- Welcome to Gornergrat.
(dramatic sweeping music)
- [Female Hiker] The Swiss Alps
are the most beautiful place on earth,
and the town of Zermatt is one of the best places
to view this awe-inspiring scene.
Home to the most recognizable mountain on earth,
Zermatt was made for tourism.
Zermatt was built at the foot of the Matterhorn,
specifically to attract tourists to the Alps.
And countless hiking trails throughout the mountain
offer dramatic views of the mighty mountain.
There are many gondolas, lifts and trains in the region
to get high in the mountains.
And one of the most beautiful places to visit
in all of Zermatt, is Gornergrat.
We're going to share with you,
just why you have to visit Gornergrat
when you travel to Switzerland.
- Well, we've made it up here to Gornergrat,
and it is the highest point at which a cogwheel train goes.
(mellow music)
- [Female Hiker] The Gornergrat cogwheel train
has been operating since 1898,
and is Europe's highest open-air cog railway.
It starts in Zermatt, but we caught the train
partway up the mountain at Riffelalp,
after hiking the famous Five Lakes hike.
The full journey is 9.4 kilometers from Zermatt,
and takes 33 minutes
to reach the destination of 3098 meters.
That's more than 10,000 feet.
- It just keeps on going.
I guess we get off at the end.
- It's a steep climb
with awe-inspiring views.
With each turn we took, the scenery became more stunning,
and we had constant views of the Matterhorn all the way up.
It's so cool because you get right up here
and you're amongst all the glaciers
and just surrounded by these peaks.
Usually you'd have to fly or trek in
or do a helicopter tour,
but the cog train took us right up.
That was a pretty special ride.
- Definitely.
- Gornergrat is home
to Europe's highest hotel,
and there are many viewing platforms
where you are surrounded by 29,
4,000 meter plus mountain peaks
that include the Matterhorn
and Switzerland's highest mountain,
with the Gorner Glacier plunging into the valley below.
There's a small chapel,
a restaurant, and an interactive museum,
so it's worth spending a little bit of time
once you reach the top.
Well, it's worth going into Zooom.
That's a really cool interactive place
where you can do some virtual reality.
There's a great film
that makes you feel like you're right in,
like you're part of a flying through the air,
and there's some history on the area as well.
So definitely go inside.
I keep using the term spectacular
and I don't know what else to use,
because it really is.
Every time I turn around, it's so beautiful.
Doesn't seem real.
- This is worth the hike.
(upbeat music plays)
- Wow. Like that's crazy.
There's no railing or anything. Wow.
- [Female Hiker] And there's a lot of people
up here with kids.
- Yeah.
- Just running around.
After you finished looking around,
you can take the train back down,
or you can hike.
We highly recommend hiking
because it's one extraordinary scene after another.
Since it's all downhill, it's quite easy.
and you get to keep an eye out
for the famous Blacknose sheep.
So we came up on the cogwheel train
and thought we were just going to snap a few pictures
and see the Zooom and be on our way.
But it's just way too incredible.
So we decided to hike down to the next train station
because we gotta check out all of these scenes.
The great thing about hiking in the Zermatt area,
is that most of the hikes are downhill.
The hike from Gornergrat to Rotenboden
was about 45 minutes,
but we probably took at least an hour
because we kept stopping to enjoy the sights.
It seemed as if we were walking through a painting.
The trail follows the train tracks down,
and once you reach Rotenboden
you can hike to Lake Riffelsee
to see the beautiful reflections of the Matterhorn.
Riffelsee is part of the famous Five Lakes hike in Zermatt
and we already hiked the lakes the day earlier.
We also went mountain biking through the Four Lakes route,
so, since we had seen a lot
of the beautiful lakes of Zermatt,
we decided to focus our efforts
on finding the famous Blacknose sheep
that roam the mountains.
I hope we find some sheep.
The sheep are not too hard to find
if you're willing to hike a bit,
as they have GPS trackers on their collars.
Once we reached the train station,
we followed our GPS and found the shepherd with her herd,
where she allowed us to have a little visit
with these cute creatures.
(upbeat music plays)
Well, we found the beautiful Blacknose sheep here,
and the sheep herder Debra, by using the app.
That's really great.
I was like, I didn't know if it would work or not.
And I'm walking down going,
I think the sheep are somewhere around here,
and here they are.
It's amazing.
There's about 150 of them here, right?
- [Shepherd] Yes.
- Well, 150 sheep.
(sheep's bells clang)
They're lazy this afternoon. It's been a long day.
It's late, but this one loves having her ears pet.
Yes you do. Yes you do!
Ooh. Yes you do. (she laughs)
(upbeat music plays)
These sheep are so cute.
They're at their afternoon napping spot.
They come to this little culvert
and hide from the heat, I guess.
And they're really cute.
They can barely see anything,
but they'll come running up to you and get a pet
and it's really adorable.
I love how you came right over. You're like, oh, hello.
They're like, oh, there's someone new
to give me a big rub.
(shepherd laughs)
Our trip to Gornergrat
was one of our most memorable days in Switzerland.
The views were breathtaking.
The hike was easy.
The historic train ride was a once in a lifetime experience.
And the sheep were adorable.
Who could ask for more?
(uplifting music plays)
- Well, our time in Gornergrat has come to an end.
- So we're just taking the train down
but we had to have one last look at this incredible view.
Take a mental picture, I don't think we'll ever be back,
but I will remember it forever.
- Me too, but I wanna come back.
- Congratulations baby.
(both mwah)
- Good job.
- If you enjoyed our video
be sure to subscribe to our channel
and click on that bell for notifications,
because we have a lot more travels from around the world
coming your way each week.
(uplifting music plays out)