Three-Day Trip to the Swiss Jura Mountains, DAY 1

Overview: 

The Jura Mountains are a Subalpine Mountain Range which generally form the country border between France and Switzerland. On the Swiss side, there is a national hiking Route: "The Jura Crest Trail (Route no.5)",  a 16-stage, 320-km trail of which we have done a couple of sections close to where we live, i.e. near the Eastern end of the range which runs almost to Zurich. But we don't often travel to the Western part of Switzerland because most destinations take us four hours or so to access, and that's just too long for day trips.

So this week being a vacation week for us and the weather being particularly nice in the Southwestern part of the country (near Geneva), we planned a three-day hike there (with two overnights in hotels along our chosen route), walking a total of about 50 km on the final three sections of the trail.

The Jura Crest trail covers approx. 320 km from near Zurich to Geneva, mostly along the western border of Switzerland

Sunday May 17 -- On the first day, the plan was to take a bus to the mountain pass called "Col de Mollendruz" where a possibly not-so-exciting 9-km and approx. 3-hour ascent to the summit of the highest peak in the Swiss Jura -- Mont Tendre (1679 m) -- awaited us, then continuing South along the ridge to the next pass, "Col de Marchairuz", where we had reserved a hotel room for the night. This section would have been 17 km and 5 hours in total.

As it turned out, even though the Swiss Railway Schedule showed a bus course up and over the pass, when we got on the bus we were informed by an eager local passenger that the bus is NOT running to the pass at this time, because it is a tourist run and during COVID-19 the tourist runs are cancelled. We apparently weren't the only ones who were fooled, as several people quickly jumped off the bus and took the next train back the way we had come, a train that was just pulling into the station! Thanks to the Internet we were able to quickly figure out an alternative route to the summit, namely starting at the Lac de Joux on the West side of the mountain, and even though the climb was higher and steeper, we got to the summit faster and at about the same time as originally planned! As it turns out, we were very happy with the change in plans, as we then also got to see the Lac de Joux, a pretty upland lake popular with bike riders.

As it was Sunday, we had expected some other hikers, but were not prepared for the sheer numbers of people up at the summit, where there was a very cold wind blowing, and from where we actually had no view to the French Alps as hoped, because the air was very hazy. Instead of returning to the main trail, we meandered our way across the top of the ridge through large bowls of not-yet-melted snow, freshly hatched crocuses, and most wonderfully, a large abundance of bright blue gentians, thousands of them. Those and the sighting of the fox, plus the miles upon miles of dry-stone walls, were the highlights before we got to our hotel at about 6 p.m., a very busy establishment having just opened a week earlier and very successfully serving visitors in their outdoor gardens (Lots of motorcycles along these pass roads).

In the end, our revised version of the hike was just over 14 km and officially less than five hours, although it took us much much longer...

A detour with train and bus took us along the lakeshore of Lac de Joux, to the small town of Les Bioux, from where there was a trail directly below the peak of Mont Tendre.

We had perfect weather for the steep climb. It was sunny but with a cool wind

For a large part of the ascent we were alone, until all of a sudden several other hikers passed us going to the top. Here is a view down onto Lac de Joux. The mountains behind the lake are still Switzerland, but beyond that is France.

First of many captivating dry-stone walls, which form grids all over the hillside

The surface of the land here consists of lots of Jura Limestone, a very permeable rock which causes water to quickly sicker away, and therefore the land is not useful for agriculture. To create pastures for animals, the rocks are collected and piled into "fences" to keep the animals in.

Urs spotted a beautiful fox, it watched us for a long time before heading back into the forest. 

I was very happy with the sighting of the fox. I've seen the odd fox out of the train windows as we travel to various destinations, but never like this on one of our hikes

The first of the wild gentians. I love the blues!

Most of the stone walls have these narrow passages that you have to cross

A wonderful lush green open meadow... That ring of stones protects a water reservoir. We saw many like this. Each stable up here (of which there aren't many) has such a ring of rock-wall to protect the reservoir

More and more gentians. They are lovely mixed with the yellow flowers

Emerging from the forest just below the peak, this wonderful view over the Jura range to the North and West

Great path to the top

Looking behind me to the South, more people are arriving. This would actually also be the same path to return to, heading South again, but we walked along the ridge instead

This stunning wall seems to have been freshly built, and follows the ridge for as far as we can see!

There is still surprisingly a lot of snow up here. We have decided that instead of returning along the trail, we're going to head South along the top of those hills past the snow

At the summit of Mt. Tendre: It was very cold and windy. This spectacular view is along the ridge to the North, where we originally had planned to come from, via the restaurant "Alpage du Mont Tendre" which you can see on the right. 

It was difficult to find a good spot for our picnic lunch that a) wasn't in the midst of all the other people, and b) was in a bit of a wind screen and not on a slope where I had to worry that my back-pack would slide down!

View from our picnic spot: We had hoped to see the French Alps beyond Lake Geneva, but the air was unfortunately very hazy. Nevertheless, the view was fantastic 

On closer inspection, you could just see the tip of Mont Blanc, the highest peak in the Alps, peeking through the top of the clouds

And directly South of us we spotted the large spherical structure at the top of Mt. La Dôle, which is where we are planning to go on Day 3

A look back at the peak of Mt.Tendre before heading off to the snow fields. We were glad to get away from the crowd! (These were mostly people who simply walked up the hill and back down the same way)

Zoomed view of the peak of Mt.Tendre and all the people up there!

Instead of returning to the trail, we meandered across the top of the ridge (no trails) which was a good thing, because we saw so many beautiful things up there

Heading straight across the top of the ridge to the snow fields

I just had to climb up on some of the snow!

First batch of what turned out to be masses and masses of beautiful blue gentians

Lovely and unusual landscape along the top of the ridge

This was my favourite part of this day's hike, all the beautiful gentians

So beautiful!

From here we headed down the slope to join the main trail again, for another ascent to that tower on that hill

Another climb behind us, from here it's mostly downhill to the next pass called Col de Marchairuz

Very little of the trail was on paved roads, most of the trail was soft and nice to walk

More blue and yellow

Walking along Route no.5: The Jura Crest Trail (or in local language: "Chemin des Crêtes du Jura"). At this place there was a farm called "Monts de Bière Derrière", I thought that was such a funny name

Last stretch before getting to the pass and the hotel

The restaurant had just opened a week earlier and was quite busy. They did it well with masks and plastic face shields. Only the lady "guarding" the entrance to make sure no two people were in the foyer at the same time was ridiculous, as she had her mask on her chin, smoking a cigarette, while chatting with people while spraying their hands... all within approx. 1 meter! Forget the possibility of "getting infected", I wasn't going near her because of the cigarette!

We had a fine dinner in the salon, it was pleasant and comfortable with a very nice assortment of clocks, all striking the hour at separate times! 

Our alternative route: 2 hrs 30 minutes to climb the 650m altitude to the top of Mont Tendre, and then another approx. 2 hrs 30 minutes to the Col du Marchairuz. With several ascents, we ended up climbing almost 1000m! And also, we made a full day of it, starting shortly after 10 a.m. and getting to the hotel at 6 p.m.

In red is the original trail we wanted to take to the top of Mont Tendre, but the bus wasn't running up to the pass this day. Our alternative was a higher climb but shorter, and quite enjoyable.