Kanisfluh Conquered and a New Source of Energy for the Tramp

The drive to Zurich airport went unbelievably well, though it must be said that there was an emergency exit in Winterthur to ensure that if tramp1 arrived with an empty stomach, he would be fed. Like the tramp, tramp1 suffers from numerous food allergies; unlike the tramp, he eats a tremendous amount (something about being young, athletic and working out regularly in the gym) so the concern on the tramp’s part that the combination of a cheap flight (no food) and great hunger required serious attention on the part of the trampess was not ill-founded. Sadly, the supermarkets along the way all seemed to be on the wrong side of the highway. Whenever we exited to a near, but small village, the food shops seemed to be hidden (the tramp concluded that in these places no one eats). Winterthur was the last option before the stores would all be closed. Luckily, we stumbled (as only a WLW can) across a small shopping centre which had both a Co-op and a Migros – the trampess was spoilt for choice and sneaking in 10 minutes before closing time (my mother at this point would have thanked St Anthony), did a major shop. The tramp devised a new rule: one should never travel on an empty refrigerator. The trampess concurred – though she did somewhat timidly point out that the supermarket in Salzburg was not a fertile shopping ground.

Having reached the airport, the question remained where to go. Airport car parks are not on the whole the sort of place the WLW can find appropriate accommodation: the height of the ceilings is inadequate to the WLW’s stature. There did seem to be an almost completely empty car park adjacent to a BP station just near the terminals. Not being put off by the no entry sign at the only place one could see to enter, the tramp drove the WLW in and parked parallel to and near a stack of huge metal beams. It made us look, well if not small, in proportion. I prepared supper and we ate.

Just as the trampess was sipping the last drops of her wine, a police car drove up. I smiled at the tramp, put the bottle in the refrigerator, and suggested that he deal with it. The tramp, who oozed more charm than I have ever seen anyone use on the police force of any nation, smiled and explained that we were waiting for tramp1 and that we were too big to enter the normal car park. The police, equally charming, explained there was no problem but there was another delivery of metal beams and if we wouldn’t mind parking on the side they would be most grateful. The tramp assured them it would be no problem at all and moved just as a large lorry load of beams arrived. We relaxed in the full knowledge that we were now under the unassailable protection of the Zurich police. How safe can one feel! Just under two hours later tramp1 texted to let us know we had landed; the tramp instructed him to come out to the pavement and text when he was there. We drove through the airport once more, stopped, tramp1 jumped in, and off we drove to Bezau. The tramp, his good mood restored, and it being late at night with no traffic on the roads, made unusually good time. We drove into the parking lot of the football pitch (not wishing to cause havoc in the campsite at such a late hour), and turned in before midnight, warning tramp1 that we normally rose at 6:30 and tomorrow would be no exception since we needed to establish ourselves in the campsite as early as possible in order to have a good hike – and not waste tramp1’s precious time off work. Tramp1 assured us that graduate school had trained him for 5 hour nights, so 6 ½ would be a lie in. On that happy note we all collapsed.

Tramp1 was as good as his word and was happy to wake up the next morning when the trampess announced porridge and eggs were cooking (all the young tramps are quite adept at cooking but are very pleased to have the trampess cook for them – in fact it is a well known threat, repeated in a poem the young tramps wrote for her most recent, significant birthday, issued by the trampess if she is really, really desperate – how often can that be?? – to suggest that one or more of the young’s tramps has just had his last meal cooked by her). Tramp1 downed a huge bowl of porridge with a banana, two eggs, several knaeckerbrot with various nut butters and anything else he spotted on the table. Not impressed with the tramp’s two eggs with flax seed and the same knaeckerbrot and nut butter, he proceeded to lecture the tramp on the importance of slow release carbohydrates if he wanted to sustain major physical exertion. The trampess, of course, always eats porridge for breakfast and is never hungry before time, and as it is well know, does not run out of energy. She listened in amusement to the son propounding her own theories on breakfast (to which the tramp had heretofore not given much credence). The tramp promised to try out the theory the next day but maintained that porridge had never been enough in the past. Tramp1 suggested that there was no need to replace the eggs with porridge, the porridge was to be a supplement! The tramp smiled.

