Hiking in the Jura

How to I even begin to describe today?...Fantastic, wonderful, breathtaking, or amazing just don't even come close to the beauty I got to see today.


We met in the CERN restaurant at 7:10am to catch the 7:26 bus to Thoiry, France. Of course, that meant I got to wake up bright and early at 6am, which was funny because some of my friends back in the US hadn't even gone to sleep yet. Most of the group was from the U of M REU program, but there were a couple that weren't, and there was yet one more person we were meeting up with once we arrived in Thoiry. Anyway, we had to catch this bus because the next bus wouldn't come for another hour. (Side note: The bus system in Europe is very strange. No one collects your bus pass when you get on the bus - in fact, you can buy it on the bus if you want. So really, you can get a free bus ride if you choose simply not to pay for a pass. The catch is that buses are randomly stopped by the Swiss or French police and anyone caught without a pass is fined upwards of $300. Although apparently you never get stopped...I'm not sure if I trust that.)


We spent 15-20 minutes on the bus from CERN to Thoiry, where we met up with the final member of our party. It was another 1km trek through winding mountain roads to get to the trail head. We began to climb, and at first it wasn't too bad. We passed by quaint French homes, and to our left was a farm field. We passed a French vineyard with rows upon rows of grape plants:

Soon enough, however, there were no more buildings to pass and we were officially hiking the mountain. And I was starting to die a little bit. We were climbing at what I estimated to be a 45 degree incline, which is most definitely not a trivial climb. Oh, sure, I'd be able to handle a couple hundred yards or so of such a steep climb, but this climb just went on and on. I finally realized in the midst of my huffing and puffing and focusing on anything other than the burning in my legs that we were climbing straight up the mountain. No zig-zag patterns that are all too familiar in the US and make the climb longer but much less grueling. Straight up. Which meant that it likely was going to be straight up for most of our 3-4 hour trek up the mountain. Do your legs hurt just thinking about it?

There were a couple people in our group who were very experienced climbers, and they made what I was struggling so hard with look like a walk in the park. We eventually split into three groups: the very experienced and physically fit, the pretty physically fit, and the somewhat physically fit (me). I like to think of myself as being healthy and in decent shape, but this climb was something entirely different than just going for a four mile run. I was literally focusing on putting one foot in front of the other. We finally reached a road and an observing point, where the view was an incredible painting of the valley containing Geneva:

I couldn't believe how high up we were already! We were already almost half the altitude we intended to end up at. We continued our 45 degree climb, with our next stopping point at about 400m higher than our current altitude. But by that point, the burning in my legs had been replaced by the beginnings of that numbing sensation you get when your muscles are hyped up on adrenaline. I had also found myself a walking stick, which lightened the work for my legs tremendously. I did not have any sense of time while we were climbing so I can't tell you how long it took us to reach our next stopping point. I could tell that the trees were getting thinner and shorter and that the air was getting thinner. That's about when we encountered this:

Yes, that is exactly what you think it is. A cow, staring at us from the middle of the path, at least 1000m above sea level. Little did I know that would not be the last we saw of the elusive mountain cow...


We stopped for a short while to have a snack and drink some water, but then we continued our climb. I'll fast forward to the more interesting parts...We finally got above the treeline and to a crossroads, and what did we see? Why, exactly what you would expect on top of a mountain! Herds of cows! Wait what?...I don't understand these Europeans. Anyway, this is the point we decided to summit three peaks today instead of two. There was another path that detoured but looped around again to where we wanted to go. It was only 10am (!!) by that point, so we decided to go for it. Turns out that added summit was a very difficult thing to get to. Well, I guess not really, until the very end, when I swear we were climbing a 60 degree hill. How obnoxious. I was grabbing on to a cable that conveniently ran up where we were going, which turned out to be an electric fence used for keeping the cows confined. Luckily I wasn't the one to get shocked though.


The view from the summit made that last torturous stretch more than worth it. On one side was the valley Geneva is in, and on the other side was a beautiful little valley. We decided this would be a perfect place for lunch so we popped a squat and ate some grub while we took in the view. Too soon, we were on the move again, but quickly had to backtrack when a sheer cliff blocked our path. We found a trail that went around the backside of the peak, so we were able to continue towards our next destination, Le Reculet. We went up and down a few times and saw a very distinct peak coming up and thought for sure that had to be our final destination, Crêt de la Neige. We continued along the ridge and finally made it to the summit of that peak. We were quite proud of ourselves for climbing the tallest mountain in the Jura. We relaxed and ate some more food, and I was enjoying the view before our descent when one of our party said, "Uh, hey guys...this isn't Crêt de la Neige...this is Le Reculet..." We weren't done hiking yet. Of course we had to go to the highest peak - that was the whole point of the trip. It was not a big deal, but we were laughing that we didn't realize we were on the complete wrong peak. On the plus side, the view was incredible!

And look, we even found CERN from the top!

We continued along the ridge for about 15 more minutes when the landscape began to change. Where Le Reculet had been all grass and low vegetation (and definitely no trees or boulders), Crêt de la Neige was covered in trees and rocky trails. There were even some trails of rocks that looked almost like rivers. And it was a very sudden change. I felt like we were in a different mountain range than Le Reculet. There was even a canyon! We continued on...then all of a sudden the summit was there. It was not nearly as impressive as Le Reculet, but apparently it's taller. We were officially 1720m above sea level (1270m above the surrounding valleys)! We hung out there for a little while, took some group pictures, left our marks (mine was throwing an extremely bruised banana into the trees). Then we started our descent.


I honestly don't know which was worse: the ascent or the descent. I would probably have to say the descent because at least the pain goes away after a while when you are ascending. Your legs just don't feel it anymore. But on the descent, after about 300m vertical altitude my knees started to hurt. And it only got worse and didn't go away for the entire remaining 1000m vertical altitude descent. Again, the Europeans must really hate zigzagging because everything was just straight down the mountain. (As I am writing this post, I am sitting with my legs stretched out in front of me, carefully not bending them too much because bending them is extremely painful...) As expected, it was much faster going down than going up, and we all did a cheer when we finally reached the trail head and were able to walk on solid, comparatively flat terrain. We caught the bus back to CERN, and arrived 20 minutes later.


But the activities weren't over yet. CERN has a music club and today was an expo at which all the CERN bands performed their music. One of the coordinators for my REU program is in a blues band that was performing, and we arrived back just in time to watch his band. These physicists are actually surprisingly talented! I scarfed down my dinner like it was the last meal of my life and then called it a day, heading up to my room for the rest of the night.


All in all, this was a fantastic day. I am so blessed for the opportunity to be able to do any of this, and I would do that hike again in a heartbeat. If you are ever near the Jura mountains, don't pass them by without climbing at least one of them. The view will take your breath away!