For the first time in 10 years, Seealpsee froze over completely smooth and we headed up for a few hours of skating. We have been having very unusual winter weather. There is hardly any snow int he mountains and we have been stuck in the fog for most of the past weeks. But there have also been some good side effects. Due to the fog and low temperatures, a light dusting of frost covers everything at least in the morning and sometimes the whole day. In the mountains, the low temperatures and no wind, has frozen the lakes. And they have frozen to black ice, which means the water is clear, or in deeper parts black, any bubbles trapped in the water are white, and it is perfectly smooth. Often natural lakes or bodies of water freeze with bumps and pieces of ice stuck in them which makes it difficult to skate on. But this lake was a dream to skate on.
We took the early train to Wasserauen and then hiked up the steep hill for an hour until we reached the lake. We were smart to get there early. Although there were people out on the ice, there was much more going on once we left 2.5 hours later.
We laced up our skates and after a few wobbly steps, started gliding across the lake. Seealpsee is nestled in between mountains and is a popular place to go in summer. Although the absence of snow was noticeable and made for a strange feeling (it is winter after all!) it was still beautiful. The sun came up across the mountains, but didn’t quite make it down to the lake.
We couldn’t get enough of the beauty and the pure luck we had of being able to skate around the lake while marveling at the smooth ice and the frozen bubbles. A singer/songwriter was out making a music video, and two young men brought out their Schwyzerörgeli and gave an impromptu concert.
After a couple of hours we decided it was time to head back home and leave the lake to all the others who were there. We turned around one last time to enjoy the view before heading back down into the valley.
It was the perfect winter outing and we hope to be able to skate on a few more lakes the winter.
