“Due to a combination of altitude and nerves, climbers often have trouble sleeping…”

“During a normal summer from 3500 to 5000 will attempt to reach the summit. Of that number less than a third will succeed.”

“…in the past forty years the Zermatt Mountain guides have not lost a single client.”

“Until Ricard agreed to guide me, I had regarded the Matterhorn simply as a mountain. ”

“It is obvious he regards unguided climbers something beneath suicidal.”

“It is difficult to exaggerate the Matterhorn’s scale.”

“To the east is the Monte Rosa, south is the Weisshorn and west is the Grand Combin.”

“Ricard and I lingered on the summit long enough for pictures and a quick lunch then turned and started down.”

“The lower ropes were even more chaotic, a situation that would grow worse by early afternoon.”

“We started from Zermatt on the 15th of JuIy, 1865 at half past five on a brilliant and perfectly cloudless morning. We were eight in number-Croz, old Peter and his two sons, Lord F. Douglas, Hadow, Hudson and I.”
Thus begins Edward Whymper’s account of his eighth attempt to climb the Matterhorn. During seven previous attempts the twenty-five year old London engraver had approached the 14,690 foot summit from the south. Departing from Breuil, Italy he had repeatedly tested the sheer cliffs above the CoI de Lion. Each time, however, combinations of bad weather and the extreme technical difficulty of the southwest ridge had beaten him back.

As late as 1865, many Zermatt locals were convinced the Matterhorn was the World’s highest mountain. Legends claimed that jinns and effreets–supernatural beings in human form, haunted its high ramparts. They were convinced a ruined city guarded the Matterhorn’s summit and when Whymper laughed at their fears, he was admonished to look carefully at the mountain’s sheer cliffs from where guardian demons would soon hurl rocks down upon him.

In 1865 what is now called the “Golden Age of Mountaineering,” was drawing to a close. Most of Europe’s major peaks had been scaled and the world’s finest climbers were competing to be the first to summit the Matterhorn. On that clear July morning, Whymper was determined to beat John-Antoine CareIl, an Italian guide who, for reasons of national pride, insisted upon assaulting the summit from the south ridge. Carell was a superb climber and Whymper knew he was mounting an attempt from Breuil. If Whymper did not succeed that day, chances were excellent that Carell would claim the summit.

Relying on information from Old Peter Taugwalder, a Zermatt guide of some repute, Whymper planned to climb the untested Hornli Ridge. His climbing partner was eighteen year old Lord Francis Douglas, the brother of the Marquis of Queensbury and an experienced alpinist. During the previous day these two had met the Reverend Charles Hudson who, at thirty-seven was considered by many to be the best amateur climber of his time and Hudson’s friend, nineteen year old Douglas Hadow who, though he had climbed Mont Blanc, was also still relatively inexperienced. Since both parties would be attempting the same ridge, they agreed to join forces. To this group was added Michel Croz, a Chamonix guide whom Whymper had employed on earlier attempts and Old Peter Taugwalder and his two sons.

Departing from Alexandre Seiler’s Monte Rosa Hotel before dawn, the group made excellent time up the narrow path from Zermatt. In his book “Scrambles Among the Alps” Whymper records that, “At half past eleven we arrived at the base of the actual peak then quitted the ridge and clambered round some ledges, onto the eastern face.” There at eleven thousand feet, they pitched camp.

Today, more than century and a half later, climbers overnight in the Hotel Belvedere or the Hornli Hut both of which sit immediately beneath the start of the classic Hornli Ridge route. Due to a combination of altitude and nerves, climbers often have trouble sleeping and at three a.m. I find myself staring out the window at the star filled southern skies.

In the century and a quarter since Whymper’s party started up the Hornli Ridge, the Matterhorn has gained a reputation as something of a walkup, an exhilarating hike to 4500 meters. It is Switzerland’s most famous landmark. As recognizable as our own Statue of liberty, in this immaculate country of seven and half million, its profile dominates ads for watches, cars, butter, jam, chocolate and cheese. In 1959 Watt Disney built a 1/100 scale model of the Matterhorn in the middle of an Anaheim orange grove and since, roughly a million people per year have ridden the bob sled which careens through its stucco interior. Over the years the Matterhorn has been reduced to a visual cliche and this familiarity has bred a certain contempt. During a normal summer from 3500 to 5000 will attempt to reach the summit. Of that number less than a third will succeed.

Some will lack conditioning, others experience. The majority, however, are defeated by the weather. Rising to 14,690 feet the Matterhorn breeds storms. Flowing up the Italian face, warm Mediterranean air cools and precipitates into clouds. In fifteen minutes the Matterhorn can change from stark silhouette to impenetrable fog bank. Worse, this has been the wettest summer in a century, a climber’s nightmare marked by fast moving southern storms bearing fog, rain and on the east and north faces, heavy snow.

