I know that sound - pounding on the window, crackling on the roofs, drumming on the asphalt. It's just after midnight and it's raining again. Besides, it has turned cold, a frosty breeze seeps through the open window, for the first time in a long time I am grateful for a warm blanket.
Wonderful prospects for a rather strenuous hiking day to Les Paccots. Nothing new for me.
The hiking guide puts it this way:
With the mighty Moléson in front and the town of Gruyères behind, you ascend to the Plan Francey midway station, hike along the northwest flank of the Moléson and descend into the forested foothills of Les Paccots.
Length: 16 km, Ascent | Descent: 950 m | 600 m, Hiking time: 5 h 00 min
For me, however, there is an additional section from Broc to Gruyères, but what the heck, the main thing is to move forward.
The rain, the park and other things
Does anyone remember the wonderful Sixties song of the Cowsills? It was the creation of a many-headed family clan, as there were and are numerous in the USA. Well, for all the forgetful readers, here the link: The rain, the park and other things.
Anyway, the sorrowful look through the rainy morning reminds me of the song (and other rain songs, not to forget Rain by the Beatles, even on a better level). Because it's not only raining, it's pouring. All this sounds quite familiar to me.
Anyway, I once again toss on all my rain gear, say goodbye to the nice hotel staff and rush out into the rain. Broc looks deserted in the morning haze, few cars rush by, throwing their spray to all sides. A single person huddles under its umbrella giving me a pitying look.
Gruyères greets me on the hill in the distance, my first destination of the day, but first I have to take the hiking trail along a small creek. The path is hardly passable in some sections, large puddles prevent the passage. Water drips from the trees, mist rises from the soaked meadows, an optimal start to today's stage.
Gruyères - a cheese hotspot
How could it be otherwise - after half an hour, I haven't even made it halfway to Gruyères, the bad weather escapes somewhere where the devil is supposed to live, and the sky thaws into milky blue. If I had left half an hour later, I might have stayed dry. Well, shit happens ...
Gruyères is situated on a picturesque hill, the castle greets with pointed turrets from afar. You cross the river by a covered bridge (Le Pont qui branle) and shortly thereafter prepare for the climb up to the village, of course on much-loved steps.
Gruyères (or Greyerz in German) is a well-known medieval tourist resort, though it is best known for the eponymous Käse,whose billboards plaster the slopes along all cross-country skiing and biathlon competitions in winter. But the village is actually worth a visit, even if the rain has left a somehow dreary impression.
I'm sitting pretty much alone in front of a restaurant, surrounded by wet tables and chairs, sipping a coffee, while absolutely nothing is happening all around me, except a few trucks and delivery vans unloading or loading stuff. Or are those a few foreign tourists, standing rather lost in front of the houses and probably wondering what they are doing here?
Besides the castle, offering all kinds of cultural activities and also said to have an important collection of whatever, the small town offers above all a glimpse of the way people built and lived hundreds of years ago.
Remembering ALIEN
If I had a little more time and didn't have a tough route ahead of me, I might visit the HR Giger Museum in Gruyères.
I remember all too well ALIEN by Ridley Scott, at the end of the Seventies, at that time still in the largest cinema in Zurich, the Apollo. The theater was packed, after half an hour quiet as a mouse, while the horror in the shape of a monster slowly began to strain the nerves.
The ultimate horror show - a confined space in a huge spaceship, in addition dark, damp, with many gloomy alcoves, and somewhere an unsavory alien that grew bigger and more dangerous by the hour, and to which the entire crew of the spaceship Nostromo fell victim. Except Ripley, played by Sigourney Weaver, who went down in film history as the first action heroine.
But the monster, the alien creature, created by Hansruedi Giger, set the blueprint for many of the horror or SF films to follow. Not surprisingly, Giger won the Oscar for it.
Here is an excerpt from the film (not for the faint-hearted):
The way to the south, towards the Moléson
Shortly after Gruyères the ascent begins, initially through a forest. A few men stand discussing next to the completely destroyed wreck of a pickup truck. Apparently a victim of the past thunderstorm, which not only affected trees and buildings, but also cars that were in the wrong place at the wrong time and were crushed by falling trees.
Once again, nature shows us who is in power here.
But then the path leaves the forest and starts to climb gently. The valley remains behind, the slopes are less rugged than in previous days, I feel very comfortable, although once again, far and wide, there is not a single soul, except the obligatory cows, to be seen.
But in the distance, still shrouded by fog and clouds, the Moléson, the local mountain of the people of Fribourg, a striking limestone colossus, shows its face. It shows me the direction, the path will go south past it.
