Running Away: The Breithorn

The Breithorn (4164m)

It was a quite strange stepping out of the cable car station built into the mountain, there was something quite James Bond-ish about it. But it was very cold and damp with water dripping from the rock ceiling of the cable car station so a Bond girl bikini wouldn’t really have been an appropriate outfit, if it ever is. At 3,883m Klein Matterhorn is the highest cable car station in the world and I am guessing the views are spectacular however the weather was distinctly “Scottish” basically foggy and raining so I didn’t see a thing at that point in the morning.

Klein Matterhorn (3883m) with the Matterhorn behind

We followed Andrei, our guide, out of the cable car station which was already packed with enthusiastic skiers despite the early start – yes, you can ski in Zermatt in August! Excellent news! – and followed the ski lift to the glacier. Away from the ski tows and on the glacier we roped up and put on crampons and I was already re-discovering the “joy” of being in a group where the other members were not people I knew in advance of the climb. As we stepped out the cable car into the thick fog Andrei assured us that the cloud was due to clear a bit and that the summit, if not the surrounding valleys, would be clear of fog for at least a short while during the day but already one of the group, a woman whose mission it appeared was to get on my nerves all day, had been checking the internet and telling Andrei that his weather forecast was wrong and that it was going to be thick fog and snowing on the summit while I did my best to disguise my eye rolling. Its not like Andrei hasn’t spent just about everyday of his life in these mountains is it?

We set off across the glacier, still in the mist, Andrei in the lead, myself next and then 3 others behind me and headed toward the smoothly curved dome shape of the mountain. There were quite a few instances as I walked where I felt the rope suddenly go tight and jerk me backwards so after about half an hour of this I flicked the rope backwards quite hard to register my displeasure and the instances did reduce and when they did happened they were accompanied by a “sorry!”. I was not sure at all what the woman behind me was doing but it was certainly getting irritating. This was the same woman who had told Andrei that his forecast was wrong.

Andrei the guide in the lead

Crossing the glacier

Atmospheric!

The fog lifted from the summits

Looking back down on to the glacier

The climb

Sure enough, as we walked out across the glacier the mist and fog slowly began to dissipate and the summit of the Matterhorn began to materialise before us in an almost ghostly fashion. The sun came out and all of sudden all round us summits appeared as far as the eye could see. It was an amazing sight, Mont Blanc was visible as was Gran Paradiso, the highest summit entirely in Italy. White clouds skimmed the nearer summits and the temperature had risen noticeably. The sunlight reflected off the glacier was almost blinding and I was starting to regret the number of layers I was wearing which was equalled by the number of layers stowed in my bag – plus a down jacket. Well, you can’t be too careful can you?

Mont Blanc in the distance

The Matterhorn with fog in the valley and over the glacier below

Clouds skimming the summits

After a couple of hours of walking at a slow pace upwards, the group obviously having to move at the pace of the slowest member, on a gentle gradient, we reached the summit ridge and Andrei stopped. Andrei was looking along the ridge presumably to see how much space there was and was trying to work out which group was about to move off as there were a couple of groups on the summit. To my right there was a slope of a few hundred meters down on to the glacier from where we had just come although the slope wasn’t massively steep and to my left there again wasn’t a massively steep slope disappearing downwards into the mist but the mist concealed a substantial drop.

The summit of Breithorn was busy

Looking down on the glacier

The view north east

The fog closed in again on the Matterhorn

I had stopped as instructed as had the other group members – all except that woman who raced forward, phone in hand, to get that all important summit selfie. Andrei also rushed forward to stop her selfie induced suicide mission. The problem for me was that Andrei and the rope were on my right hand side and she ran past me on my left hand side meaning I was swept clear off my feet by the rope. It was fair to say I was somewhat displeased and questioned her climbing abilities quite loudly. In front of everyone. Andrei however had done a pretty impressive job of pre-empting my reaction and he swiftly intervened to prevent me from killing her and she was given the appropriate bollocking.

The summit of the Matterhorn appearing again out of the fog

That all important summit photo.

The Matterhorn. Again.

The Breithorn ridge leading to Castor and Pollux

We didn’t seem to stay at the summit for long enough although we were probably there for a good 20 minutes, it just didn’t feel long enough to take it all in. The panorama was magnificent, the Matterhorn appeared again through the clouds like a ghostly apparition and the cloud drifted over the ridge between the Breithorn (4159m) and the summits of Castor (4223m) and Pollux (4092m) with the huge bulk of Monte Rosa and its summit peak of Dufourspitze (4634m) behind the cloud moving over them and giving tantalising glimpses of these mountain tops. Sadly, Zermatt and the valley was still in the fog as was the Theodul glacier with the summit of Klein Matterhorn just poking up out of the cloud. Reluctantly I pulled myself away and we started the descent. We had to descend in reverse order so while I was at the front of the group on the climb I was at the rear of the group on the way down which gave me a chance to observe exactly what this woman was doing as she seemed to be making very heavy weather of what was a very simple climb. I quickly saw that the reason why I had kept being jolted by the rope on the way up was that, despite Andrei’s pleas and threats about stepping on his rope while wearing crampons she was doing exactly that, she kept standing on the rope. Basically, she was unable to walk in crampons. Or more accurately she would have been able to walk in crampons if she had just shut up for two minutes and did as Andrei instructed.

It was easy to tell that Andrei was an accomplished mountaineer and therefore probably worth listening to. Like so many who are very good at what they do he was pretty taciturn and getting him to talk about his mountaineering was like drawing teeth but I eventually established that he had been to the summit of the Matterhorn some 125 times and had climbed Annapurna in Nepal. I am sure he was more than qualified to give the days weather forecast for the climb.

Although it had seemed a very obvious and easy ascent and on the way up I was wondering if I could do it myself, reality struck on the way down when I looked down on the glacier only to see the dark gaping crevasses ready to swallow up the unwary. That bashed that idea on its head! Nobody was walking solo and everybody was roped up. I watched jealously as a group made their way towards Castor and Pollux. Maybe next time.

A group of climbers on the glacier below skirting round a crevasse

We seemed to get back to Klein Matterhorn in no time at all descending into the encroaching fog and we all went our separate ways. My first stop (after enviously watching the skiers) was the café as it had been a long time since breakfast. I pondered the climb over a cup of coffee and a packet of maltesers. I can see how climbing mountains could become addictive…..hmmm….what should I climb next….? I wandered out to the viewing platform from where apparently its possible to see some 38 summits over 4000m but nothing was visible in the thick fog and there were some very disappointed tourists sitting there gazing hopefully at the sporadic patches of blue sky above that appeared and disappeared as quickly. I think I would have been disappointed too as that cable car ride was pretty expensive just to look at fog and go for a cup of tea. I wandered back into the café and resisted the temptation to buy a Matterhorn pen, or Matterhorn keyring, or Matterhorn tea towel, or Matterhorn cookie cutter….you get the idea…before joining the queue to get the cable car back down the mountain.