Slow Train to Switzerland

by Diccon Bewes

  Geneva might today be half the size of Zurich but, by both accident and design, this city by the lake has found a global role in the past century and a half. It is feted no longer as the Protestant Rome but now as the Capital of Peace, which for once is more than tourist-board hype. The Red Cross, the United Nations, the World Health Organization and so on and so on – the list of worthy organisations is almost endless, right down to the headquarters of the Scout Movement.

  How different would Geneva be today without the events of 1863? Very, though that’s not particularly thanks to tourism or Thomas Cook. Foreign visitors were nothing new – it was merely the numbers that changed – whereas becoming the centre for international diplomacy gave the city a role on the world stage that it has not yet lost.

  THREE

  UNWRAPPING THE ALPS

  Within the last few years the character of Chamouny has much changed; it was quite a secluded spot and now, in the busy season, it is full of business and bustle.

  —Cook’s Tourist’s Handbook to Switzerland, 1874

  The aptly named mauvais pas, or false step, was a treacherous way to reach Chamonix

  Mont Blanc might be the highest point in France, and indeed in western Europe, but so far it is proving to be elusive, with all 4810m permanently swathed in cloud. It is Mont Invisible. As I stand on our balcony the next morning, looking at where the mountain is supposed to be, I begin to think that the postcards have all been Photoshopped and there is actually no mountain at all. Every so often the clouds swirl around enough for a tantalising glimpse of rock through a fleeting gap, rather like a dance of the seven veils where the mist never reveals its secrets. It’s hard to tell which particular lump of rock it is, but it’s certainly not white. The good news is that it’s stopped raining. The weather is still grey, cold, damp and miserable, but at least no water is falling from the sky, so we venture out in relatively good spirits. Only the British could be so wildly optimistic about the weather.

  The first item on the day’s agenda is breakfast. Our hotel is depressingly one of those that thinks this is an optional extra, to be charged at the maximum possible rate. That makes three hotels in a row now, including Paris and Geneva. Charging extra for breakfast was quite normal in Thomas Cook’s day, too. The Excursionist states that breakfasts without meat or eggs were cheaper than ones with them, so hotel and tour prices were labelled “with meat breakfast” to make it clear what the customer was getting for his money. That’s little wonder, as of course the meat involved wasn’t merely a couple of rashers of bacon, but steak, chops, cold cuts and the like. As for other oddities on the table, there was this warning in the Guide to Cook’s Tours:

  We desire to put our friends on their guard against excess in the novelties of continental tables. Honey, which is always set on Swiss breakfast and tea tables, should be taken with great caution by those disposed to relaxation of the system; we have seen many suffer from its too free use.

  Clearly Swiss bees were collecting pollen from far too many dandelions and cowslips, but I can’t say that I’ve noticed any untoward effects from eating Swiss honey.

  Miss Jemima rarely makes more than a passing mention of breakfast, probably because they set off before dawn most days. In Paris she does note, however:

  “at our five-o’clock breakfast how that little ubiquitous waiter tantalised us by his constant reiterations that coffee was ‘coming, coming’! And when at last that beverage appeared it was conveyed in minikin coffee pots only copious in a supply to Lilliputians.”

  Our first stop of the day is the Tourist Information Centre, where the forecast printed out and posted up on the board shows a distinct lack of significant improvement, and a webcam confirms that the clouds are deep enough to cover the mountains. I’d hoped it might be a case of untern grau, oben blau, as the German-speaking Swiss say; in other words, down in the valley it’s grey and dismal, but up in the mountains it’s blue sky and sunshine. In the Alps, you can glide up in a cable car and emerge from the gloom into glorious weather. Better yet, you can look down on a sea of fog and feel superior in every sense. The weather forecast even details the upper limits of the fog so you know how high you have to go to reach the sun. We have no such luck today, nevertheless.

