At the end of the hiking season it went with perfect conditions on a small tour in the Alpstein. From Brülisau through the Tame Goch to the Alp Sigel.
The tour on the Alp Sigel had been on the scene for some time. Since the variant over Brülisau is rather short, we had already enough time for the journey. We were therefore at 10:40 clock in Brülisau and got hold of a parking space. There were some other people came up with the idea to take advantage of the great weather. At the Lake Constance it was still foggy and closed, only from St. Gallen disappeared the clouds and the sun was shining.
From the car park in Brülisau we started over the Rossweid in the direction of Bärstein. The beginning was still in the sun, which disappeared towards the end of the Rossweid behind the Alp Sigel and we ran in the shadow to the Bärstein. From there, after a short break, the remaining 30 minutes went steeply up to the beginning of the Zahmen Gocht. However, this is very short and so we were already after almost a quarter of an hour on the Alp Sigel in the sun.
At first we enjoyed the warmth of the sunshine for the first time, before we made a short detour to P1738 to the view in direction säntis made. Due to the great weather we had a nice view of the powdered sugar covered Alps. Here on the Alp Sigel, however, were only a few isolated snow fields from last week. Only on the descent to Plattenbödli we had to cross a short distance through some snow. The way back to Brülisau was otherwise very easy and we reached Brülisau in the estimated 1.5 hours from the Zahmen Gocht.
The unexpectedly cloudless sky gave us a great tour, with beautiful views of the Alps. The Tame Gocht is indeed tame, the 'heavy' T3 section is short and super secured with kicks and irons. That was a nice short final tour for 2014, now may winter come.
Literature:
- Appenzellerland: The most beautiful valley and mountain hikes
- Club leader Säntis-Churfürsten: From Appenzell to the Walensee
- 3301T Säntis hiking map: Toggenburg - Churfirsten - Alpstein
- Swisstopo 1: 25 000 Säntis: Alpstein - Seealpsee - Hoher Kasten
