Visiting Top of Europe With No Visibility

We pretty much knew we were going to have bad visibility the day before we went thanks to the iPhone weather app, but we were locked into our ticket reservations so had to push forward.

There are multiple activities at Jungfraujoch, including an “ice palace,” Lindt chocolate exhibit, an Alpine history exhibit, the famous “Sphinx” observatory and the plateau, where you can view the mountain landscapes and get lunch.

Bry and I did all of these things and spent about 3.5 hours total on the “Top of Europe.” Here’s what we thought!

Reserving Your Ticket:

To begin your Jungfraujoch adventure, you need to go to this website: https://www.jungfrau.ch/de-ch/jungfraujoch-top-of-europe/jungfraujoch-ticket-kaufen/

Here you can choose what day, time, and method you want to go up—either the cable car or the traditional train, or a combo of both. We picked taking the train up and the cable car down. We took the very first one from Interlaken Ost, 7:05AM, to beat the crowds (if there were any).

This train ride is not cheap. The normal price is 213CHF round trip, which is about 2 hours each way. Bry had the half tax for his trip, so his only cost 107CHF. With the GA mine still cost 95CHF. You can also opt for a seat reservation for 10CHF second class and 13.60CHF first class.

The price difference was so small given how much everything else cost that we opted for the first class.

Train Ride Up:

While visibility wasn’t very good for the two hour train ride up, there were some moments where the blustery snow looked very romantic in the mountains, especially when we switched trains along the way.

The Sphinx:

The Sphinx looks extremely cool, like some kind of James Bond-villain arctic outpost, and it provides great viewing opportunities both indoors and outdoors. Or at least it would if it weren’t snowing so heavily.

Nevertheless we spent a lot of time on the outdoor platform waiting for the brief moments when the snow would clear and reveal parts of the mountain, which it did occasionally.

In between we hung out with the local birds and tried to feed them berries and get them to sit on our hands.

Overall we made the most of it and I enjoyed this unusual experience. The good news is very few people were there with us so we had what little view we could salvage to ourselves.

Alpine Sensation:

This is like a 5 minute long walk through a tunnel to the plateau that gives a short overview of the history of alpine exploration in Switzerland. It was sort of interesting but I didn't get any pictures of it.

The Ice Palace:

I am probably spoiled because I’ve seen the famous ice sculpture exhibits ICE! in the United States multiple times, which are mind-blowingly good.

I was less impressed with the Jungfraujoch Ice Palace, which consisted of ice tunnels and a few sculptures that looked a little sickly and low-energy. The idea is good but I would have liked to have seen some fresher sculptures.

Nevertheless, I was glad for something extra to do since there wasn’t much to look at outside because of the snow situation.

The Plateau:

The plateau was a highlight for us as it provided some okay-ish views of both the mountains and the Sphinx.

Visibility was again not ideal, but better than it was at the Sphinx and we got some okay pictures all things considered. It also wasn’t very crowded, which is always nice.

Lindt Chocolate Exhibit:

There’s a very small room discussing the history and manufacturing process of Lindt chocolate, which you can see in about five minutes or less. There’s also a shop with all sorts of Lindt products, and Bry picked up a couple bars of their more unusual flavors.

Lunch:

There are two places to eat at Jungfraujoch, a cafeteria-like area and a proper restaurant, Crystal. We went to Crystal right when it opened at 11:30 and we were the only ones there the whole time we ate.

I had the pork with mashed potatoes for 34.50 CHF. It was okay, but you can't really can’t expect the extraordinary in such a remote location. The entrees also came with little salmon sandwiches for starters which were nice, especially because we were both really hungry at this point.

The main benefit of the restaurant was access to large windows from which we could occasionally see the mountains peak out from the snow storm. This was the best view we saw all day, so I think this is a good option if you're otherwise having a bad visibility day on the Top of Europe.

On the Way Down:

Because we took the train up, we opted to take the cable car down, which takes about 1.5 hours and offers different views of the mountain.

There is a short train ride to the cable car, however, and we were given free souvenir chocolate by the train conductor. If you're in Switzerland long enough anything that's "free" will excite you, so we were thrilled.

The cable car ride was spectacular and it was so awesome to see the mountains, the people skiing, and the magical little town of Grindelwald on the way down. It was still snowing but there was a lot to enjoy, especially the closer we got to the ground.

From Grindelwald we took the train to Interlake Ost again, and then back to Zurich.

Conclusion:

I’m not gonna lie, spending so much money and time on an excursion to a mountain top without much visibility was a disappointment. However, if you have a limited time in Switzerland and need to check the Top of Europe off your bucket list, you can still have fun, take some good pictures, and make some nice memories if you end up there on a snowy day.

I personally will definitely be back to the Top of Europe to see its famous view points, but I’ll probably go in the summer or fall when the chance of snow is a lot lower.