  Instead of going up to see the glaciers, we look at the information panels about them; or more specifically, about how much they are shrinking. The before and after photos are like a record of some extreme diet regime, with the glaciers wasting away every year. In the earliest picture, from 1865, the Mer de Glace is truly a wonder, a frozen torrent filling its valley and surging forwards towards Chamonix. Today, it has lost both its majesty and 1.2km in length, plus over half its depth. The neighbouring Argentière and Bossons glaciers have suffered the same fate, retreating by a kilometre or more since the end of the nineteenth century. Computer simulations predict a further 800m of shrinkage by 2030. And some people say that climate change is a myth.

  Two factors determine our next move, given that we are unable to follow the Junior United Alpine Club. The Alpine Museum is open only in the afternoons and, even more unbelievably, the weather has improved so much that we’re in danger of seeing a spot of blue sky. So we decide to follow the “off” day advice and walk to the Cascade du Dade, without umbrellas. What could possibly go wrong?

  There are no prizes for guessing the outcome. Far from being “about ¾ of an hour from the village” as stated, the waterfalls seem to get further away the longer we walk. And naturally, the drizzle starts before we can even leave “the village”, although Chamonix has long since outgrown that label. With hoods up against the rain, we enter the woods where the path becomes ever steeper and slipperier, so much so that we fashion a walking stick from a fallen branch for my mother. Combined with her all-encompassing raincoat-and-hood, the stout staff makes her look like Gandalf from behind; I begin to feel like a hobbit on a quest.

  It’s not the peacefully bucolic outing we had expected. Sadly, the constant hum of traffic is never far away, and is sometimes too close for comfort, thanks to the Autoroute Blanche climbing up the same hill towards the mouth of the Mont Blanc tunnel. At last, we leave it behind and turn the final corner – and we’re rather underwhelmed. The cascade is nice enough, but it’s not exactly huge as waterfalls go, more of a watertrickle.

  “Perhaps it was better when the glacier was bigger,” my mother says, looking higher up the hill, “when all the meltwater would have been coming down?”

  I follow her gaze up to the distant pinnacles of ice poking out above the dark pine trees. In the 1860s, the ice used to reach right down into the valley, not far from where we’re standing; Miss Jemima talks of the “acres, nay, miles of ice, spreading and penetrating into the vale”. We bid farewell to the disappointing spectacle and head back to the hotel, in need of dry clothes and a hot drink.

  Miss Jemima’s excursion that day to the Mer de Glace also ended in everyone getting soaked through, despite seeking shelter in a mountain hut. Dressing for dinner that evening was an unusual challenge:

  “mighty amusement had we in trying to make a presentable appearance … out of the remnants of the wet clothing that had weathered the drench. Miss Mary took the monkish character, arrayed in cloak and girdle. Miss Eliza personated the decayed gentlewoman in limp garments, another, our artist, ignored crinoline for the graceful folds of drapery, while Miss Sarah, who had been befriended by her mackintosh, had to make presence for the whole party in modern attire.”

  Standards of decorum could obviously lapse while abroad, something that has not changed at all. But the lack of dry clothing does raise one interesting point: luggage. What did Miss Jemima pack in her suitcase? And indeed, how much baggage did she take with her? The answers are not so easy to uncover, except in general terms.

  In The Excursionist, Thomas Cook is clear on the question of luggage: “Baggage is one of the greatest nuisances in travelling on the Continent”, not least because it had to be “weighed, registered, ticketed and paid for
at every station where the journey is broken”. Luggage limits are listed as 60lb per person in any class of travel; that’s about 27kg, so marginally more than a normal check-in allowance on flights today. But did Miss Jemima really take that much with her? This was not a coach tour, with cavernous luggage compartments under the seats, and she rarely mentions carrying any bags. Before departing from London, she notes that “the baggage of the members was then, after much effort, considerably reduced in bulk”, confirming that holiday packing was as much a dilemma then as it is now. She boasts of her prowess in this matter:

  “the Misses Jemima, Sarah, Eliza and Mary have settled the universally important baggage questions and claim to have travelled in the Alps with less luggage than any previous tourists, the porters of the Hotels unconsciously pouring delicious flattery in their ears by the enquiry ‘Where are your boxes?’”

