Through most of September, I was out of Switzerland, and unable to get back t following Suvorov’s route. But with the coming of October, I was back in Switzerland and anxious to get back to following Suvorov’s route.
At the end of September 1799, Suvorov was in Altdorf. But the French had confiscated all the boats on the Urnersee, an arm of the lake that in English is called Lake Lucerne, but which the Swiss call the Vierwaldstättersee. Without the boats, Suvorov was unable to go on towards Zürich. But then even worse news reached him. The other Russian army, already at Zürich, had been defeated by a smaller French force. The reason for Suvorov to go to Zürich no longer applied. And he had few options. If he were to go back over the Gotthard pass, he would be marching over land already stripped bare by the march of his own and the French army. Marching around the lake towards Luzern would be impossible due to the terrain and the threat of meeting a larger French army. So, Suvorov decided on a bold move, to go over the mountains towards eastern Switzerland.
Suvorov marched out of Altdorf leading a tired and hungry army on 27th September 1799. I took that route as well, going first through the little village of Bürglen and then to Brügg. In Brügg, I was able to do something that Suvorov could not. Brügg is at 649m above sea level, and the route over the mountains is at over 2070m. Suvorov had to march his men all the way. I was able to take the cable car from Brügg to Ruoggig, at 1727m. The cable car divides the ascent into two parts, first from Brügg to Eierschwand, and then from there to Ruoggig. Perhaps that was cheating, but I have no regrets. From Ruoggig, I took the trail eastwards to Biel Chinzig. I am not sure if I should call Biel Chinzig a village. It is more of a ski resort than anything else.
Once past Biel Chinzig, the trail deteriorates into a very rough track. It was hard to believe that an entire army had once marched this route, but that is what they did. I could see the trace of where the track threaded its way across the mountainside towards the ridge and beyond.
It was not long before I was walking in snow. At first, there were only little patches of soft snow. Then the patches seemed to merge together into larger expanses of the stuff. As I went on, there were steep slopes of snow upwards on my left and slopes just as steep going downward on my right. Then I came to places where minor slides of material from above had thrown snow across the track, very minor avalanches. I crossed over the first one without much difficulty and kept going. The second one was more difficult. The snow had only partially frozen, and not yet packed hard, so that it was unstable in places. The third such place was even more difficult, but I struggled over it and onwards. I was at about 1900m, just 170m below the ridge. The fourth one looked even more dangerous. Any slip, and I would go falling down the slope on me right. I stepped onto the pile of snow, only to go through to a space about 70cm below.
There comes a point sometimes where one has to make a difficult decision. The route was definitely dangerous, and there might be worse on the northern side of the ridge. Reluctantly, I decided that I must turn back.
Suvorov did better than I did and managed to get his army across the ridge and onwards to Muotothal. He had to contend with rain and mist going over the ridge, but luckily, no snow. I went back to Biel Chinzig and onwards down to Brügg.
I hope that I will get another chance to get to Muotothal before the end of the year. I was left wondering might I have made it, or might I have had a serious accident if I had gone on. I will never know.
Walkingman 