There was an extremely steep trail to the top, and an alternative more gradual trail.  The objective of the steeper trail is simple:  Climb as quickly as reasonably possible regardless of how difficult it would be o continuously hike up.

The hike reminded me a little bit of Echo Mountain because of the steep uphill climb and the constant views of the city below.

After about one hour and fifteen minutes of climbing, I reached Harder Klum at 8:45AM.  There was no one at Harder Klum, likely because the rail car hadn’t began operations yet.  However, the view was incredible, providing visibility of the entire city as well as the lakes on each side of the city.

I then rushed down, hoping/planning to meet Mike at the train station at 9:35AM to take the rail car up to Schynige Platte.  Instead I went back to the hostel to have a second breakfast, and Mike and I walked to the Train Station and boarded the 10:35am to Schynige Platte.  The train was extremely slow, but provided great views of Interlaken from the opposite side of the Harder Klum side.

The top of Harder Klum was beautiful and peaceful, consisting of steep, flowered hills on which dozens of cows were grazing. The cows each had bells which made for a unique, charming sound.  After about 45 minutes at the top, we descended on the slow train ride back to Lucerne.

Then we continued along on our train itinerary, gradually making our way from Lucerne to Montreaux to Zermatt.  The train ride was scenic with steep terrain, lakes, green mountainsides, and cozy villages.  At 10:15AM, we arrived in Zermatt and walked over to Matterhorn, the hostel we were staying at for the night.  The hostel was poorly maintained/run with backed up shower drains, non-lockable storage lockers, unsecured access to the entire hostel, and an unprofessional receptionist.  After settling in and showering, Mike and I walked over to the Downtown area and walked between a couple of bars.  We also ended up sharing a cheese pizza at a local shop before walking back to the hostel.  As of now, it’s looking like we’ll both be pulling all-nighters just so we can avoid sleeping in the unpleasant rooms.