Forgetting things

I am depressingly normal — nine days out from travelling to central and South America I realise that I haven't done anything about vaccinations — something that a lot of travellers leave to the last minute. Typical.

Fortunately, it turns out because of my Nepal trip years ago my vaccinations are mostly up to date, and I only need a few including yellow fever. Unfortunately the yellow fever vaccine may lay me out for a day or so, but fortunately I can postpone for next week, so I’ll plan that around not having lots of other things to do.

In other news — my glasses frame broke again — the screw came loose. I was out at the time, so I immediately went to an optometrist and they fixed them. That lead to a conversation where I found that yes, they can get me new glasses with an up to date prescription before I leave.

End of that story is I’m waiting for my eye check and then by early next week I’ll have new glasses and sunglasses that actually work for my prescription!

Back in London

I’m back, and reminding my liver what London involves with a night at the Scotch Malt Whiskey Society

Might end up in Scotland, might not, for reasons I won’t go into.

I’ve discovered I can bring 5 litres of spirits into Costa Rica… so the problem now is can I fit 5 litres of whiskey in my backpack 😂.

Because I’ll be doing some mountain trekking, I’ll be bringing my large backpack (no way to transport hiking poles except checked luggage, and if transporting those why not also my sleeping bag, etc, all of which require a larger backpack). So since I’m taking checked luggage, I guess I can take bottles of whiskey with me — I wonder if my host family drink whiskey? 😂

Amsterdam still

I’ve spent Xmas and the next few days in Amsterdam, but am heading back to London on Friday to celebrate NYE with friends there. While Amsterdam certainly is a place one can celebrate NYE, I’m not up for the insanity that is the place, I’ve done it once before. 

Amsterdam is pretty.

Amsterdam

I decided I’d treat myself to a single room rather than hostel dorms. It’s still a hostel, so this is not what you’d normally expect in a hotel 😁

To the right is a very (by comparison) spacious bathroom. 

I’m actually quite happy with it, the hostel has some great common space to stretch out and meet people if you want.

Vienna, Amsterdam

Lacking anything better to do after Zermatt, I headed to Vienna for a couple of days, but I only had accommodation there till Friday, so on Thursday I got back on the rails again and said “onward to Amsterdam!”. 10 hours later I’m on the last part of my trip.

People who don’t take European rail ask me why I’d take a 12 hour train trip instead of a 2.5hr flight. The answer is that a 2.5hr flight is always longer, you have to get to the airport at least an hour before (unless you’re confident in timings and have no checked luggage, and aren’t flying international), and airports are always out of the way, train stations are usually central, so add another 30 mins on each end, at least. Now we are looking at 4.5 hours. 

On a plane you can’t easily get up and walk around, there isn’t a dining car, the seats are small. 

To put it simply — air travel sucks.

If you are fortunate like me and have the time to spend travelling, rail is so much nicer. I do confess that getting to my hostel at 10pm does suck a bit, but to be honest, I’m not getting there exhausted from travelling — I had a nice day looking at the country side and watching movies (wifi on trains is a lot more reliable than planes).

I’ll take this mode of transport over air travel any time I’m not in a rush.

Zermatt should be illegal

I mean, come on, there’s no way something so stunning could ever be legal, there must be drugs in the air. 

It’s literally impossible to capture the beauty of this small town. I was grinning like a fool throughout my walks through the town — and that was just the town.

The scenery around, buried in a valley Zermatt is surrounded by such stunning mountain, including the famous Matterhorn itself

I look through my photos of the town and none of do it justice.

Of note is that there are no cars in Zermatt, just tiny electric vehicles — and only special ones, no Tesla’s in sight. Tom Scott did an excellent video on it. https://youtu.be/R2oD1ZHNMFE

Up and up

The morning brings my journey up the mountain — not to the peak in the photo above, but to the Matterhorn Glacier Park, which sits right next to it.

It’s a short 15 minute walk (or bus if you’re lazy and don’t like the stunning vista as you walk) to the gondola station. And then it’s up, up, and up. The gondola makes multiple stops along the way, as it serves all the skiers, they can ski down a field and take a ride back up without having to go all the way down (from the top it takes about an hour, if you ski fast, to get from the top to the bottom).

I’m just going to dump a bunch of photos from the ride up — 1600m (5300ft) to 3900m (12800ft).

Once you get to the top, you reach the main ski fields, the visitor centre, restaurant, and ice caves.

As I understand these ice sculptures are more or less permanent, the ice doesn’t thaw up here.

Now the obligatory selfies

The highest viewing platform is 3,896m (12,784ft) up. This is as high as I’ve been since the Nepal trip.

Why was I here? What drove me to take trains half way across Europe? My oxygen saturation stats were 85-90% unacclimatised at that altitude. That’s within limits, to go back to serious altitude. 

Ooops, no train!

Long story short, stopped in Visp by a rockfall on the tracks to Zermatt. Waiting for the bus, that doesn’t leave till 22:40. This will result in me getting to the hostel rather late 😂.

Tomorrow is Matterhorn Glacier Park, was intending it to be an early start, might give myself a few more hours sleep. 

In the meantime, Guinness is keeping me warm.