Zermatt arrives. After more than 150 miles of stunning scenery, I would not necessarily demand a room with a view - but I will get one anyway, for this village is obsessed with perhaps the most spectacular Alpine symbol of all. I am now "in the shadow of the Matterhorn." It is the town’s essential point of orientation, a granite exclamation point, Zermatt’s logo.

No motor vehicles allowed here. After settling down, I go for a walk around the village, looking at the Matterhorn. Zermatt is alive and open for business especially Japanese tourists. The village (pop. 4,200) looks like a stage set, a make-believe town and very commercial with all the usual tourist shops, restaurants, postcard racks - and more Swiss army knives for sale that would be needed to equip the Swiss army.

July 8 In the morning, I headed off for a cable car ride to Furi (6,115 feet), where I catch another lift to Trockener Steg (9,642 feet). There, another cable car and finally up to the Klein Matterhorn (12,740 feet). The Klein Matterhorn car, which is one of the highest cable ascents in Europe, is filled with skiers, mountain climbers and tourist alike during summer. Through an echoing tunnel, I an atop the fable downhill run on one of the world's longest ski trails. It plummets 7,300 vertical feet and goes on ... and on ... for 12 miles! The Matterhorn itself is stark in the distance, majestic in its isolation. The view of the surrounding mountains was just beautiful as recommended. Bordering France and Italy, this is the highest group of mountains in western Europe, including 50 peaks over 13,000 ft high. (The trip to the Klein Matterhorn is less popular than that of Gornegrat but some say it offers more breathtaking view at the end.)

I returned to the village before lunchtime. I have completed this first half of the journey. I think I will come back to Zermatt one day to ski from one side of Switzerland towards Italy.

Departed Zermatt in the afternoon for the glacier village of Grindelwald via Brig, Spienz and Interlaken Ost, to the heart of the mountainous interior of the west-central Switzerland known as the Berner Oberland - the highlands of the canton of Bern.

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