  In contrast to her reticence on the subject, the Guide to Cook’s Tours devotes two whole pages to luggage; imagine any modern guidebook doing that. Its main advice is still just as valid:

  Every traveller should study the most rigid economy in the amount of luggage and means by which it is to be conveyed … It would be preposterous to attempt to take trunks and heavy packages over passes and other mountain roads.

  More interesting are the details it gives: luggage over the weight limit is charged at a penny a pound, while registering baggage from London to Paris cost one shilling and needed a minimum of half an hour extra at the station for processing. The simple suggestion was to take less: “For those who intend to ‘foot it’, a small light knapsack made of American cloth or mackintosh is recommended; for others a good-sized carpet bag or small portmanteau is most suitable.”

  Murray agrees:

  It saves a world of trouble to have no other baggage than a knapsack; one containing 3 or 4 shirts, socks, drawers, slippers, alpaca coat, thin waistcoat and trowsers [sic], dressing materials, &c., need not exceed 12 or 14lbs.

  The advantage of travelling light is also made clear: “a portmanteau requires a luggage-mule or porter, whilst a carpet-bag will go behind the saddle”.

  What is apparent is that Miss Jemima’s group took all that advice and travelled very light on a daily basis, while sending large luggage on ahead. Halfway through the tour the party arrived in Interlaken, where “the ladies, having got possession of the long-absent trunks, dazzled our eyes with almost forgotten splendour”. The next day, before setting off on a walking tour, the trunks were dispatched again: “Once more we trust our baggage to the care of the Post Office to be forwarded to Neuchâtel.” Miss Jemima would not arrive in Neuchâtel for another five days, so how did she cope in the meantime?

  Essentially they sent their Sunday best on ahead and survived on whatever they could carry in a knapsack, which was not a lot. An appendix at the back of my edition of the journal contains suggested items to pack for both genders, quoted here in full:

  “Gentleman’s outfit for a tour of fourteen days in Switzerland with portmanteau, from which to refit at the close:

  Small bag containing:

  One clean shirt

  Pocket handkerchiefs

  Two clean collars

  One pair of stockings

  Toothbrush

  Writing materials

  Pocket comb

  with

  Umbrella and Greatcoat

  The above outfit obtained the prize medal of the Junior United

  Alpine Club.

  Ladies’ outfit for seven days

  Mackintosh in case

  Umbrella

  Small deal box ten inches long by eight (one used by the grocers for supplying Borwick’s German Baking Powder answers admirably). The outside label can be taken off or not at discretion. This contained the minimum of articles for a lady’s toilet.

  N.B. Dirty linen can be washed at the hotels.”

  I know what you’re thinking: they effectively wore the same clothes every day, all the while walking for hours in the heat and without a daily bath. By day three or so the smell must have been overpowering. But we should remember that our nostrils are used to a modern regime of daily showering, deodorising and changing clothes; if everyone smells, you probably no longer notice it after a while. Personal hygiene wasn’t totally ignored, however. Murray gave explicit advice on what to do after walking all day:

  Immediately on your arrival, after a day’s walk, wash extensively with cold water and change your linen before sitting down to rest or eat. When you have only a knapsack you should keep one set of linen for the evening exclusively.

  From now on I will always carry a pair of evening underwear with me. It gives dressing for dinner a whole new meaning.

