Furka Pass

Rotheisglacier

The evening rain guarantees a sunny morning. I went o get breakfast and brought it the room, packed, ate and left for Furka Pass on another glorious morning. First we enjoyed the beautiful view of the Grimsel pass that we crossed already when we came from Interlaken and latter we started to drive with numerous stops for shots and pictures on Furka pass. The pass is really special, with amazing views from all points. After too many stops we eventually arrives at Belvedere hotel and the Rotheisglacier where we bought tickets to visit the ice cave and walk close to the glacier.

Rotheisglacier

Here you see first the result of the global warming the Alps glacier melting. On top of the ice cave they put a material, about which I read a while ago, to protect against the sun and to preserve the cave against melting. The glacier look was very sad with water all over, cracked ice, blue at least in the sun and everything melting like crazy. The cave consisted of ice tunnels cut in the glacier. In some of them they installed lights in the ice that were giving a eerie effect inside. Water was gushing down in several places but his was not the melting ice on that location but some kind of melting path. I spend a lot of time inside and latter outside walking the area where water was gushing out from the lake at the base of the glacier. Latter I asked and found out that the glacier looses about 4-5 meters every year. It is not enough snow and soon it will be disappearing like most of the glaciers at under 2500meters.

Furka Pass

We continued to Furkapass that at 2412meters is one of the tallest passes in the Alps and after several pictures we started to drive down. We stopped on the way and went on a hike to Albert Heim cabin, on a charming alpine path around gushing glacier streams, and beds of alpine flowers. But the customary afternoon T storm was on the way, the peaks being covered in dark clouds, and we turned back 20 min from the cabin being afraid not to be caught by the T storm on the slopes. After we started our drive down, the rain started when we reached Andermatt, a charming little town where we stopped for lunch and a coffee eating some delicious cherries bought on the road. For the first time in Switzerland we were charged for tap water at the table, being defined as being a service; 2 glasses for CH1/each!! Andermatt is close to the highway that brought us on the 17km traffic controlled tunnel that crosses in Ticino, the Italian area of Switzerland, where after a quick nap in a parking, the coffee did not help, we drove to Lucarno. Here it started a three hour saga of finding a hotel, with Piazza Grande being closed because of a concert, and many other hotels being full. After several tries we left Lucarno trying to find something outside but it was Sunday evening and the hotels were closed (!!!). We found so many hotels closed that we don’t know if this is an attitude here or is just a sign of the crisis that for sure does not look in the restaurants.

Eventually, we drove to Lugano, trying on the way a number of hotels where the bars were full by ‘hostesses” waiting for clients. In Lugano we were lucky and found right away Hotel Besso that had a room to accommodate us for CH200. The afternoon T storm was continuing in the night so we had to walk in the tapered rain and had a very late dinner in a close by restaurant, Federale. The food was great, Italian, but something was missed in translation for the order and we ended up with CH8 mineral water at the table that tasted terrible.