Jogging in Zermatt (wait…I thought this was supposed to be a post about a hike…)

On July 26th, we planned on completing the Five Lakes Hike near Zermatt. After loading up with coffee and some takeaway sandwiches, we walked over to catch a funicular at about 11:20. One of the great things about this trip is learning how to cope with the unexpected. On this particular day, my lesson was to cope with unexpected exercise.

As we approached the ticket office, I realized we didn’t have enough face masks for everyone, which were required for the ride up (and the eventual ride down). We had a stash in our hotel room, and not wanting to keep anyone waiting too long, I took off for the hotel at a jogging pace, with Findlay by my side. Our hotel room was three floors up, so we scaled the stairs quickly, grabbed the masks, and then jogged back to the funicular…a nice 0.7-mile roundtrip jog (plus 3 flights of stairs) felt pretty good before embarking on a big hike!

We found Anya and the others right as they were buying tickets…or trying to buy tickets. It turns out that ages 8 (Keegan) and 14 (William) are important cutoffs for pricing, so in order to apply the proper discounts, the ticket seller was requiring proof of age in the form of passports (I don’t really blame her…William is just shy of 6 feet now and is often mistaken for an older teen). SO, after barely stopping to catch our breath, Findlay and I set out once again for the hotel at a nice jogging clip, bounded up the stairs, grabbed the passport bag, and jogged back to our waiting family so we could buy the tickets. Phew! A nice 1.4 mile jog (plus 6 flights of stairs) felt sort of good before embarking on a big hike!

After getting the tickets and making our way to the funicular, we realized that several of our children forgot jackets, and since we were heading up to over 8300 feet for a hike, it felt inadvisable just wearing t-shirts and shorts (let the record show that I had advised them to grab their jackets before we left). SO, after not really yet catching my breath, I set out once again for the hotel at a nice jogging clip, this time with William by my side…William, the kid who ran a 5:24 mile as a 7th grader…so I guess he wasn’t technically “by my side” but anyway we jogged or ran back to the hotel for a third time and there was absolutely no way I was climbing those stairs again, so I sent Mr. Track & Field up the stairs for the jackets while I laid down in some shade for a nap, and then we jogged or ran back to the funicular. A painfully unexpected 2.1 mile jog (plus 6 flights of stairs) is not a good idea before embarking on a big hike! I really hope someone was sitting at one of the many cafes along that path long enough to see me run by SIX times that morning so they could get a good laugh out of it.

In any event, the hike itself was truly magnificent. As the name would suggest, the Five Lakes hike takes you to five different lakes. And since the Matterhorn is only about 6 miles away, the views are stunning and humbling. We are so so tiny. And yet God knows us each individually! Amazing. The hike took us about 4.5 hours and covered 7 miles. It was really nice to have the lakes as destination points along the way to break up the hike and have goals along the way. And the big payoff was at the fifth lake, which is a popular swimming destination for families where our boys finally got a chance to cool off by taking a dip. Yeah…turned out we didn’t really need those jackets after all.