I arrive on the 17th of August, and Zermatt is crowded with climbers waiting for conditions to improve. Eddie Petrig, one of Zermatt’s most experienced guides told me, “if the Matterhorn is black then you can climb. If it is white, well, then you are out of luck!” Studylng the mountain from my room in the Belvedere, the Matterhorn rises like an immense black silhouette defined only by an absence of stars.

A century ago the Matterhorn tempted the inexperienced Hadow and in the time since, has matured into a rite of passage, a symbol of rare adventure and vigorous youth. Little wonder the thought of climbing can be so incredibly seductive. By four a.m. the Belvedere’s large dining noon is already filled with climbers checking equipment and filling water bottles with tea. I see Simon and Jim Keeling, English brothers in their late twenties who though totally lacking experience confess that the Matterhorn was a singular and worthwhile goaI. The same holds true for many of the Italians, Yugoslavs, Germans, Japanese and New Zealanders who are sleeping in the hut. Over the past century, the Matterhorn has been scaled down, made accessible to everyman and today they attempt it by the thousands, simply to say they’ve tried.

“Have you eaten?” Ricard Lehrer my guide appeares at my side and when I say I have, we step outside and start along the worn path to the rock face.Turning on his headlamp, he whispers, “It is important to start early! Otherwise we will follow the amateurs.” It is a term he uses for those who attempt the mountain without a guide.

A legend claims that a Zermatt guide once led a Simmental Cow up the Matterhorn. Along with the cow, a monkey, a bear and a man in a wheelchair are also reputed to have reached the summit. Zermatt’s Catholic graveyard, however, offers a sober testimonial to past climbers who underestimated thls mountain. Balancing Zermatt’s heroic alpine image, is an equally strong sense of tragedy. You find it on graveyard stones that contain depressingly close birth and death dates followed by the simple notation “AM MATTERHORN.”

You also find it in the Alpine Museum with its photographic and written records of past triumphs, tragic falls and desperate rescue attempts. And you find it in the stories of the guides themselves.

I had met Ricard three days earlier in front of the Seiler’s Monte Rosa. Before the Zermatt Mountain Guide Association will lead a client up the Matterhorn, they insist upon two training climbs. It is a litmus test of sorts, a chance to judge how well a client handles hlgh altitude rock and ice faces. A day devoted to climbing Zermatt’s Rifflehorn is also remarkably accurate for in the past forty years the Zermatt Mountain guides have not lost a single client.

Ricard does not look like a mountain guide. Dressed in worn ski pants, an oId sweater and a brimless beach hat, at 47, six foot four inches tall and 210 pounds, he was older, taller and heavier than I expected. Judging by his age and size, I suspect any climb will proceed at a slow measured pace. I am wrong. That morning Ricard led me to the Rifflehorn’s thousand foot block that rises below the Gornergrat railway station. High above us I can see the tiny red, blue and yellow figures of climbers who have started earlier.

Tying a rope around my waist he simply said, “Watch where I put my hands and feet and do not climb until I tell you!” With that he started up the vertical face. Size aside, Ricard moved wlth a fluid grace and he quickly climbed thirty feet then stopped and signaled me with a sharp tug on the rope.

When I reached him he repeated the process, each time keeping a slight tension on the rope in case I slipped.    In the forty minutes it took to reach the summit, we passed the other teams and were sharing chocolate and tea when they appeared over the edge. Studying the distant Matterhorn which was constantly spawning and shedding clouds, I was excited and self confident.

When we finally reached the base, Ricard said, “now you walk back to Zermatt!” Ricard’s walk proved to be a six mile, 5000 foot thigh straining descent back to the Monte Rosa Hotel. I had trained for the Matterhorn by riding my bicycle 150 miles a week and twice a week climbed 3000 vertical feet in less than an hour. The following morning Ricard, his son Ricard III and I climbed Mt. Castor and Mt. Pollux, two 4000 meter ice and rock peaks that called for crampons and ice axes. I discovered that moving as a team was exhilarating but in the middle of a forty percent ice waIl, wondered if this was just a training climb, how could the Matterhorn be considered a walk up?

The two days, satisfy Ricard and back in Zermatt he tells me, “you tomorrow and tomorrow night I meet you at the hotel Belvedere. If the weather holds, we climb the next morning.”

My original plan was to duplicate Whymper’s eighth attempt. I wanted to stay in the Monte Rosa Hotel, if possible I wanted to hire one of Peter Taugwalder’s descendants, I wanted to climb out of Zermatt and I wanted to bivouac on the east face.

