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I've seen quite a few mountain's in my time here on the blue planet, but the Alps are unique. Rugged with distinct peaks is just the beginning of how I'd describe them. Layer in the lushness of the green valleys and the picturesque towns and you start to begin to understand what the alps are about.
In the valley when it's really quiet in the late evening or early morning you can hear individual cars miles away as you watch them snake their way up and out.
The picture was taken from the summit looking back at the Kanzel which the climber in red is getting round. He's in a very exposed position. There are good holds for the hands but not much for the feet. His heels will be sticking out over a huge void.
One from deep within the archives.
A scanned Kodachrome 25 slide.
Lake Lucerne borders on the three original Swiss cantons of Uri, Schwyz, and Unterwalden (which today is divided into the cantons of Obwalden and Nidwalden), as well as the canton of Lucerne, thus the name Vierwaldstättersee (lit.: Lake of the Four Forested Settlements). Many of the oldest communities of Switzerland are along the shore, including Küssnacht, Weggis, Vitznau, Gersau, Brunnen, Altdorf, Buochs, and Treib.
Lake Lucerne is singularly irregular and appears to lie in four different valleys, all related to the conformation of the adjoining mountains.
The Urnersee occupies the northernmost and deep portion of the great cleft of the Reuss Valley, which has cut through the Alpine ranges from the St Gotthard Pass to the neighbourhood of Schwyz. From its eastern shore the mountains rise in almost bare walls of rock to a height of from 3,000 to 4,000 ft (910 to 1,220 m) above the water. The two highest summits are the Fronalpstock and the Rophaien (2078 m).
Between them the steep glen or ravine of the Riemenstaldener Tal descends to Sisikon, the only village with Flüelen right on the shore on that side of the Urnersee. On the opposite or western shore, the mountains attain still greater dimensions. The Niederbauen Chulm is succeeded by the Oberbauenstock, and farther south, above the ridge of the Scharti, appear the snowy peaks of the Gitschen and the Uri Rotstock (2,928 m). In the centre opens the Reuss Valley, backed by the rugged summits of the Urner and Glarner Alps.
Beethoven's "Moonlight" Sonata derives its name from an 1832 description of the first movement by music critic Ludwig Rellstab, who compared it to moonlight shining upon Lake Lucerne.
Gioacchino Rossini refers to the Lake in his William Tell Overture Section A: Sunrise over the Alps.
The breadth of these various sections of the lake is very variable, but is usually between one and two miles (3 km). The lake's surface, whose mean height above the sea is 434 metres, is the lowest point of the cantons of Uri, Obwalden and Nidwalden. Originally the lake was susceptible to variations in level and flooding along its shoreline. Between 1859 and 1860, the introduction of a needle dam in the Reuss in the city of Lucerne, just upstream from the Spreuerbrücke, allowed the lake level to be stabilised.[1]
The culminating point of the lake's drainage basin, as well as Central Switzerland, is the Dammastock at 3,630 metres above sea level.
Spent a week walking along the Victorian Alps in December 1982.
End of the trip, looking back over where we had walked.