Written by Hunter Hartshorne, Photos by Hunter, Timmy, Lisa, and Freddy

Editor's note: Hunter and Timmy came to visit us for 9 days during April. We really enjoyed hosting and having US friends visit. I encouraged Hunter to write a guest post for the AMDE blog, and he obliged. I hope this entices more friends to visit (and write guest posts!). I also hope Hunter doesn't mind that I made some editorial remarks and added photos!

Pre-traverse

I flew into Zuri (how the locals pronounce it) and had two nights in town. Timmy arrived in the evening of the first day. We went for a run from the house and explored the trails up to Uetliberg. If you bring a few franks, you can have a beer on top before rolling back down the hill. Took the 7 into town and walked around gathering some supplies. The next day, we packed up and trained to Engelberg. Our plan was to ski a day at Titlis and then drop off the backside and stay at the Grassenbiswik. This was the first glimpse of the terrain we would come to know intimately over the next week. Needless to say Timmy and I were slightly intimidated. We skied all day and decided to forgo the hut due to the very solar-affected aspect we had to ski in order to get to the hut. We trained to Andermatt and stayed at Hotel Bergidyll. This train ride is incredibly beautiful. The room was reasonably priced and the tapas in the hotel restaurant were tasty, albeit overpriced. If you plan to stay in this area for a few days I would check out the Basecamp hostel, they have a two night minimum but it’s very inexpensive and looks very nice. We walked around town and had a beer at Pinte which we were informed has a club in the basement with no closing time Thursday through the weekend. Unfortunately it was Wednesday. 

Day 1 Realp -> Albert Heim 

From Andermatt the train to Realp was 10 minutes, leaving us in a valley with a group of 8 or so French speaking skiers which was promising. Following the group with skis on our packs, Timmy and I hiked up the road switchbacking its way up out of the valley. Our destination was the Albert Heim hut 3,400ft of vert and 4.2 miles away. After about 600ft of climbing we were able to switch to skinning. We split from the group, who decided to go up and over the pass. We took the road to Tiefenbach and then the summer trail up the drainage up to the hut. We made good time, and this route seemed to be the better choice as we beat the other group to the hut by over an hour arriving around 1 pm. Dinner wasn’t till 6:30 and we quickly got to spritz’n and lounging in the sun on the porch, activities that pleasantly dominated our afternoons for the whole traverse. We met several other parties also doing the Urner who we would continue to bump into for the next few days. Lisa and Fred joined us after work squeaking in as dinner was being laid out. Four courses starting with a mediocre mushroom soup and ending with an apple tart. Note that all hut dinners are served as follows: soup, salad, main course, and of course dessert.

Day 2 Albert Heim -> Voralphütte 

Left to right: (1) Freddy ascending the last few vert before our descent to the Voralphütte (2) Timmy enjoying a Redbull break in the middle of a never-ending second climb. There are crosses everywhere in these parts! (3) Hunter about to make is 156th kick turn up a sorry stretch of south facing snow. (4) Lisa thinking she can slog through knee deep mush with no pants on. It was a mistake. (5) Timmy cruising to the top of Lochberg.

After filling up a liter and a half of tea and pocketing a butter and jam sandwich we got on our way. This was to be our biggest day with 6,400ft of climbing over 10.5 miles with two large climbs. From the hut we dropped down slightly and began the first climb up to Lochberg, our first summit of the trip. We made good time following the stream of skiers zigzagging up the firm track and booting up the last small pitch to the summit around 10 am. We dropped off the back of Lochberg and we’re greeted with a long descent down to the Göscheneralpsee Dam. Snow was fairly punchy up high and turned to mush low down. After a snack and some sunbathing at the dam we started booting up the summer trail, we still had around 3000ft of vert to do. We were able to switch to skinning after a bit of booting and snaked our way up a narrow swath of snow with a kick turn every five steps for well over 600ft up. Passing the Bergseehütte we hugged the underside of the ridge bellow towering walls working our way up shaded from the sun. A short boot took us over the ridge. The long dissenting traverse to the Voralphutte was slow and sticky. I gathered enough speed to catch some especially slow snow and take a good tumble. We reached the hut, worked and sweaty. Giving the porch viewers a show, Fred and I took a much needed dip in the river below the hut. Dinner was superb starting with a delicious bread soup and ending with pudding. 