Amade’ Perrig, head of the Zermatt Tourist Office and himself an accomplished climber, tempered my ambition by reminding me, “Times have changed. In Whymper’s day climbers did what they had to. Whymper could walk sixty miles in one day over two mountain passes! And he was not even the strongest in his party! You will see, the upper faces alone are difficult enough. Take my advice, ride the Schwarzee Tram and stay in the Hotel Belvedere.”

Until Ricard agreed to guide me, I had regarded the Matterhorn simply as a mountain. True, with its changing light, perfect silhouette and history, an unusually compelling mountain, yet still a schist and ice spike with a relatively easy north east ridge leading to a wide summit. Once committed, however, the Matterhorn seemed to brood above me. Studying it from Zermatt’s choked Bahnhofstrasse, I recalled tragic failures on the east and north faces. Worse, the week before, a party of ten Poles attempted to down climb the upper section during deteriorating weather and were lost. Calling it the worst climbing accident in two decades European newspapers questioned the wisdom of allowing amateurs to attempt the Matterhorn without guides.

In the early morning dark, Ricard leads me past two bronze plaques recording the death of two young Americans. Ignoring them he glanced instead at the growing number of headlamps behind us. He tells me, “Only guides start this early, the amateurs must wait until it is light enough to find the way.” It is obvious he regards unguided climbers something beneath suicidal. It is not that amateurs are not good climbers for many are, but even the best have trouble finding the route in the Matterhorn’s maze of towers, chimney’s and false leads. The tendency is to drift off the Hornli Ridge onto the East Face whlch is vulnerable to rock fall and blind leads. Forced to retreat they waste time and soon encounter problems with melting snow and the crowded upper sections.

After a night’s bivouac on the east face, Whymper’s party also started before dawn. In “Scrambles” Whymper recorded that from his tent, “The East Face rose for 5000 feet like a huge natural staircase. Some parts were more and others were less easy: but we were not once brought to a halt by any serious impediment for when an obstruction was met in front it could always be turned to the right or to the left.”

Conditions have changed little since that July morning and using the headlamps to locate hand and footholds we made good time. It is difficult to exaggerate the Matterhorn’s scale. Distance reduces the mountain to a manageable perspective, but once on the Hornli Ridge, climbers shrink to colored dots on the brown rock. What appear in Zermatt to be stair steps become major cliff faces, a sliver of snow turns into a vast field and a smooth transition is a tremendous talus field. The familiar logo used on chocolate, butter and jam is in fact, an immense mountain, intimidating and unforgiving.

Alpen glow was just touching the Moseleyplatte as we started up its steep lower sections. Named after the first American killed on the Matterhorn, the Moseleyplatte leads to the Solway Hut, a precarious fifteen by fifteen foot refuge built at 13,210 feet by the Zermatt Guides as shelter against fast moving storms. We paused only long enough for a drink of tea then continued upward through a series of rock spires and knife edge ridges where a slip would mean a thousand foot fall down the North Wall. Half an hour later the rising sun finds us lacing on crampons beneath the Shoulder Snowfield. Guides have anchored thick nylon ropes to the Shoulder itself and once across the snowfield, we start up its slick, crampon scarred face.

Othnar Kronig, a past president of the Zermatt Guides believes that without the ropes, 85% of the climbers who attempt the Matterhorn would not reach the summit. Halfway up the Shoulder his estimate seems conservative for the sheer face is devoid of secure holds. When I trust my weight to the rope Ricard cautions me to keep one hand on the rock. Thinking about how difficult the descent will be I must slow down for Ricard tugs on the rope. I search for a handhold and fail to find one. He tugs again.

“Ein moment,” I caIl up to him and receive an answering tug.

Hadow too had problems in this section. Whymper recorded that he was unaccustomed to this kind of work and required continual assistance. “It is only fair to say the difficulty which he found at this part arose simply and entirely from want of experience.”

Forgetting the rock and ignoring Ricard’s advice, I climb hand over hand up the rope and a moment later am standing next to him on the roof. From here to the summit is a short hike up a gentle snowfield and ten minutes later we are standing on top. It is a rare and beautiful mornlng and for a number of minutes we have the summit to ourselves. I am filled with a sense of accomplishment, joy and wonder. Around us the Pennine Alps dominate the horjzon. To the east is the Monte Rosa, south is the Weisshorn and west is the Grand Combin. I understand what Whymper must have felt when he sprinted up the last pitch.

