On the "Chemin des Bisses" in the Val d'Anniviers

Monday Sept.7th -- Whereas the rest of Switzerland wasn't having great weather on Monday, in Canton Valais the run of good weather had already started, so we decided to head down that way for three days. The main plan was a 2-day round hike to the Moiry Glacier with an overnight in a hostel perched high next to the glacier.

But getting to the Moiry Lake at the end of the Val d'Anniviers is five hours travel for us, and after five hours in public transport I don't like to start a long hike. So we booked a hotel in Grimentz, a popular vacation town at the back of Val d'Anniviers and just 20 minutes by bus from the lake (so we would start our Moiry Lake Hike on Day 2), and for Day 1 we would start in the Rhône Valley at Vercorin, and walk INTO the Val d'Anniviers.

The fastest way to get to Vercorin is by cable car, and from there we followed a section of the "Chemin des Bisses" (a 100-km regional trail which follows several of the historical irrigation channels along the Rhône Valley) for about 12 km to the village of Mayoux, from where it was going to be a short 20-minute bus ride to our hotel in Grimentz, instead of the 70 minutes it requires for the full bus ride from Sierre. (As it turned out, they had started construction on the road that day, and we had to walk an additional 30 minutes to Vissoie to catch the bus that runs the detour to Grimentz).

In any case, a very interesting hike high above the valley, along the ancient irrigation channel called "Bisse des Sarrasins" (abandoned in the mid 1800's probably due to the loss of too many lives during its upkeep). Since 2004, the Association of the Bisse des Sarrasins has been working on the resurrection of this irrigation channel by restoring its original route based on the findings of various iron pegs and wooden structures used for the channel at the time of its estimated construction in the 14th Century. The source of the irrigation channel has been pinpointed to just below the village of Pinsec (a cute little village requiring a 200m climb to get to), and the 10-km channel brought precious water from the Anniviers Valley to the Briey Plateau on the side of the Rhône Valley just below Vercorin. 

Always some interesting things to discover!

At the summit station of the Vercorin cable car, a look down at the beautiful Rhône Valley, in the French part of Canton Valais

Before starting on our hike, a walk through the pretty village of Vercorin

Main square in Vercorin

Heading down to the start of our trail, toward the Val d'Anniviers

Our trail along the Bisse des Sarrasins first goes into the Crouja Ravine, then via Pinsec to Mayoux. (Definitely more like 4 hours to Mayoux). From there we would have had a 20-minute bus ride to our hotel in Grimentz, but they had started construction on the road, exactly on this day! So we had to walk an additional 30 minutes to Vissoie across the valley to catch the "detour" bus. 

4 hours to Mayoux, then another 30 minutes to Vissoie, where an extra bus takes the detour route to Grimentz. It was supposed to be a short hike! 13 km. Trail no.58 is the "Chemin des Bisses" and follows the various side valleys of the Rhone Valley.

Heading into the Crouja Ravine. Behind me is the road into the Val d'Anniviers. It is a long bus ride from Sierre to the back of this valley.

On the South side of the Crouja Ravine is the abandoned part of the irrigation channel which first had to be discovered before the trail could be restored.

We ran into a sign that offered an "Easy Way", but we of course chose the "Hard Way"

Along the "Easy Way", we would have missed this view across to the North side of the Ravine, where you can see how the Bisse des Sarrasins was originally hewn out of the vertical cliff to transport the water out of the Anniviers Valley.

Zoomed view of the irrigation channel across the ravine

Very close-up view of the planks that the residents of the valley had to walk, to keep the irrigation channels clean. This section of the "Bisse" is privately owned, and you can pay for a guided walk along the planks, with climbing gear to attach to the cables. 

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This photo, taken from the Internet from the website: https://notrehistoire.ch/entries/KgQYA5NxYwv, 
shows how once can walk along the planks on the opposite side of the ravine!

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On the other side of the Val d'Anniviers is the road that goes to the back of the valley.

As we exit the Crouja Ravine, a wonderful view to the back of the Val d'Anniviers. The fantastic peaks at the back (including Zinal Rothorn) are unfortunately covered by clouds on this day. 