Cows again and again, my constant companions since Rorschach; will they still graze in such numbers on the meadows in fifty years, or has climate change driven them away for good? On the one hand a necessity, because the eternal farters are responsible for at least part of the CO2 emissions, on the other hand a painful loss.
But change always leaves victims.
Le Moléson - Freiburg's local mountain
The mighty hilltop of the Moléson approaches step by step, somehow threatening in its ruggedness, its blackness, its obvious rejection of any visitors from outside. Or does it only seem that way?
At Plan Francey there is the base station of the cable car up the Moléson, another highlight that I miss due to the tight schedule. The view, however, is likely to be rather modest on this foggy day, so I miss nothing. But that must be made up for sometime.
But at least there is a huge restaurant where I have a coffee and actually ours Lucerne couple behold. I hardly have time to say hello, because a border collie has taken a liking to my tireless pats.
No more thinking
Sometimes, far too seldom, my thinking stops, even though there is so much to see, hear and smell to the right and left of the path. These are the highlights of hiking, when one is in complete balance.
Perhaps the numerous meditation courses have had their effect after all.
I remember the first Vipassana-Course after the U Ba Khin tradition in 2003, especially the unbearable pain when sitting in the unfamiliar position (I can still feel, after almost 20 years, my back, my legs, my shoulders ... and the thought of running away).
The seemingly endless hour, the counting of the last minutes, converted into seconds, just 300, just 250, just 100 ... And then, at last, the singing of Mother Sayamagyi, heralding the end of the session.
The complicated structures of Buddhism, the eightfold path and everything else, initially incomprehensible, until after some time they finally made their impact.
The noble silence, an almost unbearable torment for us permanent chatterers - 10 days without talking, without media, without music, without books, without contacts, without anything - until on the ninth day the silence is broken, and everything is bursting out. Everything accumulated, everything communicated only nonverbally, all the thoughts that clogged the brain during the endless hours, everything has to come out, immediately.
And the most important thing - suddenly you feel that your battery had been recharged, as if you had been internally rejuvenated by years.
And precisely now mindfulness, one of the central issues in Buddhism, is awakened and activated on the way to Les Paccots. You just can't expect more ...
Still far away - Lake Geneva
The Moléson disappears in its self-chosen fog costume, it still throws some black threatening looks after me, but does not disturb me, because now it is slowly going downhill.
Nature changes, becomes flatter, at least sometimes, tiny brooks bubble through swamp-like meadows, covered with knee-high vegetation that I once again cannot identify.
Then, however, a first unexpected surprise (I know, a pleonasm) - far away, it seems, a light blue stripe is indeed recognizable, the first greeting of Lac Léman. Or does it want to deceive me? To pretend something that is not there, only in my imagination?
And yet, it seems that I am getting closer to my final destination. In one week, I'll be in Geneva. Wistfulness creeps in quietly.
But for the time being, I'm still a long way from Lake Geneva, even a long way from Les Paccots, today's destination.
The path leads sometimes laboriously along the tarred road, then again through the middle of the forest and once even along a fin track. I read somewhere that Les Paccots must be a true paradise for sports enthusiasts. I wouldn't be surprised to soon stumble across a jogger (or rather he stumbles across me). So it must be that I am slowly approaching civilization.
Les Paccots - not my kind of thing
Nothing can shock me, not even the threat of rain, hanging like a sword of Damocles over the disheveled landscape. At some point, I'm standing in front of the town sign of Les Paccots, but as will become clear, that doesn't mean much in this elongated village that seems to stretch on for endless kilometers.
But patience brings roses, as the saying goes, and indeed Au petit Gîte appears, a small hotel far from the center, as I will painfully find out. But the room has its own wooden charm, although the lady of the house makes a somewhat dismissive impression.
But I don't really care, it's gotten late, it took me over eight hours (coffee and dog petting included), and I really want to eat something. However, the intention is once again in complete contrast to reality, because to find a restaurant is apparently a hopeless endeavor.
With aching feet and legs, I stumble along the seemingly endless road, always hoping to find the center somewhere, where wonderful restaurants are waiting to feed me.
But well, there are hairdressing salons and strange stores offering all the junk, as it is only offered in tourist strongholds, there are even hotels, but they are closed. In the end, quite unnerved and annoyed, I actually end up in a fast food restaurant and have a cheeseburger with fries. At least a football game of the EM is playing in the background, which at least partially soothes me a bit ...
Song on topic: UNKLE - Set no Sun
And here the way continues ... to Vevey on Lake Geneva
