Conquering the mighty Matterhorn

7 min readSep 5, 2016

The movie Everest got me thinking about what it would take to actually conquer that mountain. I thought to myself, it couldn’t be that hard… until I found out that it costs around 60,000 EUR to reach the summit of Everest. That is the kind of money that I simply don’t have.

The next day, while drinking gin at FRANK Bar, complaining about my sad life to a friend, and not having enough cash to conquer that mountain, he said, “Dude, no worries, I got you. We’re planning something seriously exciting, but way cheaper — a trip to the Matterhorn.” I was immediately sold. “I’m in! Now… what is the Matterhorn?”

Fast-forward one year, when I land in the Zürich Airport, in Switzerland, and take the train towards the Matterhorn. I was seriously excited about it, and still had zero mountain-climbing experience, but how hard could it be?

T-3 days — Riffelhorn training day

At 6am, we met our badass instructor, Michael Lerjen. Our first meeting with him revealed what awaited us. Apparently, we were too slow eating our breakfast, we had seriously over-packed our bags, packed the wrong things, and had no climbing experience. To put it plainly, Michy was not impressed.

Our first training day was at the Riffelhorn, which provided excellent rock-climbing facilities with various levels of difficulty. It’s a good place to get some basics sorted out before ascending to higher mountains.

Some things were gradually starting to become clear. It was going to be an amazing adventure, featuring some of the most beautiful places in the world, but it would be physically hardcore. Michy reminded us many times during our training, and we understood what he meant… You need to suffer!

To get acclimatized, we stayed at Hotel Riffelhaus for the next 2 days. It is 2,500 meters above sea level, and offers a perfect view of the Matterhorn across the valley.

… where we found some Pokemons

… and it came with the perfect spa experience.

T-2 days — Breithorn half traverse 4022m

Michael said that the second day was endurance day, whatever that meant. However, we figured that it meant more suffering… and we were right.

We started with a 1.5-hour hike across a glacier, but it felt more like a race, with our heart rates nearly maxing out.

Breithorn was a beast and we got to see some beautiful views…

found some interesting vertical rocks …

and saw awesome snowy mountain tops …

T — 1 day —Hörnlihütte

The final day before tackling the Matterhorn was a rest day, but we did hike to the Hörnlihütte at the base of the Matterhorn, at an elevation of 3260m

However, Hörnlihütte was positioned 1km higher than we presently were. The “light” hike turned out to be a bit more serious than we previously thought.

We finally arrived and got to see the Matterhorn up close for the first time. That’s a big rock ! :)

We had our final dinner, did a gear check, and received a blessing from our guides before bed …

T day — Matterhorn summit 4478m

The big day had finally arrived. The alarm set for 4:13am, but by that time, nerves had already woken everyone up and we hurried downstairs to put some food in our bodies.

4:40: Everyone was rustling behind the starting door, but no one was allowed to open it before 4:50.

4:50: A massive struggle begins to get out the door. The order will establish a pretty firm arrangement for climbing, as the track is narrow and there are not many places to pass someone.

You want to be one of the first ones in line so you don’t need to wait behind slower climbers or get stuck in places that tend to create traffic jams.

Also, it was pitch black and we couldn’t see anything. The only things to show the way were the guide and a small headlamp.

Halfway up, following 1.5 hours of climbing in the darkness in a heavily vertical stretch, we finally saw the sunrise and got our first break, allowing our heart rate to fall below 140 for the first time.

It began getting steeper and more icy; the track was getting slick, so it was time to put on crampons (a metal plate with spikes fixed to a boot for walking on ice or rock climbing).

At the last part of the mountain, you need to climb with the help of a rope that is permanently fixed to the mountain. The incline was getting seriously vertical by that point.

Dead tired, but super happy we got to the top. Whoop!!

Also, we carried a flag with the “We are hiring” slogan. It was rather impossible to get a good picture in these windy conditions.

Then we realized that we were only halfway done. The hard part was just starting — getting down from that rock.

I still remember the thoughts in my head — I could see the small ledge where I was supposed to put my leg, and I was even able to place it there, but I didn’t trust my legs to carry all the weight and not drop me into oblivion.

It took me a total of 5 hours and 11 minutes to make it up and down. We were all tired, but also ecstatic. Most importantly, everyone made it back safely. That mountain deserves some serious respect points.

On our final look back towards the road we came by, I promise you, that mountain was getting bigger every minute.