If you take a funicular straight up the mountain at the side tip of Interlaken, you will arrive at Harder Kulm. A gorgeous view of the Eiger, the Mönch, and the Jungfrau, and a bonus view of the lakes. It is truly spectacular.
Maybe you've seen the one iconic photo of Harder Kulm. It is a triangular-point of a viewing deck that stretches daringly over the mountain top.
It becomes my cousins last minute choice to visit. Without the pre-information and planning we usually have, it turns into a rush.
I pull the van in front of the ticket office and the funicular ride up the mountainside. Two cousins, jump out of the van to investigate tickets and the feasibility of taking Mom in a wheelchair.
They return having bought the tickets and the next funicular leaves in twenty-minutes at 12:10.
"Can Aunt Janice walk up the 38 stairs to the funicular?"
Mom determines that she will indeed walk, one step at a time.
As everyone unloads the van, Mom has already started. She will be fine.
"Is there a place to park?" I ask.
"The man at the ticket office said you could park at the train station, and if you're lucky, you might find an open spot on the street."
I find neither. The train parking lot is full and it is a weekend afternoon in Interlaken.
It is almost noon. I send a text. I will not make the 12:10 train. But I will enjoy the short walk to the top.
I receive a return text: the climb is two hours.
Okay, I will try to make the 12:40 funicular.
I google for parking in Interlaken. A mile away, I find a lot and the kiosk where I can pay. But it is indecipherable to this English speaker.
Fortunately, humanity is kind.
"Do you speak English?"
"Of course!" The young Swiss couple answer. They explain that I can only use coins because the app and the QR code are only for Swiss people.
I only have a paper ten franc, but they have change. I buy a two hour ticket, lock the car door and begin my one mile hustle to catch the funicular.
A text. Can you bring the wheelchair?
Can I?
Yes I will bring wheelchair.
Now, I will not only be running to reach Harder Kulm, I will be pushing an empty wheel chair on the busy sidewalks of Interlaken.
And then I reach the stairs. If Mom did it with a cane, I can do it with an empty wheelchair. Thirty-eight stone stairs, one at a time.
At the top, I fold up the wheelchair and hand it over to the funicular workers who will put it on the train. But the train is so crowded, they make me sit in the wheelchair. I hadn't put on the brakes and soon found myself rolling into the lap of the woman sitting across--for which we had a good laugh.
And the view from Harder Kulm?
Spectacular--and almost as fun as getting there.
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