“What if we should be beaten at the last moment?” he asked himself as he climbed above the Shoulder then hurriedly continued, “The slope eased off, at length we could be detached and Croz and I dashing away ran a neck and neck race which ended in a dead heat. At 1.40 p.m. the world was at our feet and the Matterhorn was conquered. Hurrah! Not a footstep coud be seen!”

A short time later he sighted Carell far below on the Italian Ridge.

“Croz,” he told hls guide, “they must hear us, they shall hear us!” and using his climbing stick to pry away a boulder sent a torrent of stones pouring down the cliff which forced the Italians to turn and flee.

Whymper’s party lingered for an hour upon the summit. Later he would recall, “The day was one of those superlatively calm and clear ones which usually precede bad weather. Mountains fifty-nay a hundred-miles off looked sharp and near. All their details-ridge and crag, snow and glacier stood out with faultless definition.” They planted a flag made from Croz’s shirt, which was immediately seen in both Zermatt and Breuil then started down. They were still above the Shoulder when Hadow suddenly slipped and tumbled into Croz knocking him off hls feet. An instant later the two dragged Hudson and Lord Douglas off their feet. Whymper and the elder Taugwalder braced for the shock and when it came they held but the manila rope broke and Whymper records that, “we saw our unfortunate companions sliding downward on their backs and spreading out their hands, endeavouring to save themselves. They passed from our sight uninjured, disappeared one by one and fell from precipice to precipice to the Matterhorn Glacier below…”

Thus Whymper’s moment of triumph ended in a tragedy that ultimately drove him from the mountains. A week later a rescue effort retrieved the bodies of Croz, Hudson and Hadow. The remains of Lord Douglas were never found. During the inquest that followed it was learned that the elder Taugwalder had used a weakened spare rope to secure the first group to the second. Though Whymper bitterly questioned his judgment, the board of inquiry eventually absolved him of blame.

Ricard and I lingered on the summit long enough for pictures and a quick lunch then turned and started down. By then the Shoulder’s ropes were choked with climbers and we were forced to thread our way between guides and clients.

The lower ropes were even more chaotic, a situation that would grow worse by early afternoon. Below the Solway Hut on the Moseleyplatte we passed teams of climbers connected by bright ropes strung from anchor to anchor. Ricard suggested we down climb a more difficult pitch and I accepted gladly for after the summit my confidence was boundless.

Shortly before noon, a little less than seven hours since we left the Hotel Belvedere, we crossed the final pitch beneath the bronze plaques. Ricard was pleased with our pace and joked about a cold victory toast back in Zermatt. During the climb I had discovered my boots became treacherously slick when wet and thus I do not know why I stepped in the spring that crossed the rock path. I was tired, and elated, and overconfident and, in Iess time than it takes to read this, I suddenly slipped, bounced and was sliding off a hundred foot cliff when Ricard instinctively threw his weight into the rope and stopped me. For an instant I gaped at the scree covered ice below, then slowly crawled back to safety.

Accepting Ricard’s hand up, I was both embarrassed and grateful. How do you thank a man for saving your life? I struggled to find the words but Ricard shrugged off my efforts. “After how well we climbed I was not ready for a fall this close to the end. You owe your life to the Madonna!” he said nodding to a large bronze statue that stood in a shadowed grotto above us.

How do you thank a man for saving your life? Though I doubled Ricard’s tip it was not nearly enough and in hindsight I might have paid closer attention to Whymper’s final paragraph.

“Climb if you will,” he wrote. “But remember that courage and strength are nought without prudence, and that momentary negligence may destroy the happiness of a lifetime. Do nothing in haste; look well to each step; and from the beginning think what may be the end'”

Guides

In operation for over a century Zermatt Mountain Guides offer tours of most of the major peaks in the Zermatt area. Unless they are familiar with a client’s abilities the guides will require one or more training climbs before attempting any major peaks. The guides supply all technical equipment leaving the client responsible for proper boots, crampons, clothes and all expenses in the huts. The cost for a day climb is roughly 1200 Swiss Francs,with a 20% tip if successful.

For more information contact:

Zermatt Alpin Center
P.O. Box 403
CH – 3920 Zermatt
Phone +41 (0)27 966 24 60
Fax +41(0)27 966 24 69
E-Mail: alpincenter@zermatt.ch

General Information

Similar to our own Chamber of Commerce the Zermatt Tourist Office contains a wealth of information about local hotels, trains, sports and up coming events. Run by a multilingual staff they make reservations, dispense brochures and suggest daily activities. For information contact:

Tourist Office of Zermatt
3920 Zermatt
Switzerland
Phone +41 27 966 81 00
Fax +41 27 966 81 01
info@zermatt.ch

or

Switzerland Tourism
608 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10020
Phone 212-757-5944
Fax 212-262-6116
www.MySwitzerland.com