Falling for autumn in Switzerland - Kingdom of Golden Larches

My Swissies and Switzerland lovers, today I will take you to the kingdom of golden larches. In October, when it gets colder, thousands of larches turn into golden guardians. This spectacle is unique, and to see it, we have to travel a long way. The journey begins colorfully, as if nature wanted to prepare us for the spectacle. We have a five-hour drive ahead of us. The starting point is our home village Brienz, in the Bernese Oberland. The day begins mystically, and the ordinary fog fields let us pass by in a friendly manner. Whenever road conditions allow, we travel from Brienz to the Ingwerdin over the alpine passes. The first pass is the Susenpass, we reach it via the Grottmental. Most of the alpine passes will close around the end of October, and the beginning of November. That's why we're enjoying this opportunity while we still can. As is so often the case this autumn, the weather is changeable. Usually we have stable high-pressure weather in autumn, but this year everything is different. That's why planning is a bit more difficult than usual. On the Susenpass we take a little pee break for Rasta, and then it's off to the canton of Uri. It is always fascinating for me to see how the vegetation changes within a few weeks. There is no longer any sign of the lush green from July. We drive over Andermatt to the next pass, the Oberalppass. This is also closed in winter, and then serves as a ski slope and winter hiking trail. Oh, here we take a little pee break for Rasta and get some fresh air too. It looks a little bit different than in winter, right? Yes. After the short stop of the Oberalppass, we drive through the entire Furderrheintal to Reichenau, where we then head towards Thusis. From there you can either take the Olbloppass to the Engadin or the Julierpass. Since we wanted to stop briefly at Lake Balbonia, we went over the Olbloppass. However, I already had a premonition. The lake is a so-called hotspot at this time of the year. As feared, all the parking spaces were already full, but hey, I still have some wonderful shots from last year. After that we continued through the stone desert, as I call it, until we arrived in the Engadin. We are not here yet. We still have to cross a pass, the Berliner Pass, and then we will reach the Puschloff. And yes, strictly speaking, we are no longer in the Engadin. The Puschloff is a world of its own. But we still haven't reached our destination. Now we have to take the Postbus for a short distance. We are now in Svazú and are allowed to enter the beautiful Valdikamp, where two of the most beautiful mountain lakes in Switzerland are located. So this is our place where we will stay two nights. It is a wild valley. And I will show you the beauty of it. We are now in the Alpkamp and they only have one room, which dogs are allowed. Right? I will let you know. We are right now in the Valdikampo. This is far, far away in the southeast of Switzerland, really, really far away from Brienz. We drove about five hours, of course, through the pass roads, because it's much more beautiful. And now we are in the paradise of the golden larches. There are two lakes in this area. One is the Lago di Saoseo and the other one is Lago di Viola or di Valviola, something like this. And Lago di Valviola is bigger than the Saoseosee, but more picturesque is the Saoseosee. I hope that we will get better weather tomorrow so we can see the full bloom of the golden larches. But it's already wonderful, isn't it? And if you are here in this area, you have to be aware because there are bears and wolves living here. You don't have to be afraid. They are more afraid of you, but just so that you know. By the way, Rasta is much better now. Yeah, he got too cold. You maybe saw it in the last video and we had to give him some medication. And now he's almost the old. Yeah, fresh snow on the mountains and all these golden larches. Crazy nice, isn't it? It's an army of golden larches. I mean this is the absolute highlight of autumn in Switzerland. It begins to rain a little bit. Yeah, the weather in Switzerland is so changeable right now. In one minute it's raining, in the next minute sunshine, hail, thunder, tornado. No, no tornado. It's just changeable. Rasta, you have to cross the bridge. Yes, exactly. Great. Come here. Let's go. It's late in the afternoon, so that's why you see no people here. But when we drove up, we saw many, many, many people. And if we don't disturb anyone, I show you the area from above. Oh, Rasta, the light. Look me up. See the light? Wow. Oh, that light. Despite the changeable weather, we were able to enjoy a few beautiful moments and then we went back to Olbkamp, where we were treated to a speciality from the Veltlin, Pizzoccheri, a type of pasta made from buckwheat and wheat flour topped with Savoy cabbage, potatoes and cheese. The next morning, we went to the Sao Seu Lake. So this is now the other lake, the Sao Seu Lake, where we try to capture the sunrise. At least the sunrise colors. The sun is here. It's time for hiking. Oh, Rasta, paddle. Yeah, you can go in. Oh, super nice. Enjoy. Rasta, I think we found another paradise. Huh? Sure, huh? Yeah. New paradise for mom and you. Hey. Hey, don't you, dog? He wants to go paddling. Yeah, maybe not, Rasta. Well, maybe not. It's hard to describe, but it somehow feels like being in a fairy tale. That's probably why it's called the Kingdom of the Golden Larches. With so much beauty around you, you forget everything that is happening in the world. And you wish that everyone could have this feeling of peace and happiness. The world would be a better place, right? So we saw now the Lago di Valviola, and the Lago di Saoseo, and the wonderful valley. But we didn't see the third lake. Let's go. Yeah, the Larche das Gispadus. Yeah, I will ask the owner of the mountain hut how I should spell it, okay? Also, they say hi, Gispadus. It's an odd-uled lake. Yeah. Yeah, the owner of the mountain hut told me that normally this is not a lake. Because there is normally not that much water to fill it. But this year was different. So that's why we have a whole lake here now. What you see here is not sand, these are the needles of the larches, which already went down. It's beautiful here, huh? It's like a carpet, a golden needle carpet. Do you see? Yeah, if you need a golden needle carpet, they have some left here. Then the wind came up and whispered in our ears that it would rain tomorrow. You could see it on all the leaves and needles, and even the Swiss flag seemed to be saying goodbye to us. We enjoyed another delicious dinner of local dishes. The next morning brought rain, and we looked back gratefully on the last few days, which were filled with fun, colors, golden forests, delicious food, and left the kingdom of the larches with a little sadness.