Snowshoe Hike Report – ‘Bühlberg Trail’ (SM SS-119)

Short Description

This very short snowshoe trail forms a loop through the forests and creeks above Bühlberg, away from the busier pistes. Bühlberg trail entices with views of the Simmenthal mountains in addition to the tranquil surroundings.

Notes

• Wildlife protection area. Stay on the signaled route.
• If arriving by car, there may be a one way traffic rule in place, giving you only a short window between **:45 and **:55 to start your ascent. Same for the way down (half an hour later).

Impressions

This route having been newly added to the Schweizmobil selection, and me having newly been added to the illustrious ranks of Schweizmobil’s “Fotopaten”, as well as having just picked up snowshoe hiking, I of course agreed to take pictures of it for the route’s online presence.

Due to how short Bühlberg Trail is, and how far we’d have to drive to get there, it seemed logical to combine it with another rather short trail in the Region: Kandersteg’s ‘Spittelmatte Trail’ (see hike report). Since Spittelmatte included a mandatory cable car ride and the last departure was set for 4PM, we did that one first.

So far, so good. Now for the lesson of the day: Never trust Google Maps navigation.

I’ve learned that lesson before, and yet I still didn’t check the route before setting off. Google tried to lead us over a mountain pass between Kandersteg and Lenk instead of along the horseshoe shaped main road connecting the villages. That mountain road was closed, of course, barring special permission. It also doesn’t look very drivable even in summer.

A fact that is known to both map.search.ch and the author of this text, the latter as he checked the route the evening before, which obviously didn’t stop him and his wife from having to turn around after Adelboden village, having seen themselves confronted with the restricted road sign, thus adding an hour to their trip and reminding them to always double check google’s routes and to rethink investing into a real navigation unit for their car again even if Becker unfortunately doesn’t exist anymore and both Garmin and Tomtom seem suboptimal and not worth the cost by comparison.

As such, the sun had already set on the trail once we arrived, instead of setting during the tour, as we had planned. Oh well.

While it didn’t bode well for the quality of the resulting pictures, owed in part to my kit lens, which is perfectly fine in well lit conditions but struggles in low light situations with its maximum aperture of 3.5 and a lack of a tripod, it made for some wonderfully romantic and lovely views in person.

(I’m not going to double the duration of my hikes to set up a tripod for every shot, and I wasn’t expecting the sun to have set already for this one.)

As previously mentioned, Bühlberg is a rather short trail, at an estimated 1.25 hours required – 45 minutes for people trying to get 100 representative photos in before the light fades completely.

Nevertheless, we enjoyed the seemingly secluded nature of the trail, the gorgeous views of the Bernese Alps in the evening light, and the solitary ambiance, which may of course differ significantly on a weekend afternoon.

Recommended as an after dinner walk for people who had another reason to be in Bühlberg.

Would you like to share your own experiences with this hike? Do you have any questions? Something to add? Feel free to leave a comment below 🙂

Route Report / Gallery

Full size images without watermarks are available for licensing to interested parties. Check romans.pictures for a selection of my favorites, or contact me for details.

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