  But what did they wear in those days? The short answer is quite a lot, especially the women. Think of The King and I or Gone with the Wind and you’ll get a picture of how voluminous the dresses were, although travelling outfits were slightly less bulky than ball gowns. This was the era of the crinoline, a cage-like device of light steel hoops linked by cotton bands that sat under the dress to give it that typical bell or beehive shape. By the mid-1860s it was fashionable to have a flatter front with the back sloping out at 45 degrees; within 20 years that would shrink down to a straight skirt and a bustle at the back. Then there were several petticoats and the yards of fabric of the dress itself, plus long drawers underneath to save any blushes when the wind caught the dress. In contrast to this billowing mass, the upper body was tightly fitted with a chemise, corset, blouse and jacket, plus a shawl or overcoat; not forgetting all the accessories, such as hat, muff, gloves, parasol and boots. It would be hard enough to walk down the street in all that, let alone hike over glaciers. No wonder some women had ties attached to the bottom of the dress so they could hitch up the hem when walking. Incidentally, women generally made their own dresses (paper patterns were available by then) or had them made; ready-made clothing would not become popular for another two decades or so.

  Menswear was less cumbersome, though just as formal. Jackets (single breasted) and trousers were typically of contrasting colours and different fabrics, but the “tourist’s suit” was popular when travelling abroad. In The Smell of the Continent, the suit is described as a checked shooting jacket with matching knickerbockers, which makes it sound truly hideous. Suffice to say that a gentleman who wouldn’t be seen dead in such an outfit in Britain was quite happy to sport this leisure wear while on holiday; the Victorian equivalent of rolled-up trousers and a knotted hanky.

  As for what extras to pack, The Excursionist warns its readers to “Take care and not go without soap”, while Murray advises that “No pedestrian should travel without a pocket-compass, nor without a leather drinking-cup”, but decides that “a telescope is not of much use, as the view is seldom minute”. The Guide to Cook’s Tours has a helpful list for ladies: needles, thread and buttons, strong but light umbrella, writing materials, opera glasses, alpenstock, sticking plaster and salve, and a “little medicine chest for disordered interiors” – presumably not referring to untidy hotel rooms.

  There was also the need for a phrasebook, such as A Handbook of Travel-Talk, published in 1858 for the English abroad. It’s full of useful phrases for travelling – “May I not be allowed to carry ashore my carpet-bag?” or “Sit still! The train is moving” – eating out – “I do not like garlic or oil” or “Which is the strongest wine?” – and everyday situations – “What do you charge for the hire of a grand piano per month?” or “You must have some leeches put on. I must bleed you”. All were translated into French, German and Italian.

  After a change of clothes, we are warm and dry again, but the weather is neither. We’ve learnt our lesson from the morning’s adventure, so indoor cultural pursuits are top of the afternoon’s agenda and we make a beeline for the Alpine Museum, not for the old skis but for a picture of how Chamonix used to be. First we stop to admire the building itself, easily one of the largest in town.

  Seven storeys high, with the last two tuck
ed into the near-vertical grey roof giving it a very French look, the façade stretches across a whole block. Black iron balconies and shuttered windows punctuate the bright white walls at precisely regular intervals. It looks remarkably like a grand hotel, the kind that was built for well-heeled tourists of a bygone era. And that’s exactly what it was: the Chamonix Palace Hotel. It opened 50 years after Miss Jemima’s time, in 1914, but it was merely the latest in a long line of big hotels in Chamonix. From the 1770s onwards, what had been a quiet mountain village was transformed over the decades into the tourist capital of the Alps:

  [Chamonix] is now a large and important community, which displays almost the bustle of an English watering-place in what was once the most retired of Alpine valleys. With the exception, however, of the enormous hotels which appear to have been dropped there, the village, as most other Swiss and Savoy villages, retains its pristine appearance.

  Perhaps appreciation is only a matter of time. What was then seen as too new and too large, spoiling the character of a village, is now almost treasured as part of local history; maybe in 150 years, our glass-and-concrete constructions will also be regarded with affection. Nevertheless, inside the museum the old prints and engravings from the 1860s make it abundantly clear how much those “new” hotels stuck out like sore thumbs or, more correctly, eyesores. They were huge and often detached from the rest of village life. No wonder they had grandiose names invoking images of size and superiority.