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Enjoy!
The Glacier Walk is nice and flat or you can take the Snow bus across it to reach the look out and small restaurant as well.
Hi Lucas,
I just read your excellent report on your visit to Glacier 3000, and I enjoyed your nice photos and the various comments. You certainly were blessed with a great weather day.
What I would like to add is that this is a much more doable trip time-wise if one is based in or around Montreux (or even Lausanne). From the Montreux Gare CFF it is about a twelve minute ride by train to Aigle VD. There are over a dozen trains running each way between Aigle and Les Diablerets VD, along a very picturesque route, as you are rising quite steeply from the Rhone valley, and these runs are less than an hour in duration. From Les Diablerets it takes about 16 minutes by bus to get to the base of the gondolas at le Col du Pillon. I found this bit on the internet as I have never been to the Col du Pollon. However, I lived for a time in a village below Villars VD and I can tell you that the scenery around there is lovely. I used to zoom around by motorcycle and that was great fun. There are also buses running up from Aigle and Bex VD (the next CFF stop south of Aigle) which will get you to Les Diablerets via either Leysin VD or Villars. I suspect that there is also a train running from Bex to Villars but am not sure if and when it runs. There is no train from Aigle to Villars. Thank you for for directing me to this thread.
It’s me again, back with one more thing, a link to the live panoramic camera up at the Glacier 3000. What a beautiful day it is up there ! glacier3000.roundshot. com/
Great pano camera Peter – thanks! It can’t be right about Mont Blanc though….it makes it seem to me that Mont Blanc is right there!?
And yes I wouldn’t really recommend this as a day trip from Zurich at all – definitely should be down from Montreux preferably or perhaps as far away as Bern is not too bad.
Yeah, I noticed the same thing. Is it possible that they mean that Mont Blanc is behind that other mountain ? Let me check on my topographic map…..
Yup, that’s exactly the case. I went onto SwissTopo and drew a red line from the peak of Mont Blanc to the top of Scex-Rouge, and you can see there is no way one can see Mont Blanc from Scex-Rouge, as it is blocked by that very imposing Tête-Ronde (3210 metres) less than 3 km to the SSW. Scex-Rouge is a little under 3000 metres. Here’s a map with a red line to show that the line of sight to Mont Blanc is blocked.
Attachments:Ah ok. Makes sense I suppose. A little misleading though. 🙂
To people who are not familiar with the geography of this part of Europe, definitely ! It’s too late now for today, but perhaps tomorrow I can find other instances at other locations where they do the same thing.
Hello Lucas,
That was one great and informative trip report. Thanks for sharing it! Just a quick question – Is it possible to view the schedule of the cable car from col du pillon upto Cabane station and Scex Rouge? I tried in the SBB timetable, but no luck.
Thanks again!
Hi Gayathri,
>> Is it possible to view the schedule of the cable car from col du pillon upto Cabane station and Scex Rouge? I tried in the SBB timetable, but no luck.
The stops you need for the timetable are Col-du-Pillon to Glacier-des-Diablerets.
Or to coordinate your whole trip from wherever you are starting from that day, use your starting point instead of Col-du-Pillon.
Alpenrose
Alpenrose has it exactly. The easiest option may be to choose your preferred arrival time at Glacier-des-Diablerets on the SBB timetable and see when you need to leave from wherever you are starting that day (Montreux etc).
Great. I got it! Earlier, I didn’t get the station name right. Thanks for your help, Alpenrose & Lucas!
Hi Lucas,
My wife and I are going to be staying in Bern two weeks from now. We would like to spend one of those days hiking and being in nature. I was initially planning for that day to be spent in Niederhorn, which is close to where we’re going to stay, but I just learned about Glacier 3000 and want to know if it would be worth the trip after making time/money considerations. We will have a rented car, so we do not have any types of “savings passes,” but I’m trying to figure out if the hikes at Glacier 3000 are in addition to the ticket prices for the cable car ride, or if you simply purchase a ticket and then do whichever hikes you wish to do when you get off the cable car. Can you provide any insight into that?
Thanks!
Hi Aaron and welcome to MySwissAlps1
Hikes in Switzerland are free of charge – you just need to pay for the cable car or train to access those that start on mountain tops (or you can hike up the mountain for free too….but that is usually reserved for the Swiss!).
Thanks for the insight. As I said in my last reply, our initial plan was to stay in Beatenberg for our hiking day and hike some trails from Niederhorn. Would you say that we are going to miss out on much if we choose to do that for the sake of time and money, instead of going to Glacier 3000? If not, would you suggest any specific hikes in the Beatenberg/Niederhorn area?
Thanks again!
Hi Aaron,
It’s two very different experiences and both are good if the weather cooperates. This hike gets you very good views, especially the first half: http://www.myswissalps.com/hi king/niederhorn-waldegg.
Yes, certainly the Niederhorn is closer to you and easier to access. I might make the call on the night before (or day of) your travel to see how the weather looks at both mountains.
The Glacier 3000 is a lot higher up and if you are looking for that kind of experience (with snow and a glacier) then that would be your only choice!
Amo, thanks for the suggestions. Everything that I’ve read about the Beatenberg area hikes seem to think the best views are from Niederhorn-Gemmenalphorn. Do you think the Niederhorn-Waldegg is a better choice than the Gemmenalphorn hike?
Thanks!
Lucas,
Thanks for the insight! I want the very high/glacier experience, but I’m unsure if it will be too cold for my wife, or not, as she gets cold much easier than I do. Is it a bitter cold that would be miserable for someone who gets cold easily, or is it comfortable with a good jacket a insulated boots? Also, is there a trustworthy website that you would recommend for checking the visibility conditions of both mountains, so that I can make the best decision on the day of?
Thanks again!
It can be bitterly cold with the right weather conditions. So can any part if Switzerland in the winter. In September I doubt it will be too cold. When I was there in late January it was about -10 I think.
All Swiss mountains have current weather reports and usually webcams too: http://www.glacier3000.ch/en/ information/weather
Here are two excellent live webcams:
For the Niederhorn: niederhornbahn.roundsh ot.com/
For the Glacier 3000: glacier3000.roundshot. com/
If you check both of these right now, just after 9 AM, you will see that the Glacier 3000 is totally enveloped in clouds. Pretty cloudy at Beatenberg as well, but at least it looks more promising.
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