Day 3 Voralphütte -> Tierberglihütte

Left to right: (1) Sunset at the Tierberglihütte (2) Apricot tart being devoured. (3) Beer resupply by helicopter (4) Toeside Eddy on the move! (5) Team at the top of the Sustenhorn (6) Timmy and Lisa thriving in the back.

After filling up on tea and muesli we got moving. With 5k of climbing to do over 7 miles the objective at hand felt like a relief from the previous day. We followed a benched gully up to a Chelenalphorn a bump on the shoulder of the Sustenhorn. Traversing around and hopping over the ridge we made our way up to the summit. Greeted by grand views, we looked back on the terrain we traversed through and down on the Tierberglihütte where we’re spending the night. The turns from the summit were firm but fun, at the bench we split ways Fred and I skiing lower to get a few more turns lower down before meeting Timmy and Lisa back at the hut. The Apres scene at the Tierberglihütte was hopping with beer on tap and apricot tarts in ample supply. After downing a few large beers and still hours before dinner Fred and I hatched a plan for a BN lap on the 1k pitch in direct view of the hut porch. With light packs and a stout buzz we made good time up. We were greeted with soft turns on the down, some of the best of the trip. We returned to the hut without fanfare, no one seemed to have noticed. Dinner started with a chicken soup and ended with a pastry roll. 

Day 4 Tierberglihütte-> Engelberg

Left to Right: (1) Two splitties survived some very hardpack conditions (2) Cruising up from Sustenpass (3) Jovial Joe about to ski a 6k foot descent (4) Under her Majesty Titlis

Originally we were planning to stay another night at the Sustlihütte and ski out the following day but decided to link the days and ski out early with Fred and Lisa. To get to Engelberg we had 4.600 ft of climbing over 12.5 miles and 6k of descent. We started with a long firm descent to the Hotel Steingletscher at the base of the valley where we had some tea and coffee before starting the climb up to Fünffingerstock. After some steep icy skinning we submitted Fünffingerstock around noon, still time to catch the last bus of the day back to Engelberg. The turns off the summit were surprisingly soft. With skins back on for the last time we had a short climb up to the Grassenbiwak. From there we had a long descent down into the valley. As we dropped lower spring snow made for great skiing until the snow ran out and we had to take to the summer trail. We caught the bus to the Engelberg Abbey and gorged ourselves on cheese and fresh bread made by some monks that pray to a big wheel of Gruyere in the sky. From there we grabbed a few train beers and made our way back to Zuri. 

Turns out skiing over here across the pond is closer to a booze and culinary cruise through the mountains than skimo sufferfest. Going to be dreaming about apricot tart and aperol spritz next time Conor convinces me to go winter camping in the Basin. Big thanks to Lisa and Fred for hosting Timmy and I!

Left to Right: (1) Gang walking out of the Engelberg Valley to the bus (2+3) inhaling cheese and beer at the Engelberg Abbey

Rankings:

Best Aperol spritz: Albert Heim 

Most elaborate shit conveyer system: Tierberglihütte (Note that all but one hut had composting toilets)

Best Après scene: Tierberglihütte

Best soup: Voralphütte bread soup 

Worst soup: Albert Heim “mushroom” soup 

Best tea: Albert Heim 

Worst smelling boot room: Albert Heim 

Hardest shredding staff: Voralphütte (decision solely based on goggle tan)

Most throat hacks: Timmy 

Best cowboy hat: Fred 

Advice for other visitors: 

Visited for 9 days, the major objective was a slight variation on the Urner Haute route, a ski traverse from Realp to Engelberg with a few unplanned days on either end. Upon arriving I bought a 8 day SBB unlimited train pass for $270 at the SBB office in the airport which made for convenient travel and ended up being slightly cheaper than buying individual tickets but this was only cheaper because we went to Millán for a night at the back end of the trip. If you know your travel destinations go to the SBB office at the airport or HB and have them price it out for you they’re quite helpful, you can also buy ski tickets for Titlis cheaper than at the resort. The SBB offices also do currency exchange if you have cash.