Wildspitz (1580m) snowshoe hike from Sattel to Goldau

Busy weekend. We went shopping for living room furniture on Saturday (I've been living here for 1.5 years and guests keep remarking on the echo in our empty living room ;-)). So that'll hopefully be solved soon.

Need more stuff?

Following that we went to a talk and presentation by renowned Mountaineer and Doctor Oswald Oelz. He's the third person ever to stand on the Seven Summits and climbing partner of such luminaries as Reinhold Messner. He gave an impressive overview of his life dedicated to the mountains: Eine lebenslange Liebesaffäre mit dem Himalaya. Inspirational - being able to put up first ascents on your sixtieth birthday is not a bad way to grow old! The event took place in the Songtsen House, a non-profit organization celebrating Tibetan culture and facilitating exchanges between Switzerland and Tibet. Beautiful original art on display and delicious home made Tibetan finger food.

We spent the crowning end of the day partying at the "Pimp Pallazo", otherwise known as Henrik's flat share.

Early next morning Anita and me left for the village Sattel. Starting in dense fog with visibility of fifty meters or so we soon eclipsed the valley and enjoyed beautiful vistas over an endless sea of clouds. While we were being burned by the sun we could just make out our "Hausberg" Uetli peaking out of the clouds and bad weather for the lowly valley people at home ;-)

We enjoyed a quick picnic on the terrace of the Halsegg restaurant. The waitress was decidedly unfriendly and didn't really want us around. They were having some sort of cheese fondue and wine party watching Ski on tv. Guests were seen as a nuisance.

Trails were well broken in and felt like some sort of snow shoeing highway. A correspondingly large number of people were around. Some with sleds, most on snow shoes or ski touring.

Taking the long way down to Goldau soon saw us on our own though and finding and breaking our own trail for a little while. Just when we got onto a level and easy gravel road again Anita sprained her ankle. Especially ironic since we had just successfully negotiated the trickiest part of the whole tour: steep muddy wet meadows with patches of ice and snow, talking about proper walking technique... Anyway, she still made it down and her ankle is getting better.

~15km, ~950m up, ~1450m down