Tag Archives: nausea

Aug25

Riding the Gondolas of Zermatt

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Tuesday, 23-July-2024


I’m tired, man. I’ve got a sunburn, I hiked just about a billion miles straight up yesterday, and I’ve still got to pack up for Germany. I’m going to let something else do the work of ascending the mountains of Zermatt today.

I’m going to take the Gondolas.



Zermatt has tons of gondolas. Like… most everywhere you look, there’s a gondola going up to a mountain peak. Or are they ski lifts? I frankly don’t know the difference, so I’m going with Gondolas for the time being, since they sound more interesting.

Zermatt is a mountain / ski town, so it makes a lot of sense, when you think about it, and I was excited to take full advantage of this fact. I’d booked a ticket the evening before, grabbed some breakfast, and set out to let human ingenuity carry me up to the heights surrounding Zermatt.

My first stop was Trockener Steg, up at 9,642ft elevation. It was surprisingly easy to get there, too… Google had told me I’d have to take a couple of different gondola rides up, but in the end it turns out that all those “separate” rides are actually just one continuous chain… Sure, my car switched cables, but it was all automated. I had the difficult job of sitting still, enjoying the views, and taking pictures out the windows:


At Trockener Steg, I disembarked and wandered a bit… quickly realizing just how high of an elevation I was at. I usually deal with elevation fairly well, but this time… Well, I’ll blame the quick ascent for my vertigo, but dear lord it kicked my butt. I’d planned on quickly continuing my ascent, but frankly I was simply unable to – I was woozy and disoriented, to a rather concerning extreme if I’m being honest.

I walked slowly and carefully, in light of the light oxygen count. I found a restaurant (with Schnitzel!), drank a ton of water, and took some time to let my brain get used to the decreased oxygen count. As an interesting note – a humans “SpO2 count” is a measure of blood oxygenation. At sea level this is usually 98% for people – this drops to 95% at 5,00ft (Zermatt), and further drops to 90% at 10,000ft.

Anyways, I never really regained full sanity, and so pushed onward to my highest destination – Matterhorn Glacier Paradise, at 12,840ft elevation.

I arrived on one of the last cars… unfortunately, my attempt to acclimatize to the elevation up at Trockener had taken a bit too long, and Glacier Paradise was closing up – I had just enough time to appreciate the views (and the lovely cold!) before being shepherded back to the final gondola descending back to Zermatt.



The descent was lovely, with slightly different views from the ascent to keep me company. I had fun, I enjoyed, and I appreciated the views… as the blood in my poor abused body and brain slowly re-saturated with oxygen, and my mind started working a little more effectively again. I watched a snow cat grade one of the still-open ski slops, I enjoyed a bit of early sunset on the peaks, and I thanked the town for one last adventure before I dove into packing up for the next day’s adventure…

Jun17

The train from Oslo to Stockholm

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Sunday, 26-May-2024


Ohh my lord, trains make me nauseous.

I was not aware of this fact, prior to the train departing from Oslo toward Stockholm. I’d taken an electric scooter to the central terminal, arrived a bit early, and relaxed while reading my book for a lovely and quiet hour… Not thinking that I’d be desperately staring at the horizon and willing my head to remain attached to my shoulders in a short hour or two.

I have Dramamine, of course, in preparation for some upcoming ferry rides… but I hadn’t expected to need it on this beautiful Sunday and so it was packed down somewhere in my luggage.


Stepping back.

I got to the train station about two hours ahead of time… a bit above the hour and a half that the information person had recommended to me the day before when I scouted out the route from my apartment to the station. I’d had some light breakfast; a cup of coffee and a pastry, if I recall, and was feeling good.

The train arrived, I boarded, and then we were off about 15min later. As the train left, I realized (belatedly) that my seat was facing backwards… not ideal, but I didn’t think too much of it for the first minute or so… after which, I quickly realized just how closely the rocking of the train resembled the rocking of a ship at sea.

My ears couldn’t tell the difference. I quickly moved to an open front-facing seat, but by that point the damage was done and there was no going back. I focused on the horizon out of the window, and set my mind to keeping breakfast where it was. Once it was sufficiently tamed, and my hunger was starting to pique, I made my way to the food car in search of ginger ale and food… I found pepsi and spaghetti, which… sort of worked? The pepsi was cold, at least, and holding it to my head and neck did some good for my sanity.

I survived, though the ride wasn’t nearly as enjoyable as I’d hoped and the amount of blog / photo work I got done was basically nonexistent, occurring in quick snips while the train was stopped at a station. I survived, though, and was able to take some pictures out the window as we rushed part the staggeringly beautiful Norwegian / Swedish countryside at nearly 200km/hr.