Epic Hikes of the World ( PDFDrive )

© MirasWonderland | Shutterstock
an Alpine marmot
However, there’s alchemy in the sky when I wake in Grindelwald the next
morning to find the sharp lines of the Eiger sawing at a blue sky. The timing is
impeccable because today I have a date with this mountain.
The APR beelines straight out of Grindelwald to Kleine Scheidegg pass, but I’ve
planned a bigger and better day. I will walk 16 miles (25km) and climb around
4900ft (1500m) to take me up to and along the Eiger’s famed North Face. It will be
one of the finest hiking days I can remember.
From Grindelwald a trail coils tightly through the Eiger’s forested lower slopes,
rising above the bent and tortured nose of the Lower Grindelwald Glacier. Wild
strawberries grow beside the trail, providing grazing fodder. Within an hour,
Grindelwald is like an ant farm below and the North Face is near.
The trail crunches across slopes of scree that has crumbled from this mighty rock
wall. I peer down on to Grindelwald, across to the Wetterhorn and up – most
bizarrely – to a line of holes drilled through the North Face that are windows for
the Jungfrau Railway, which travels inside the mountain.