Zoomed view of what we can see of the peaks at the very back of the Val d'Anniviers, near Zinal

The start of the fun part of the hike. For the next 3 km or so, the trail consisted of these beautiful bridges along the steep cliffs (lots of rocky debris on the planks from crumbling rock walls)

Walking along the interesting bridges which replace where the original irrigation channel would have passed through (it is estimated the channels followed this path, by remains of the original constructions that they have discovered along here).

Following where the original irrigation channel would have been built

Across the valley is a small hamlet perched on the steep mountain flank. It is called FANG, and you can get to it by descending to the river below (or from the main road above)

This sign is interesting. Besides the horrendous translation from French (especially to German), it warns that the trail becomes technical from here, and that "corpulent" people should take the detour..... especially because of Part 3: "Passage à quatre pattes" or "Way on all fours"

"Section 3" according to the map, "Way on all fours": Now we know why "corpulent" people were advised to take the detour! 

Wildlife of the day

From information placards along the way, we learned that this "damage" on the trees is caused by woodpeckers.

Way up high on the other side of the Val d'Anniviers is the relatively large town of Chandolin, one of the highest villages in Europe occupied year round.

Near this point, before a humid and exhausting ascent to the hamlet of Pinsec, is where they believe the water for the irrigation channel had its source, from the Pinsec stream which descends from the peaks along which we are walking. 

Glad to arrive in Pinsec. We had only a few minutes to admire the historical buildings, as we were hoping to catch the 16:20 bus in Mayoux, next town to the South (30 minutes)

Very pretty, hamlet of Pinsec. The irrigation channel (Bisse des Sarrasins) was built approx. 200m below the village.

View across the Val d'Anniviers from Pinsec

As we rushed down the trail toward Mayoux, this is a photo of Vissoie on the other side of the Valley. We had 20 minutes to cover the 30 minutes to the bus stop in Mayoux!

We just made it on to the bus in Mayoux, the one headed to Grimentz. But the bus driver told us the road was closed, and she wasn't going that far, we had to cross the river to Vissoie for the detour bus. There is no information in the bus schedules that this detour is taking place!!!!

After a 12-km walk from Vercorin to Mayoux, we had to cross the valley to Vissoie to catch the detour bus to Grimentz. An additional 25 minutes, but it gave us a chance to look around the village of Vissoie. 

Main square in Vissoie. Here is where we catch the bus (in and out of the Val d'Anniviers). As Urs waits below, I took a quick look around the main part of the town.

Lovely old wooden barns and houses decorated with colourful geraniums. 

More modern homes next to the 13th Century "Tour d'Anniviers" (Tower)

The bell tower of the church

Heading up valley with the detour bus in the direction of Zinal, before branching off to Grimentz, the Zinal Rothorn peak comes into view

Crossing at the back of the valley toward Grimentz. This view is to Ayer on the sunny side of the Valley. Where we are headed is all in shadow.

Climbing the winding road toward Grimentz (lots of shadow here in winter, it's not quite 6 p.m.!) and a view down the entire Val d'Anniviers. 

Conveniently located near our hotel is a great restaurant with very yummy pizza and salad.

Hiking in the Breccaschlund (Brecca Gorge) at Lake Schwarzsee, Fribourg

Saturday September 5 -- After 12 days of no hiking for me, we decided to start again with a less "strenuous" hike, only four hours instead of the six we had originally planned. That is, weekend weather in the Valais region was forecast to be marvelous and ideal for a 2-day hike, but all the mountain hostels we might have considered were fully booked out! So we decided on a day-hike in the Fribourg area of Switzerland (French/German), in the region of Lake Schwarzsee (Lac Noir, or "Black Lake") where we had been once several years ago, and it was time to visit it again.

Lake Schwarzsee is a popular hiking and camping destination for the people from Western Switzerland, so we knew there would be plenty of people there, especially on the popular Panorama Trail. But it was nowhere near as mad as it must have been in the Bernese Alps (or in Valais obviously) judging by the MASSES of people waiting on the platform in Bern for connections to those areas! Never have I seen so many people on the move, as if the entire country was taking advantage of the "final weekend of summer" (or so it seems).

