Soaring

An alpine flying tour above Lake Geneva and the Swiss Alps

Woody wrote to me at the end of my preparations for the trip to tell me we would be taking a sightseeing flight with a private plane over Lake Geneva and into the Alps.

I had never flown on a small aircraft before. The night before, my body still on US time, I struggled to fall asleep.

Wades into the wild blue yonder – your correspondent, Malcolm, Woody

On Saturday morning, we drove to the airstrip and met Jean Charles, an experienced flight instructor for the Swiss military, who is my nephew Malcolm’s friend.

As we boarded the Cessna, JC’s utter ease and disarming demeanor immediately dissipated my nerves. This was going to be a great flight after all and not something to fear, just because maybe we’d bounce around.

Schilthorn – Piz Gloria as seen in Bond movie On Her Majesty’s Secret Service

We boarded, he taxied, and we lifted off over an azure Leman — Lake Geneva wide and bright below us — and headed for the mountains. Smooth weather blessed us with a mix of blue sky and partly cloudy cumulus over the Alps.

The other Wades put me in the front seat for the outbound leg, which turned out to be the right call. Up there, you’re not a passenger. You can see everything JC sees, hear everything he hears, watch his hands on the controls.

Somewhere over the Alps, he handed me the yoke. The plane responded immediately — lighter than I expected, almost conversational — and for a few moments I flew a Cessna over one of the most spectacular landscapes on earth.

Our route cut deep into the range: Dents du Midi with Mont Blanc visible to the southwest, then south to Verbier and the massive Grand Dixence dam before swinging north through Visp. We crossed the Aletsch glacier — longest in the Alps, a slow river of ice filling an entire valley — and turned toward the Bernese Oberland.

Up close and personal with The Eiger, and its iconic north face

The Eiger filled the windshield at one point, its north face dark and vertical even in sunshine. Then Mönch, Jungfrau the green slot of Lauterbrunnen far below, and finally the Schilthorn — Piz Gloria, the revolving restaurant where they filmed On Her Majesty’s Secret Service — before JC brought us down smooth at the airstrip in Saanen.

Landing at this state-of-art airstrip near Gstaad, next to old barns and pastures we walked five minutes into town for a quick beer and Wienerschnitzel, with attentive service and a cool venue at Landhaus.

Our landing in Saanen (near Gstaad).

The return flight followed the northern shore, the Lavaux vineyards terraced above Vevey and Montreux, Lausanne spread along the lake, before we touched down and had one more drink at the airstrip cafe.

A stunning day – the Alps had gone from a thing you admire from afar to something you moved through. One of coolest things I’ve ever experienced!