Summary
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Trail in numbers
- Distance: 120 km
- Total climb: 400 m
- High point: 1058 m
- Ridable: 100% (all paved road)
- Duration: 3 days
Highlights
- Interlaken sits in a unique position, connecting Lake Thun to Lake Brienz whilst offering postcard-like views of the Jungfrau mountain peaks. For this reason it boasts lots of tourists, especially from China, India, Emirates and Japan, so it can be tricky and expensive to find reasonably priced accommodation. You can find another adventure in Interlaken clicking here
- Meiringen is a little village that will not strike you for any reason. However, this is a famous site for the nearby Reichenbach Falls, a spectacular fall that was the setting for the final showdown between Sherlock Holmes and Professor Moriarty. Also, the villagers claim that the meringue was first created here.
- Grandhotel Giessbach is a spectacular luxury hotel located by the shore of the Brienzersee, immersed in a lush forest and by the rumbling Giessbach waterfall. Its elegant Belle-Epoque features are quite striking, especially given the all-Swiss lakeside backdrop.
Useful info
- When to goApril-November. You could probably do this all year round, but during winter it can be very cold. Also be prepared for the rain, as this is one of the regions in Europe that gets constant rainfall.
- Trail options:. This is a no-brainer. We simply followed the National Swiss Lakes route, which is perfectly signposted.
- Food and Water: this is a stroll on tarmac always in fully civilized places. No issue.
- Recommended gears&bike: whatever has two wheels, a handlebar and a saddle would work. Good brakes would help, as well as decent bike geometries…however Maria made it without any of these features, having ridden a city bike that nearly could not climb at all and completely melted its V-brakes on the first descent.
- Starting point: Spiez, near Thun. You can reach this location easily by train from every major city in Switzerland passing through Berne, and from Milan in 2.5 hours.
This is the table of contents of this adventure story:
Photostory
The national Swiss Lakes Route is 505 km long cycling trail that runs across Switzerland cutting it horizontally, from West to East, predominantly on paved roads passing by dozens of picture-postcard lakes (more info here: http://www.veloland.ch/en/routes/route-09.html)
Eager to experience cyclotourism, Maria and myself decided to embark on this adventure, tackling three stages of the route in three days, from Spiez to Lucern, for a total of 120km. This would be the first experience of this kind for the two of us, having nothing but our gears, our bikes and one spare change of clothes to keep us going for three days. This was everything I carried:
Being early May, we did not expect necessarily stunning weather, but we began to feel some subtle sense of inadequateness one week before the start, when the forecast showed an unforgiving picture: 2 days out of three under the pouring rain. We did not get discouraged and we geared up the best we could – waterproofing our rucksacks and bringing heavy clothes – silently hoping for a mistake in the weather prediction but also getting excited about the adventure ahead.
Our hopes got unattended: when crossing the Gotthard tunnel I was still hoping to find the relatively good weather of the Italian side of the Alps, but as soon as I entered the German-speaking part of the country the rain started to be a constant travel buddy. When I met Maria in the family-run lovely bed and breakfast in Spiez on friday night, we calmly started to accept the fact that we would have to make a go/no-go call the following morning.
Day 1 – from Spiez to Meringen
The following day, it was just as expected: grey, cold and raining. We waited for a couple of hours tuning up our bikes (installing Maria’s brand new bike rag and bags) hoping for a change in the weather, which did not come. At that point we had to choose between riding for 50km in the rain or aborting the mission, at least for day one, and cover the first stage by car.
We decided to give it a try for 5 minutes, as we would have immediately understood whether our gears would have kept us relatively dry or not:
Maybe because the gears were giving positive signs, but most likely because of our stubborness in sticking to the plan no matter what, we decided that we could do it and that the weather would not stop us.
The route unravels for 52 km from east to west bordering the Thunersee first, and the Brienzersee afterwards – with Interlaken laying in between the lakes. The cycleway was almost entirely paved and with no relevant elevation gaps hence we proceeded at a good pace despite of the rain. The ride was pleasant and the landscape was somehow mysterious and mystic because of the low clouds wrapping up the forest trees and hiding the towering peaks.