Breakfast over, the three intrepid tramps set out on an easy hike (the tramp did not wish to plunge his first son into the deep end on day 1!) to Bizau over marshland. The plan was to have lunch at the Schwanen and then walk home over the hill route. Tragically, the Schwanen has its day of rest on Wednesday so the tramps hoofed it home quickly in the hopes that the trampess would whip up a quick lunch. She did of course. As tramp1 was clearly in top hiking form, the next day, the tramp determined the hike would be to the more challenging Baumgarten. The tramp fuelled himself at breakfast according to tramp1’s suggestion and we all set out. Tramp1 was predictably every bit as fast as the trampess, and indeed, quite obviously faster but as the hike was not overly steep he was content to keep her pace and wait for the tramp to catch up. The plan was to reach the summit at around 1pm when the bergbahn service back down to Bezau resumes and get home for a reasonably timed lunch. The climb went according to plan but there was an unnaturally long queue at the bergstation: there was a problem with the lift and no one was quite certain how long it would take to repair! The tramp was not keen to walk down: he neither wanted to arrive home for an early dinner instead of a late lunch, nor did he fancy the assault on the knees the long march down would mean. Happily, the buzzer went, just as panic was beginning to set in and a few nuts had been eaten, indicating a gondola on its way. It was not long before the tramps were at the front of the queue. The next meal could still be classified as lunch – only just. The good news was that the tramp declared the addition of porridge (with a banana of course) to his breakfast had made a difference. The trampess’s pots were just big enough to cope with the demand for four boiled eggs and a mountain of porridge. The tramp did declare, nonetheless, that he would cry off hiking the next day and go to the gym but the trampess and tramp1 were welcome to climb Kanisfluh. The trampess was thrilled – with young tramp1 as pacesetter, she was quite confident that no matter what the weather conditions the next day (and they did not look promising) she and tramp1 would arrive at the summit. Hurrah! Tramp1 was only concerned that we would take enough food to sustain us (tramp1 worries a lot about getting enough food).

The next morning was suitably grey, foreshadowing rain. The tramp was concerned about tramp1’s inadequate clothing as far as attacking Kanisfluh was concerned but the trampess (being blonde) pointed out the obvious solution: tramp1 would take the tramp’s backpack instead of his own and he would have a ready kit for all weather. That settled, the trampess and tramp1 ate a very sustaining breakfast and headed to the bus stop. They arrived in Mellau town centre just as the rain came. Out came the ponchos. Protected against the elements, they headed to the bergstation where the path to Kanisfluh began. They both knew the obvious: when you are climbing a mountain it is inevitably an uphill journey. The way may be briefly disguised but in the end it is only a disguise, and only brief. Tramp1 declared that he far preferred the sort of unrelenting climb that he was about to undertake since at least one knew one was making progress! Ah, the wondrous optimistic outlook of youth! The trampess was delighted and so the climb began. Partly through the first major assent, it became clear that the forest was protecting your intrepid heroes from the rain and the ponchos were making them very sweaty. It was decided to remove ponchos, shake them, turn them inside out, and return them to the bottom of the backpacks.

That done, the pace quickened. We found ourselves, having started at 10 am precisely, at the edge of the glacial basin (where the tramp gave up the first time and declared the path to the bergbahn was the only way) at 11:30. This was record time (at least in the trampess’s experience and also it must be said compared to the estimated time posted on the first signpost) and meant that if we kept the pace we would be at the summit (note the sense that we were actually climbing a mountain implied in the word summit) by 2pm. As we crossed the glacial basin we came across a large group of teenagers – in the usual swaggering and slow, group walk. Tramp1 turned on the speed and overtook them just before a small bridge. In order to do the same, the trampess wound up hoofing it through marshy ground (yuck – the boots were very miserable – but totally waterproof and luckily nothing splashed in over the top so the trampess’s feet remained dry) and practically leaping onto the bridge in front of some rather amazed young German boys (who never expect to be overtaken by a speeding OAP!). Tramp1 kept the pace for some time (we were taking no chances of being bogged down by a group on a long, narrow trail upward!). It did not take long to lose them completely – most likely they were not following us to the top. Surprisingly the walk across the glacial valley was not as muddy as expected, nor as full of cow dung as the one time the tramp and trampess had proceeded a bit further in the direction of the summit. That walk had been muddy but gentle and the trampess had hoped that horrendously vertical was not going to be the descriptive most appropriate for the next hour. However, the first rule of mountains (namely that they are always an upward experience) shortly became evident. Any thought the trampess might have had that the summit was a gentle climb from the glacial valley soon disappeared. If the first 1 ½ hours were unrelenting, so were the last! Only this time the path was not just steep, but very rocky, not well marked and, oh yes, visibility was very low – the clouds were with us, we were in them, and quite often tramp1 disappeared in the mist. At a crucial point, the trampess had to call out his name to determine the way forward (at least the way tramp1 had chosen to go forward!)- the path went both right and left (if the path was marked the marking was too far ahead to see with the visibility so low) – it would have been bad to arrive at two different peaks : it does not look good for a mother to lose her son on a mountain (never mind that he was in the lead)! Happily, he was within earshot and merely answering told me which way to turn.

