Читать книгу Walking in the Bernese Oberland. Over 100 walking routes онлайн

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Running parallel to the Kandertal (the valley of Kandersteg) is the Engstligental, with Adelboden in its upper reaches. The village is set on the hillside, not in the valley bed, looking south to the Wildstrubel, a mountain that Adelboden shares with its neighbour to the west, Lenk.

Lenk’s valley is the Simmental, one of the most important in the Bernese Oberland by virtue of its ease of communications with country to the west over a brace of passes. But Lenk lies near its head in a tranquil landscape, untroubled by through-traffic, unbothered by big mountains. It’s a neat village set in a shallow plain, with a fine western wall of pastureland pitted with limestone hollows, and with easy walkers’ passes that lead across the hills to the Lauenental, which has the Wildhorn at its head.

By comparison with Lauenen, Lenk is a bustling metropolis. For Lauenen is a secretive place that nevertheless deserves to be on the list of all who delight in mountain walking. It has much to commend it; not least a day’s circuit that takes you to a green tarn, a nature reserve, a superb waterfall and a mountain hut in an idyllic setting. There are other outings of value, too, of course, one of which takes you over another gentle pass among woods and meadows, and down to Gsteig, last of the villages tucked under the mountains on the northern side of the chain. Above Gsteig rises the big massif of Les Diablerets which marks the last of canton Bern and the first of canton Vaud. All to the west is French-speaking territory; some fine mountains and charming valleys which long-distance walkers tackling the Alpine Pass Route explore on their way to Montreux. But for the purposes of this guidebook, Col du Pillon which marks the canton border, is the limit of the region under review.