The place where it's always winter...

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One week ago, I got home from a twice-delayed vacation to Europe, and I'm sorting through the many photos I took. I flew into Frankfurt, and drove through or visited seven countries -- Germany, Luxembourg, Belgium, France, Switzerland, Lichtenstein, and Austria -- over the course of seventeen days.

In Switzerland, I stayed in the Alpine town of Grindelwald, and on Sunday, April 10, I took a series of trains to the Jungfraujoch, which is a glacial saddle connecting two mountains. The railway station there is the highest in Europe, at 11,332 feet. From the railway station and visitors center, you take an elevator up another 387 feet to the viewing platform on a mountain called the Sphinx.

There is always snow here, and temperatures rise above freezing only on a few days in the middle of the summer. On the day I visited, the temperature was 1 degree Fahrenheit, and there was a 20 mph wind. The thin air was kicking my butt, and I really had to pace myself, but oh what views!

Jungfraujoch – Top of Europe | jungfrau.ch
 

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Standing up there, I was just awed by the majesty of it all, the sheer, stark beauty of nature. And then I saw the plaque mounted on the wall of the building, which summed it all up for me...
 

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Inside the visitors center, there is a lot of information on the entire complex. The building at the top of the Spinx houses a climatological research station on the second floor (with scientists living there year-round) and an observatory on the third floor.

One of the photos below is of a sign in the visitors center, and shows the sphinx building as it sits on that mountain.
 

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Beautiful photos. Thanks.

Those Alps are good neighbors.
In the winter, when you live north of them and sunshine is rare, they provide sunshine at their heights and to the south.
In the summer, the heights are naturally cool, in a region where air conditioning is rare.


Sent from my motorola one 5G using Tapatalk
 
The Swiss love their winter sports! Riding the cogwheel train to and from the Jungfraujoch, I got some great shots of folks skiing, hiking, and just enjoying being outdoors...
 

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Glad you enjoyed yourself and got back without incident.

When you were in Belgium did you wave across the Channel to my old hometown?

Thanks, Rusty. Luxembourg and Belgium were quick day trips, to pay my respects at the American Military Cemetery and to visit General McAuliffe Square in Bastogne... :)
 
It is truly mind boggling that people and pack animals (and maybe a few choppers) hoofed every piece of that structure up there and then assembled it in that environment.

I can't make it through an IKEA dresser without a support group.

Building the railway was the key to getting everything else up there. It was the vision and dream of Adolph Guyer-Zeller, who is memorialized there.

Here's the whole story of how they did it...

Construction of the Jungfrau Railway | jungfrau.ch.
 

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Great pics of my dads hometown and yep,winter sports were instilled as soon as we could walk (bend zee knees!) lol
He had a story about sliding down the cogwheel tracks on a flat stone and catching a lot of grief for that 😆
 
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