Short Walk from Rothenflue to Alptal near the Mythen Mountains in Canton Schwyz

Thursday June 19, 2025 -- After our two-day trip to the Surselva Valley, we didn't want to travel far this day. We also wanted to start early again to beat the day's heat.

We traveled just 90 minutes from home (leaving at 7:15) to reach the summit of the Rothenflue gondola cable-car station at the base of the Mythen Mountains in Schwyz, from where we did a relatively short, five-kilometer walk down to the road in the Alptal Valley. We enjoyed cows newly let out of the barns onto these upper pastures, and walked mostly through forest and marsh landscapes with lots and lots of meadow flowers again, to my delight. There was a lovely breeze blowing and it wasn't at all too hot.

It was only a 90-minute walk to the road where the bus heads down the Alptal Valley to Einsiedeln, and originally we were going to walk for another hour on a trail following the Alp River, but the next bus out wasn't till two hours later, and we didn't feel like spending another two hours in the heat of the valley bottom. So we took the 11:13 bus (which we just reached with five minutes to spare) to Einsiedeln, and went to visit Urs' Aunt on the way home. Then we enjoyed a pleasant afternoon at home.

The view of the Uri Alps from the 10-minute bus ride from the Schwyz train station to the Rothenflue cable-car station.

We left home at 7:15, and got to the cable-car station just before 8:30 for the first run up the mountain. As the gondola ascends, we look down at the city of Schwyz, and can just see Lake Lucerne in the back.

Directly to our north is the magnificent Greater Mythen mountain. (Grosser Mythen). You can see the zigzag trail that goes up to the summit. (We climbed this once in 2014, maybe it's time to try again?)

At the top of the gondola cable-way is a restaurant and a look-out platform. From here you can also see Lake Lauerz on the right, and the summit of Mt.Rigi behind it.

Here is a photo I have to take every time I am here!

A close-up look a the summit of Mt.Mythen. There is nothing up there but a restaurant! The trail up to the summit is very popular, though. Interesting fact: The red rock at the top of the mountain is older tan the gray rock below it, proof that at some point Earth's crust flipped over.

Starting out on our hike now, with a look to the north into the Alptal (Alp Valley) where we will ultimately catch a but to Einsiedeln in the north.

There was a little shop inside this old cable-car cabin! You could buy locally-made cheeses here, but we didn't buy anything this time.

Leaving home at 7:15, we got to the summit of the Rotenflue cable-car at about 8:45. After a short five-kilometer walk, we caught the bus in Brunni on the road in the Alptal (Alp Valley) at 11:15, heading back home via Einsiedeln and Goldau.

Heading down the hill on the first part of our hike with a view of the Schwyzer Alps to our south.

And the cows were heading up the hill toward us.... but as it turns out, we had just passed by their water trough, and that's where they were headed!

We love the cows in the mountains.

I took this photo by accident, but I love it!

VIDEO:

Walking past a parade of cows heading to their water trough!

First the cows were keeping an eye on that little dog, and then they were curious about us! These are not the typical Swiss Brown Cows we usually see here. I checked the Internet, and I think they are Jersey breed of cows.

They always watch Urs!

From here we can see the "Grosser Mythen" on the left, and the "Kleiner Mythen" on the right. ("Greater" and "Lesser" Mythen).

More cows

View to the south. Behind the first stretch of lower hills is the Muota Valley (Muotathal).

Here at the saddle with the cutest name: "Müsliegg", we headed north, and the rest of our walk was downhill into the Alp Valley.

This hillside is quite wet with lots of marshy landscapes. The people who keep up the trails lay down wooden boards in the wettest areas to make walking easier. We had lots of shade which was great on this hot day.

Several little bridges

A couple of sunny spots were welcome as well. It wasn't at all hot here as there was a breeze blowing.

In this clearing (which was kind of a marshy area) were loads of little yellow flowers. And we could just see the summit of the larger Mythen mountain.

Pretty cornflowers.

Another soft trail through marshy meadows.

A close-up view of the summit of the large Mythen mountain, where the upper and older rock glows red! And the single building at the top looks so out of place!

As it was now 10 a.m. and we were looking for a bench to sit and have a snack, we were pleasantly surprised to find this cute covered sitting spot in the woods, perfect to enjoy a few minutes of cool!

In fact we only found this by accident as we were walking down the road, because two other hikers emerged from the forest onto the main road and we wondered, "What in the world were they doing in the dense forest where there is no hiking trail?"

On a hot day like this one, we are glad for any forest trails which we can walk along!

More boards on the trail!

Ahead of us here we can see the peaks of the other part of the Mythen mountains. These are called the "Kleiner Mythen" (or "Smaller/Lesser" Mythen).

A field full of wool-grass, although already kind of collapsed, unfortunately. They look so pretty when they are all fluffed up.

Back down at the road now waiting for the bus at the Brunni Gasthaus. We got here with six minutes to spare before the bus came. That's a lot of extra time for us!

Here's the 11:12 bus (starts at the Brunni cable-car station one stop closer to the Grosser Mythen), right on time!

This is what our hike looks like on Google Satellite Maps. We started at about 8:45 the top of the Rothenflue cable-car line, and walked five kilometers via Müsliegg to the vehicle road in the Alptal Valley (11:15) .