The EuroHigh Page

Click on any image to see it in greater detail

On Saturday 7th October, 1996, in the early afternoon, I found myself living out a lifetime's dream. I was in a small Mooney four-seater aircraft, buzzing 12 of the alpine peaks over 4000 metres, including Mont Blanc, the highest and the famous 'killer mountain', the Matterhorn.

The 'Plane

The Route

We took off from La Blécherette private airport, near Lausanne and flew past Lac de Gruyére in the direction of Fribourg. Then, turning towards Thun, we flew over the icy blue waters of the Thuner See, until, passing it by, we found, below us the glaciers leading to the Jungfrau at 4158 Mtrs, above sea-level. With the Finsteraarhorn (4274 Mtrs) to our left, we passed two more huge peaks, before buzzing the small town of Brig & the Simplon Pass. From there, it was but a sweep and a circle round some of the most rugged of the Alpine tops, before coming across and circling the lone erect crag of the Matterhorn (4478 Mtrs). To our left, could be seen, clearly, Monte Rosa (4634 Mtrs); ahead, stood Europe's tallest, Mont Blanc (an imaginative name that :-)), who's peak, at 4810 Mtrs, we enjoyed at extremely close quarters. From there, passing the beautiful Aiguille Verte (4128 Mtrs), we turned north into France, towards Chamonix, Morzines and the Lac Léman for the end of our journey. What a movie-length experience that had been.

I had, with me, one of those small disposable Kodak cameras, and below can be found an album of some of the snaps, I took.