A Section of the Rhine Valley High Trail from Wildhaus to Sax

Sunday May 26, 2024 -- After a whole week of rainy weather, Sunday was a lovely day in many parts of the country. We opted to travel to the eastern part of the country to the Rhine Valley where the river forms the border of Switzerland and Austria/Liechtenstein. This was actually a last-minute decision to switch from our original plan to head south, as we've been south so often, and we want to take advantage of any nice weather in the north.

We had long wanted to do another section of the Rhine Valley High Trail -- in this case a stretch heading out of the Thur Valley from Wildhaus, and then following the base of the eastern side of the Alpstein Massif -- but with the fabulous visibility on this day we should rather have gone somewhat higher for better views. With all this rain, though, many of our favourite trails are wet and muddy, so in the end we were probably better off on this trail, as much of it was either on paved roads or forest roads. 

We ended up leaving the High Trail after 12 kilometers of walking, catching a bus on the main road below and parallel to the trail (many places to descend from the high trail). I found the long stretches through the forest someone tedious, as it was quite a hot day and I had only slept about three hours the night before. Still, it was fascinating to have the high cliffs on our left, and recognizing where we had done much more exciting hikes behind the ridge on two previous occasions! Plus the Toggenburg landscape in the Thur River Valley is so very pretty. 

These first photos are from the trip to and through the Toggenburg, early on a beautiful morning:

As we leave our city of Zug and head north toward Zurich, this is the view south... on a clear day you get the most fantastic view of the Bernese Alps. (And Mount Pilatus on the right, which is Luzern's local mountain). 

From Zurich the train heads south again on the east side of Lake Zurich. Here we get some lovely views of the Glarus Alps. 

Heading east along Lake Obersee (southern part of Lake Zurich), this view is into the Wägital (Wägi Valley) where we have also been a few times. 

Heading by bus now down the Thur River Valley. 

Up ahead we have now reached the north side of the Churfirsten mountains. (We have also walked twice on that upper plateau just below those peaks, 2023 and 2020). 

Crossing the Thur River at Stein (Canton St.Gallen)

As we now approach the Alpstein Massif near the start of our hike, we can see up the valley on the right to the Mutschen Saddle, which we crossed in September 2021. On this day we are hiking on the far side of the craggy peaks on the right. 

To the south is the summit of Mount Chäserrugg, one of the seven peaks of the Churfirsten mountains, and which can be accessed by cable car. 

Here is where we started on our hike, at the village bus stop in Wildhaus. It looks like the locals are getting ready for a traditional church service. 

As we had left home very early at 6:15 a.m., we were able to start this hike at the early hour of 9 a.m. at Wildhaus, and catching a 2:10 p.m. bus in Sax. That is early for us to end a hike and already be on our way home! In all, this was a 4-hour and 14-km hike. 

We are following Regional Trail no.86: "Rheintaler Höhenweg", or "Rhine Valley High Trail". Obwald/Sennwald is the direction we are headed. (Although Sennwald is too far!)

A second church steeple in Wildhaus with the Alpstein mountains as a backdrop

These two were so curious, they came running to us to check us out!

A lot of work goes into shingling these buildings!

A small ruins called the "Wildenburg Ruins", but we didn't go up there, as it meant quite a detour. 

A look behind us at the Churfirsten mountains as we head eastward in the Thur River Valley

And this is the first look into the Rhine River Valley, which runs perpendicular to this valley. 

A bigger part of this walk was on narrow paved roads, which is not usually a problem as there is very little traffic on these side roads. 

Near a small lake called the Schönenboden Lake, we took a parallel trail through the pastures. We usually like these trails, but also here the trail was soft and wet and the grass fairly high, and we were actually glad to get back to the road!

Appenzell-style farmhouse (We are currently in Canton St.Gallen, but the Canton border with Appenzell is over the top of these mountains)

The yellow meadows are just so pretty.

At least here the meadow grass along the trail has been mowed, making walking so much easier! Water troughs are always nice.

Another house with lots of small shingles. 

My favourite daisy meadows

From here on we constantly had this beautiful range of cliffs on our left. Back in 2021 we walked on the other side of those peaks. 

A good place for a coffee break at 10:20, admiring the view into the Rhine River valley, where the Thur Valley opens up. On this side of Wildhaus, it is not the Thur River which flows into the Rhine (the Thur River heads west from Wildhaus). 

More lovely yellow meadows at our feet where we had our break. 

The mountains behind me are actually in Liechtenstein, on the east side of the Rhine River. 

So many of the mountain farmers still rake the cut mountain grass by hand. 

As our trail now heads to the north along the Rhine Valley, this is a look down at the city of Grabs to the south, with the mountains of Liechtenstein in the background. 

As we got back on the paved road through the forest, this small snake was trying to make its way across the road. It was a baby, only about 20 cm long, and looked to have been injured on its tail end, possibly having been run over by a mountain bike, of which there were quite a few on this road. It's not a poisonous snake. It's called a ringed, or grass snake. 

That building has seen better days! Here is a photo of what it looks like on the other side of those peaks on the left --> HERE

Heading further down into the Rhine Valley

In the center of the photo is a small cleft called the Saxerlücke. We have been up there on two separate occasions. From there you can walk down to here, which we did not do. We stayed on the other side of the range both times. 

The wide and flat Rhine Valley below us. The mountains in the back are in Austria. And this kind of road is great to walk on at this time of year when the pastures are wet!

We passed through a place called Kanada! Unfortunately for us, there was a nationwide rifle shooting competition going on this weekend, and one of the ranges was very nearby. Even though it was noon (and on a Sunday!!!), the competition ran overtime, so we had to endure the sound of the shooting till about 12:30.

A look up at the cleft called Saxerlücke. 

There is a long valley on the other side of those cliffs, which we ascended in 2021. At that time we saw several rock climbers. I can well imagine that this would be interesting for them. 

Finally a really nice and comfortable forest trail, dry and soft. 

Just before descending to the main road to catch a bus, we did a quick detour to the ruins of the Hohensax Fortress. The panel informs about the power of the 13th-century noble Sax Family (from the region of southern Germany) in this region. The fortress here was built in about the year 1200, but ransacked and destroyed by the Appenzell people in 1446.

A quick detour to the ruins of the Hohensax fortress. For the few minutes we spent up here, the sun disappeared!

These are the remains of the Hohensax Fortress, erected in about the year 1200. 

The ruins of the Hohensax Fortress. The sun reappeared right after we left the ruins. 

On the way down the hillside to the main road. It took us another 30 minutes from the ruins to get to the bus stop. 

It was high time to find a water trough, as my water bottle really needed refilling! (And my face was pretty warm!)

Here at the "Gasthaus Schlössli" is where we caught the 14:13 bus for what turned out to be a shorter than expected trip home (2½ hours instead of 3) due to a delayed train from Austria. We got here with, once again, just five minutes to spare. We could have stayed here at the restaurant for refreshments, but preferred to call it a day.  

A final look up to the Saxerlücke

Heading south now by bus toward the city of Buchs, we can look westward to the mountains which we walked below. (At about the level of the lower trees). 

The pink line is the hike we did this day. These are all the hikes we have done in the eastern Toggenburg region and the Alpstein Massif near the border of Liechtenstein. Mount Säntis is the dominant mountain in the Alpstein Massif. 

Location of Wildhaus and the eastern Rhine Valley within Switzerland