2025 Switzerland – On the Niederhorn. The second day
Christian left during the night, he did not feel well and he did not want to take any risk.
So it is only the 3 of us, Noé, the guide, Sebastien and myself.
That means that my backpack is much heavier than the day before, because all the equipment that was distributed among 4 people, now is carried by the 3 of us. I don’t think it is a huge problem for my travel mates, but I am really small (150 cm and 52 kg). I did not weight it, but it must be around 20 kg. That is not the only difficulty. The hardest part is that we are climbing up today and the path is quite steep. Never mind. I’m not a little spoiled princess and my mates are both very reassuring about the fact they will help me.
We dismantle the camp, pack the material and go. In order to trave lighter, Noé decides to leave the food in excess and some other stuff on that spot and retrieve it in a few days with his next excursion.
It is 11.00. Quite late.
Maybe half an hour has passed, but I already need to stop. However, the problem is not the weight of the backpack. As I was afraid of the cold, I wore too many layers of clothes and now, with the physical effort and under the sun, it is evident I am overdressed. So we stop in the middle of the slope, among the trees and I improvise a stream-tease on the snow, as I need to remove the layers under the ski pants. It takes 10 minutes, maybe longer, to undress, redress and find a way to put the clothes in the backpack in a decent way without having to rearrange everything. Then we continue and it is much better, I feel reborn as I can breath now.
I fall in the snow a few times. Seeing my difficulties, my mates are very understanding ad helpful.
Noé slows down the pace and decides to shorten the itinerary by some kilometers. « It is the slowest one that dictates the pace » is one of his teachings. Sebastien takes position behind me, ready to help and lift me each time I fall in the snow. Noé also takes some materials from my backpack so that it is easier for me and fixes better everything that is attached to it so that it does not bother me while I’m walking.
When the ground is flat, I have no problem, it is going up that is killing me, when the slope becomes steep.
But I’m determined to:
- arrive at the end of the 3rd day. I did not come there to go back in the middle of the adventure.
- Not spoil the fun for my super travel mates.
Anyway, in the second part of the afternoon the hardest part is over and the march resembles more to a nice walk.
As we are late on the schedule, Noé decides to speed up his pace and find our shelter for the night.
He tells Sebastien and myself to keep on following the path and that if there is any deviation , he will draw a arrow in the snow.
We nod and he leaves, while we continue at my pace.
After a few minutes we lost sight of him.
We joke about the fact that we are so late that once we arrive, Noé will have already lit the fire and cooked the dinner, so we only have to sit, eat and sleep.
In the meantime, it is the sunset, it becomes darker and darker and we wear our head-torches.
We start worrying, because we have no idea of the distance to cover and of the meeting point.
We can only keep on going, there’s nothing else to do.
At a certain point the main path leads us out of the forest and on a hill we do see a fire and we start laughing loudly.
That’s Noé waiting for us.
We hurry up – as much as possible in our conditions – and cover the last 500 meters that separate us from a well deserved rest.
Noé is happy to see us and welcome us with a big smile.
He’s melting the snow to refill the flasks.
I get out of my snowshoes, lay down the garbage bag I brought as isolating material and sit on it, unable to move and talk.
