Day 20: "Best Decision Ever"

OMG... the train was hot!!! We walked into our 6-bed cabin on the train and were struck with hot, stuffy, unpleasant air. Opening the window was fine, the cool fresh air rushed in - until we were trying to sleep. The sound of air rushing in the open window of a vehicle travelling at 200km/h (I made up that speed) is not exactly the soothing lullaby you want to be dozing off to.

So it was quite un unpleasant ride with minimal sleep all round. Katie met us at the train station (much appreciated given it arrived at 7:16am) and layed out our options for the day. With storms forecast for all the days we are here, but not starting until about 5 o'clock this afternoon we decided to take possibly our only opportunity to go hiking in (or near) the alps.

We chose a 2-and-a-half hour walk which would take us up into the foothills (or foot-mountains) of the alps, to a hut for lunch and then across the hills/mountains to get a cable-car back down to the bottom.

The journey upwards was fine - nice weather, nice views, nice walk, nice lunch. As we ate lunch the dark clouds began to appear over the distant mountains. As we left the hut after lunch, the clouds were moving in, and there was occasional lightning in the distance. It looked like it was going to miss us, though.

Following this walk, there was an option to take a detour and climb to the top of one of the peaks, and come back down. We decided not to go this way, and instead forge on towards the cable car... just in case the storm did come over us...

Best decision ever.

As we continued walking, we got some cracking views of storm-cloud covered mountain-tops - lightning flashes over the alps... all the while closing in on us. Literally minutes after arriving at the cable-car building, all hell broke loose.

The wind raced through, looking like it was going to rip the flag off its pole. Clouds appeared to be falling from the sky as the rain swpet across the valley towards us before the downpour began up on our peak. The occasional thunder crash and lightning bolt added effect. People who were still out on the walk when the rain came were emerging from the end of the walking trail drenched (and then had to push through the wall of people in the doorway who were all standing around taking photos of the people being poured upon!).

Then the hail. Big hail stones came down at just as acute an angle as the rain was sheeting in. More people emerged from the trail, moving as fast as they could without risking losing their footing on the sloping, rocky trail - and covering heads with arms for whatever protection they could get from the hail stones.

The building we were in, which housed a large waiting area (for cable-car riders) and a cafe quickly became very crowded - with people arriving faster than usual to get out of the rain, and with the cable-car not operating due to the wind.

It was a ripper of a storm, but it swept over us in minutes leaving no sign that it had ever been, except for the layer of hail covering the ground, and a lot of wet people. The sun was out, shining brightly.

The cable-car soon started up again, and the train we through we had missed at the bottom of the hills was in fact just very late - so all ended well.

The two photos below are taken facing the direction the storm was travelling. So it's looking out over the sunny part of the mountains just as the storm got above our heads.