Brig und Naters, Twins at the Gates to the Aletsch and Simplon

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Brig und Naters

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Welcome back to our German Series: Deutsch? Klar! where we visit our favorite places in Switzerland that are not so big but are still really great places to visit (it is also a reason for Colin to write and practice his German).

Last time we were in the wonderful town of Spiez in the Berner Oberland with the prettiest bay in Europe. This week we head a half hour through the Lötschberg Base Tunnel to the Canton of Valais and the multifaceted communities of Naters and Brig.

Naters sits along the Rhone on the far side of the river from busier and more urban Brig. Both towns are at the heart of the large Rhone River Valley in the Canton of Valais. For many tourists on their way to Northern Italy through the Simplon Tunnel or to St. Moritz with the famous Glacier Express, Naters is not easy to distinguish from Brig. Throughout the years, Naters and Brig, like many Swiss communities, have grown together and, without the river, it would not be clear today where one community begins and the other ends.

Naters and Brig are both excellent with an exceptional castle in Brig and many traditional Valais buildings and an excellent Museum about the UNESCO World Heritage Aletsch Jungfrau Region in Naters. Perfect for a short stop or even a longer trip through the Valais.

As the Gateway to the Aletsch and Simplon, Naters and Brig are also a good starting points for your Alpine adventure.

Thanks for joining us!

To the World Nature Forum

From Brig station, Naters is just a short walk across the Rhone. The view from the bridge is the first glimpse of Naters, but there's not that much to see. The buildings near the station are almost all from the last fifty years and Naters, like many Swiss towns, is a bit urban. That said the mountains behind Naters are very large and beautiful.

For most people, this peripheral area may not seem that great, but for us it's a worthwhile stop, home to the modern World Nature Forum museum. The World Nature Forum tells the story of the UNESCO World Heritage Jungfrau-Aletsch region, which is located in the mountains peeking out just behind the village.

The World Nature Forum in Naters

The museum has exhibitions on a range of topics from geology and glaciology of the Aletsch Glacier, the largest glacier in Europe, to the Jungfraujoch and tourism. With a focus on interactive elements and great IMAX videos, the museum is exceptionally interesting and engaging.

Jungfrau-Bahn wagon in the World Nature Forum

My favorite part of the museum is an original Jungfrau Railway carriage. Inside the carriage is an interactive journey on a planned rail route from the Valais to the Jungfraujoch that never came to be. With lots of ice between the Jungfraujoch and the Valais, the plan for the route would have taken visitors straight across the fast moving glacier, a complicated and dangerous endeavour!

The Old Village Center of Naters

The old village center of Naters is a fifteen-minute walk from the World Nature Forum. Built of wood in the Middle Ages, today this original portion of Naters looks like a time warp. Many buildings have large round stones between wooden stilts to keep rodents out and raw wood is omnipresent.

The old village center of Naters

Like other places in Valais, Naters also has a large Catholic church and an infamous ossuary or Beinhaus.

Readers of this blog will remember the ossuary of Leuk. These structures are a bit creepy and hold the bones (mostly skulls and legs) of former inhabitants on full display. In Naters, the ossuary has a large window that children have to walk past every day on their way to school!

After looking around the small streets of Naters for a while, we head back to the station and the town of Brig.

The Beinhaus in Naters

Brig and the Stockalper Path

To make a long story very short: today the Simplon Pass is no longer one of the most important Alpine passes. This was not always the case. The Simplon Pass was an important route for trade between northern and southern Europe from the Middle Ages all the way up until the 19th century.

Over the centuries, the Simplon Pass was used for trade and travel, but it was the Stockalperweg or Stockalper Path, the first paved road in the 17th century, that really changed the pass and the region.

Kaspar Stockalper, born in 1609, was a wealthy regional merchant from Brig. He financed infrastructure along the pass route and ultimately developed a monopoly over trade which made him exceptionally rich. With that wealth Stockalper built a large and ornate castle right in the heart of Brig.

Buildings on the Simplon Pass

After Stockalper, Napoleon built a new and improved road in 1801 so that his troops could conquer northern Europe. This consolidated the Simplon as a key trade route. One hundred years later, in 1906, the Simplon Tunnel, the largest in the world at the time, was opened. As with Stockalper, the tunnel changed everything in Brig and Naters. Brig was now more important than ever, but the pass road with its steep and winding grade fell into relative disuse as it remains to this day.

Today you can walk from the train station through the center of Brig to the beautiful Stockalper Castle. A small museum at the castle tells the story of Stockalper and the pass route he developed alongside the story of the Simplon tunnel. The castle has a nice garden and there are even a few good restaurants and cafés nearby if you are feeling peckish.

Stockalper Schloss in Brig

The Gateway to the Alps

Brig and Naters serve as a gateway to excellent alpine adventure. Behind Naters lies the Belalp and the Aletsch Arena, where you can find a myriad of hiking and climbing options. On the other side of the valley the original Stockalperweg serves as another great hiking trail (most of Napolean's path was so well engineered it became the modern road). You can even hike the entire route from Brig to Domodossola in northern Italy and spend the night in the same buildings as Stockalper.

A short section of the Stockalperweg from the Simplon Pass to Simplon Dorf is one of my favorite hikes in Switzerland. There are so many stories on display here from Stockalper to secret bunkers from the Second World War. A perfect layer cake of history.

Alternatively, Brig is very good for connections. Trains go in every direction into the wonderful mountain landscape and no matter which way you choose, you are unlikely to be disappointed.

Thanks for reading this short episode on Brig and Naters. For other posts in this series, check out our “Deutsch? Klar!” page. If you like this post, you might also like the other posts in our English series, “Into the Alps”. Until next time, have a good trip!

Views of the Simplon Pass