Soon a few hikers coming down crossed our path (all, it must be said, older than the trampess; not one tramp1’s age – tramp1 found this vaguely unsettling – where were all the fit, adventurous youth?). We did not speak to them apart from the obligatory “Gruess Gott”, but we felt we could not be far from the top now. It was beginning to get chilly and the thought of adding a layer or two did cross our minds, but we were sweating (not that a trampess ever sweats, you understand) and the sheer energy of climbing was keeping us warm. – or at least focused. One lone hiker came down and as he had passed us earlier, I felt we really must be close now. I asked him how much further and he replied less than a minute (this should give you, dear reader, an inkling of the visibility!) but didn’t I have more clothes? It was he said, very, very cold and windy at the top. How could the weather be so much worse so soon? Is the summit such a micro-climate?? I declared I did and would be ok. He announced he had done the climb in 3 hours flat and was obviously quite pleased with himself. I looked at my watch – if he was right about our being a minute away (give or take 5), tramp1 and I would make it in 3 hours flat as well!

He was right on all counts. We could barely unzip our backpacks fast enough. Tramp1 put on every layer of clothes the tramp had in the pack and then looked up and asked if there were any gloves. There weren’t – the tramp’s hands are kept warm by the gloves he uses with his Nordic walking sticks – not a look the young tramp thought appropriate for his age. His fingers were so cold he could barely open the sardine tin, but by this time in need of food, he managed. Everything we brought was demolished -even the chocolate bar which it seems had suffered by not being eaten on the Baumgarten trip; to say that it did not melt in the mouth is a very poor description of the crumbling collapse that occurred (clearly Lindt does not expect a bar of chocolate to suffer so many dramatic climatic changes in such a short period – this bar had past its prime, notwithstanding a best before date some years hence!). Just as we were convincing ourselves that lunch was hitting the spot and more impressively actually being eaten at lunch time, tramp1 let out an expletive. I would not dream of repeating his exact words, but I followed his eyes as he directed his gaze over his shoulder. The winds had blown away the clouds and we had a clear view behind us. Dear reader, we were sitting on the edge of , if not a cliff, an extremely steep incline (let us say between 85-90 degrees) all the way down to Mellau (approximately 1350m vertical distance). Reclining to rest our weary bones, while not something we had even for a moment contemplated, might have resulted in our premature arrival in town without the aid of the bergbahn – and perhaps without our immortal souls remaining in our all too mortal bodies. To say that your formerly-afraid-of-heights-but-now-happilly-not trampess gulped is the grossest of understatements, but perhaps the ambition of hang gliding (given that fainting might have produced the same result as reclining) is not entirely out of the question; we continued our lunch (without even considering moving forward – though we were careful in rising to our feet afterward), texted the tramp to let him know of our success and then prepared to descend.

If the way up had been challenging, the return journey was worse. This is of course known to all real mountain climbers, but the trampess is discovering these laws for herself, sometimes all too painfully. The large, flat surfaced, rocks which were difficult to get purchase on on the way up were much more terrifying on the way down. And while it wasn’t raining, it was very moist – the ground between the rocks was pure mud. The first time the trampess slipped, she let out an expletive (she is her son’s mother after all). Tramp1 did not hear, and so did not come to the aid of the fallen trampess. Luckily, the Nordic sticks didn’t become detached or wind up in an awkward place, and in the end did prove helpful in returning the trampess to a vertical position, though not for long. After the first fall, it would have been unseemly to swear again, so your trampess reverted to laughing. Tramp1 heard this time (and subsequent ones) and checked to make sure he was not going to have to carry his mother down a mountain – especially since he, too, while not actually falling, was doing his fair share of sliding (and if the truth be told, issuing expletives). Even at the trampess’s delicate weight, the thought of managing her, her backpack and his own was daunting even to tramp1! Happily he did not have to. Once the peak was descended, the final stroll to bergbahn seemed just that.

Back in Mellau, he tramps rewarded themselves with hot drinks and water on the terrace of the hotel which overlooked the bus stop. With only one bus per hour and no desire to walk back, despite the fact that it was now full sunshine, it seemed the sensible way to kill 45 minutes.