I was up early on the first day of 2020 in order to catch the Gornergrat Bahn all the way to the top. I'd bought a one-way ticket, as I planned to train up and walk back. It didn't go entirely to plan but I'll get to that...

I was on the way to the station when I spotted the light on the Matterhorn, so I had to stop and take a photo, of course!

I hopped on the train and went up and up and up the mountain. The train, the Gornergrat Bahn, was the first electrified cog railway in the world. It went all the way up the Gornergrat mountain at 3,089 m above sea level, which had magnificent views over the Matterhorn and the surrounding mountains.

I was doing a walk from the station that looped around towards the Matterhorn then back to Riffelhaus. It was on trails that had been graded, were easy to walk on and quite visible thanks to the red poles. I had worried a little about being lost in the whiteness up there but it actually was quite easy. I was out early, but started encountering more people the further down the mountain I walked. It was so gorgeous though - never seen anything like it before. So much white, a lovely blue sky overhead, the crunching of the snow under my boots and the silence when I stopped walking.

I was hungry by the time I got to Riffelhaus so I stopped to get some food. This was a really busy place, with skiers coming in from all directions to get food. I went in and ordered a rösti with egg and bacon, and it was one of the most delicious things I've ever eaten, sitting outside in the snow and the sunshine.

I mentioned earlier that my train ticket plan didn't go entirely to plan. Well it turned out that I wouldn't be able to walk from Riffelhaus to Rotenboden, which was the next train station down the hill. So I had to buy another ticket, which ended up being quite expensive! But I got off there and continued my walk downhill.

This part of the track was both a little boring and much more treacherous than the first section. It mostly wended itself around trees, but occasionally crossed the ski slopes - crossing those was nerve-racking! But then there was a huge section of it that was downhill and seriously icy. I kept slipping so in the end, I put my old gloves on, crouched down, and pushed myself down the path on the scary parts, using my boots as a kind of toboggan.

This worked fine most of the times but at some points I met other people along the path and felt a little silly. I stood up and attempted to walk down, but next minute I had landed on my arse on the ice and ended up bruising my coccyx. From then on, I didn't care if I looked silly or not, I just wanted to make it to the bottom. It came out on a much more gritty path that went a lot more easily down to Zermatt.

I made it back to Zermatt, and had a bit of a wander around before it got too dark. It was New Years day so very busy in town, but I went to a cake shop and bought myself a lovely-looking tart for afternoon tea and went back to my accommodation to warm up and eat it. It had been quite a long day out in the snow!

I had another quiet night in Zermatt, packing up my bag again for another early train journey tomorrow, this time to the city of Chur.