What is Jungfrau?
Jungfrau is one of the summits in Bernese Alps and it’s peak is 4158 meters.
But today we are not going to talk about this mountain as I have never climbed it :))
We will talk about Jungfrau – top of the Europe, as they call it on their official website – adventure platform at 3454 meters above sea level, and it’s really fascinating 🙂
It has a restaurant, highest in the world watches shop, chocolate shop, art installations, huuuuge ice rooms, amazing terraces to enjoy views of all year round glaciers and on the top of that – a observatory 🙂
So it’s really a must visit place in Switzerland.
How to get there?
Maybe the most easy way is just simply go to Grindelwald which is a beauty itself 🙂 It’s a small Alps town situated in the valley of enormous surrounding mountains.
You just have to go straight to the Grindelwald train station and buy a train ticket to Jungfrau. WARNING, the ticket price is quite big, both sides it is around 170 CHF for one person, but as far as I can see, it’s cheaper online: tickets to Jungfrau.
Still, if you can spend such amount of money, you won’t regret it 🙂
So first, you get into a nice and cute train which slowly takes you up the mountain, the views through the train windows are breath-taking 🙂 It’s really scenery!
In 30 minutes or so you will reach first destination called Kleine Scheidegg. You will already be at 2061 meters above sea level 🙂 Kleine Scheidegg has few restaurants, hotels, train station and as well many hiking routes to enjoy 🙂 We once climbed from Grindelwald to Kleine Scheidegg and it was really beautiful route up there 🙂 It’s quite steep, not very easy, but really worth the effort 🙂
So, in Kleine Scheidegg you will have to change the trains and continue your trip up to Jungfrau 🙂
Now the train goes even slower, because the terrain is getting harsher and at some time you go inside the mountain.
The tunnel in the mountain is pretty old, the construction began in late 19 century and was finished just in 1912 🙂 I wonder that the working environment had to be pretty hard.
You are going to stop two times in that tunnel, in the middle of the mountain to enjoy the views of icy valleys through open windows (if we can call those openings in the mountain a window :)).
When you get to the Jungfrau adventure platform you will see quite a lot of maps of the place, so you won’t be lost. I suggest to visit every place it has.
Simply follow the directions and you will get to art installations place, ice rooms, terraces to enjoy the view, you will go outside to see the glacier, after it all you will have a chance to buy some Swiss chocolate and candies 🙂
There’s a restaurant as well which is very very nice place to have a dinner. It offers stunning views through gigantic windows 🙂 I think it’s the best place in the world to try cheese fondue which is a national Swiss dish 🙂 The prices in the restaurant is almost at the same level as everywhere in Switzerland, so you won’t spend too much.
As we went outside we saw some people with climbing equipment walking around on the snow, so I assume it’s possible to climb there, but you should be pretty experienced as it’s ice all year round there 🙂 As well, if you climb up, you won’t get a free ride down, they check the train tickets going down as well:)
Conclusion
Maybe the only bad thing about this place is the price of the ticket up. Still, as I said, if you can spend that money, spend it there. It’s really one of the most stunning places in Switzerland, maybe in top 3 :))
Enjoy!
If you have any questions regarding Jungfrau, please let me know, I will do my best to help you 🙂
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