Here at Lake Schwarzsee, most people do the shorter loop starting with a ride up to Riggisalp with the chair lift (saving 450m of ascent on foot) and returning to the car park, but we chose a longer loop which took us right to the back of the Brecca Gorge, and which included some very nice mountain trails at the base of some imposing crags, and most wonderfully, the sighting of a herd of maybe 30 chamois moving along the base of these cliffs.

Even though the geology of the gorge is mostly karst rock, some of the area has been cleared for pastures, and there are several farms up here all of which offer some kind of food or refreshments, or cheese for purchase, and most offer basic accommodation as well. We chose to have a late lunch at one of these mountain alpine farms, because we had read that they offered Rösti besides the more common cheese-and-sausage platters. 

The only negatives on this trip: Of the 3.5 hours it takes us to get to the lake, one full hour of this is on a bus, usually too full of chatty people. And the other negative: The first hour of our excursion was unfortunately without sun, as usual for us that all the hillsides far and wide have sunshine, and only where we are walking is where the clouds obscure the sunshine....

The excursion starts with a peaceful ride up to Riggisalp with the chair lift. It must often be windy up here, because looking down I counted five hats of a large variety littered in the pasture below!

Looking to the South end of Lake Schwarzsee, into the Brecca Gorge to the right of the craggy mountains (on the ascent with the chair lift)

Heading South first, then back on this side of the peak, and around again into the gorge

There were lots of people onthe trail this day, but they managed to spread out. 

A couple of the farms here. At the back on the left at the farmhouse is where the trail switches back to head North again along the other side of this valley

The first autumn crocuses, a sure sign that summer is soon over!

VIDEO:

The goats can give themselves massages!

Sunshine everywhere except where we are walking!

Pleasant trail to walk

It's always fun when there are stairs involved!

After rounding the massif, we head South again into the Brecca Gorge. At the base of the cliffs is where we saw the chamois

Finally, the clouds are moving away from the sun, and we get to see the lake with a bit of sun shining on it

This trail is part of several regional and national trails. But we are mostly following no.267, the "Breccaschlund Panorama Trail"

A nice look to the back of the gorge. Heading in we are walking below the cliffs on the left. Heading out will be along the road down the middle

Way down below us are a couple of the farms. It's the one on the left where we ate our late lunch

The trail in on the left, the road out below. And the tiny building in the middle, another farm with restaurant, we passed on the way out as well.

Way above on the patch of rocks and in the trees is where we caught sight of most of the chamois.

Zoomed view of a few of the many chamois making their way along the base of the cliffs

VIDEO:

A large herd of chamois moved across the base of the cliffs

(The video is very shaky because the camera is hand held at high zoom, and it is difficult to hold the camera completely still)

A look North out of the gorge

Zoomed view out of the gorge. Most of the way out was along the road below

A look to the back of the gorge. We still had quite a way to way up here to the left, before turning along the road that led down to that farm.

Some nice mountain trails into the back of the valley

Actually, up to this point we had already been on the trail for three hours, and there are still two more to go! But we also spent a lot of time watching the chamois, and took a detour off the trail to look for where they might have come from. 

So many rocks in this karst landscape

Beautiful cliff formations. At this point we are heading North again, with the crags to our right.

The alp-farm called Marbach-Brecca is where we had a late lunch

Rösti with ham prepared by the farmer

Our view as we enjoyed our lunch at the farm

Heading down the road to the lake, one more hour to go. This view is to the back of the gorge again.

Looking back at the craggy mountains where we walked just a bit below the cliffs on our way into the valley

We got down to the lake with about 30 minutes to spare before the bus came up this way. On the left side of the lake is the final bus stop, or alternately the first stop on the one-hour trip back to Fribourg. The chair lift is on the North side of the lake. So we were the first to get seats, and SO many people got on at the car park.

And this, this is called a camp ground.

A four-hour, 13-km walk from the Riggisalp chair lift into the Brecca Gorge and back down to the Lake.

Our trail as viewed on Google Earth