Four days across two Swiss cantons, swapping tourist-trail sledding for something closer to the Alps proper. We started in Grindelwald in the Canton of Bern, where we went the old-fashioned way: dragging sleds on foot all the way to the top of the hill, then letting gravity do the rest on the way down. No magic carpet lifts, no shortcuts. Just the slog up and the payoff of a fast, laughing descent with the Eiger and Jungfrau in view the whole way. Day two was the bigger one. We drove from Zurich to Riemenstalden in the Canton of Schwyz, tucked our car near the little Seilbahn Chäppeliberg cable car, and instead of riding up we strapped on packs and climbed the snow-covered mountainside ourselves. Hours later we reached Lidernenhütte SAC, a wooden Swiss Alpine Club hut built in 1944, perched at 1,727m on the north slope of the Chaiserstock range with a view straight out over Lake Lucerne. We rolled in around 1 PM, boots caked in snow. The next day was a full-on snowshoe traverse: up from the hut to the summit southeast of Alplersee, then a working descent that turned into an avalanche rescue drill with beacons, probes, and shovels. Digging a full simulated burial pit was brutal. Way harder than expected, and a real respect-check if you've ever assumed backcountry safety is something you can figure out on the fly. We rode the little cable car down at the end and drove back to Zurich as the light faded. The hot chocolate at the hut after that long snowshoe day remains undefeated.
