The sun disappeared fast behind the high peaks of Switzerland’s Alps. There was no time to waste, I had to find a quiet spot to pitch my tent, before the real dark would come.
If there was a moment when I clearly heard the sound of silence it was during a long distance bicycle trip from London to Sardinia.
After a month on the road I was ready to climb the Alps. I started on easy, mostly flat terrain passing through Belgium and The Netherlands, but soon enough I had to face hills and mountains in Germany. The Black Forest especially trained me well for the upcoming Switzerland.The first time I saw the high peaks of the Saint-Gotthard Massif was in Lucerne.
With over 3.000 metres (9842 ft) height above sea level, these mountains can be intimidating, especially when you look at them from Lake Lucerne, which is situated on an elevation of 434 m (1423,88 ft) above sea level, but I wasn’t scared. I was fascinated, ready for the climb, up for the challenge. I started imagining how it would be up there, surrounded by snow, wearing a t-shirt and shorts
Before the actual climb I had to cycle all around the lake, take a ferry and keep following the shore till Altdorf. This would have been the last big town for a while, and with that I mean the last Lidl, Aldi, Asda or whatever affordable shop I was relying on in the very expensive Switzerland. It’s worth saying that I didn’t stop at any of these shops. I was on a nice cycling flow and didn’t want to break it. I would regret this decision later, but back then I was confident enough I would find more shops later in the day. To justify this action I’ll take a moment to talk about carrying stuff on a bike: one thing is to climb on a ultralight road bike, another is to ride on a touring bike with camping gear, clothes, filming equipment, laptop, chains and bike spare parts. Considering the 18kg of my beloved bike plus all the mentioned stuff, you can easily understand why food has to be strategically carried after a big climb. And that was certainly a big climb: from Altdorf the road goes up forever with no intention to decrease the slope. It’s not a particularly steep climb, but it’s constant. As I was going up I could feel the peaks closing the space around me and the sky becoming just a little triangle above my head. Rocks became less gentle, not so round, snow was taking over the grass and silence was dictating pace. You could tell nature was the boss up there because there was not so much space left for human life.
Despite all this I felt good. I was conscious of my strengths and so in control of my actions, too.
I’m not talking about “control” as we usually associate it with our routine: wake up at 7am, drink coffee, take the car, go to work, have lunch. These things may give you an impression of control, because you are so used to make coffee or to know which route is best to drive to work that you feel in control, but you are not! You are just following a path you know too well.
The real control comes out from difficult situations, while preserving your integrity. It’s only when things go wrong, when the unexpected kicks in, that we are truly free to use all our strengths to overcome problems.
Let me tell you how I experienced this powerful feeling of control during my climbing.
I think it was about 7 pm, the day was almost over as the sun was long gone and the amount of light coming from the little shape of sky left by the mountains was leaving for the darkness.
I had no food with me. All markets I found on the way up were closed, as in Switzerland everything is closed on Sunday. I couldn’t use my phone either to check if anything was open on my route because there wasn’t signal up there.
After a long cycling day finding a good spot to pitch the tent and have a good meal becomes a ritual. Not being able to eat properly could have destroyed my mood, but it didn’t.
I felt perfectly in control of the situation. I had no food but I knew I could resist till the next day. Once I had this thought I felt no more hungry. I didn’t allow the food problem (issue?) to take over my thoughts, because there was no way to find food, I would have only wasted more energy in fighting reality.
While pitching my tent at 1200m, the silence around me was astonishing. I could hear the flowing water in the river, ice cracks on the peaks, wind moving the trees but nothing else. Not a human sound, nothing artificial.
The beauty wasn’t just around me but also inside. I could feel the power of the mountain in me and I had no more fear of not having what I thought it was needed.
E.g. I used to post a photo on my Instagram at the end of the day. I couldn’t at that time because I had no signal and a big sense of relief got me. I didn’t have to worry about that either and then I felt it.
I realised all those things I used to do weren’t truly important but, on the contrary, they were slowing me down, adding weight to my thoughts. But up there, in the mountains, it was easy to see what I needed and that certainly didn’t include posting on Instagram.
One thought was in my mind. Just one.
Sleeping. Get some energy back to be ready ”the next day). The only thing I had to do was to go over that mountain. All the rest was noise in my head, irrelevant thoughts.