Once in Interlaken, we paused for a snack (a 15 euro sandwitch at Subway) and some rest in a warm place. The rainjackets we had were passing the test keeping us rather dry, but our legs and feet got soaked wet after the first few minutes (PS: I had to wear Maria’s pink&grey spare leggings as I had stupidly planned to carry only my cycling shorts – completely inadequate for the weather).
Having packed up some calories, we rapidly left Interlaken heading to Brienz. The last part of this stage cuts across a beautiful forest leading to the famous Grandhotel Geissbach and the nearby rumbling waterfall – that got us even wetter than before.
Finally, just when we were so soaked that we almost couldn’t go any longer, and after a flat 10km eastward paved route from Brienz, we arrived at the final destination of our first stage, Meringen.
Meringen is a small town at the feet of the Mount Brunig – our challenge for the following day – that is somehow famous for having invented the Meringue (which I don’t like by the way) and for being very close to the Reichenbach fall, which was chosen by Edgar Allan Poe as the set for the death of his fiction character Sherlock Holmes.
Day 2 – from Meringen to Sarnen
The Brunigpasse is a mountain road that connects the Bern canton to the Obwalden canton, with the saddle point being some 500mt uphill from Meringen. Despite the fatigue of the climb, we had the weather on our side, giving us beautiful views over the valley:
Once crossing the saddle point and having some well-deserved beers, an amazing downhill off-road route took us down to the beautiful Lungernsee lake.
The final destination for our second day was Sarnen, which sits at the northern tip of the Sarnensee lake. However, to find a relatively cheap accomodation (“cheap” is a word that has a different meaning in Switzerland), we had booked a bed and breakfast close to the southern tip of the lake. We were also coming from South, which meant that we would have reached our accommodation some 11 km before the formal end of the stage.
We were tired from the previous day and the Bruningpasse, but we immediately agreed that we had to complete the entire stage, otherwise it would have felt like cheating (someone says that this stubborness is a typical treat of those who were born under the sign of Taurus). Hence, we neglected our B&B and kept going along the lake shores until we reached Sarnen, where we finally switched off the GPS tracker and had some other well-deserved beers (in an open air bar where a drunk fat lady was having some fun engaging in a barking challenge with some dogs – and she won I think).
Then, for a honest 12 euro ticket, we had the 8 minutes train ride back to the little town of our B&B – where we discovered that the “cheap” price we had booked for had to be intended as the price per person, not for the room.
Day 3 – from Sarnen to Luzern
In theory, this stage of the route should have led us until Zug, some 25 km north-east from Lucerne. However, given the weather that again poured restlessly and the fact that Zug was very badly connected to Spiez – where we had left our car – we decided to cut it short at Luzern. This would give us some 32km of gentle descent along paved roads bordering the Lucern lake – plenty for our tired legs and soaked clothes.
The ride went smoothly but wet, as the rain would get worse before getting any better, but we made it to Luzern just under 3 hours. The entire stage is paved and supposed to give out breathtaking landscapes, but as the clouds were so low we could not enjoy such a view.
Regardless the weather, when we arrived at Luzern Hauptbanhof we felt extremely proud and happy about our unforgettable adventure. As a reward, we indulged at the station’s Burger King after changing into our (incredibly) dry spare clothes in the station’s toilets. How romantic, huh?
This adventure left us with unforgettable memories and the awareness that we can make it even in adverse weather if we just commit to it, and that the reward of achieving the goal is well worth the effort. Let’s face it, someone could have made the same route by e-bike on a sunny July weekend sleeping at Marriott’s and not giving out even a single drop of sweat, but it wouldn’t have been the same!
Already planning our next adventure. Stay tuned.
Maps and Stats
Max elevation: 1058 m
Total climbing: 2699 m