Ninety seconds on Matterhorn
The mountain costs nothing and the vantage points cost a great deal, which makes the hour of departure the decision worth making. The first train out of the village runs at seven, ahead of the regular service that follows it.
Seeing it is the whole activity, and where to stand from is the only real question. Gornergrat is the standard answer: a rack railway out of the village to three thousand one hundred metres, facing the mountain across the glacier, first departure at seven and a regular service from eight. The walk from Blauherd down to Sunnegga is the other, roughly nine kilometres and two and a half hours, past the lake at Stellisee where the reflection is the photograph the whole valley is sold on. That walk is listed as a June to September route, and the railway shuts for a fortnight of works in November, so the calendar closes in from both ends outside the summer.
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