Riffelsee Guide

The lake that doubles the mountain

There are grander viewpoints around Zermatt and there are higher ones, but there is no more beloved image of the Matterhorn than the one Riffelsee gives you: the whole pyramid, summit and all, hanging upside down in a small pool of still water, so clean and symmetrical that for a moment you cannot tell which is the mountain and which is the reflection. It is the picture on the postcards and the calendars, and the rare case where the real thing, caught on the right morning, is better than any photograph of it.

Riffelsee is not a lake you swim in or sail on. It is little more than a tarn — a shallow alpine pool cupped in the rock below the Gornergrat ridge, at roughly 2,757 m. Its entire fame rests on geometry and stillness: it sits in just the right place, at just the right angle, for the Matterhorn to fall into it. Catch it calm and the Horu doubles; catch it on a breezy afternoon and you get only a hint, the surface broken into ripples that scatter the reflection. Timing, here, is everything.

Getting there: get off one stop early

Riffelsee is reached from the Gornergrat railway, and the single most important piece of advice is this: do not ride all the way to the summit. Get off at Rotenboden, the stop before Gornergrat, and the lake is only a few minutes' walk below the platform on a clear, well-trodden path. Many first-timers ride straight to the top, see the panorama, ride straight back down, and never realise the reflection lake was a short walk below a station they passed through.

The walk from Rotenboden down to Riffelsee is gentle and short — manageable for most people in trainers on a dry day — but it is still high, exposed alpine ground at over 2,700 m, and snow can linger into early summer. From the lake you have a choice: walk back up to Rotenboden for the train, or continue down the ridge towards Riffelberg, picking up the railway from a lower station. The downhill option is the better day if the weather holds.

At a glance

The essentials for a Riffelsee morning. Heights and walking times are evergreen; confirm the day's railway timetable and conditions before you set out.

• Altitude: roughly 2,757 m, below the Gornergrat ridge.
• Access station: Rotenboden, one stop below the Gornergrat summit.
• Walk from Rotenboden: a few minutes downhill on a clear path.
• Best time: early morning, before wind picks up — for the still reflection.
• Season: roughly late spring to autumn for the open lake; snow can linger early.
• Footwear: walking shoes; it is high, exposed ground even when the path is easy.
• Onward: walk back up to Rotenboden, or down the ridge to Riffelberg for the train.

When to go — and why dawn wins

The reflection lives and dies on still air, and air is stillest early. Through the night the mountain air settles; soon after sunrise the valley begins to breathe and a breeze ruffles the surface. So the prize morning is a cold, clear, calm one, and the prize hour is as soon after sunrise as you can manage. That means an early train and, ideally, a forecast you have watched for a day or two. It is effort, but the payoff is a glassy lake and a pink-tipped summit doubled in it, with few other people about.

Season matters too. Riffelsee is a high-mountain pool, so it is at its most photogenic from roughly late spring, once the surface has thawed and the surrounding ground has cleared of snow, through autumn. Early in the season snow can still rim the lake and even cover the path from Rotenboden; late autumn brings crisp air and golden light but colder, shorter days. Midsummer mornings give the longest dry weather window and the warmest walk.

Photographing the reflection

Riffelsee is one of the most photographed spots in the Alps, and the difference between a snapshot and a keeper is mostly patience and position. Walk anticlockwise around the pool to find the angle where the summit sits cleanly in the water — there is more than one vantage, and a step or two changes the composition entirely. Crouch low: the lower your camera, the more of the mountain the surface can hold, and the more the reflection fills the frame.

Wait for a lull. Even on a breezy morning the wind comes in pulses, and a patient photographer will catch a few seconds of calm between gusts when the surface glasses over. Include a little foreground — a rock, a fringe of grass, the lake's edge — to give the reflection a frame and a sense of place. And if the main lake is ruffled, look for the smaller pools nearby, which sometimes sit more sheltered and hold the mountain when the big one will not.

• Walk anticlockwise to find the cleanest alignment of summit and water.
• Get low — the lower the lens, the more of the peak the reflection holds.
• Wait out the gusts; calm comes in pulses even on a breezy morning.
• Use a foreground rock or grass edge to frame the reflection.
• If the main pool is rippled, the smaller nearby pools may sit more sheltered.

Making a morning of it

Riffelsee is best enjoyed not as a tick but as the centrepiece of an unhurried high-mountain morning. Ride up early, walk down to the lake, give it time — sit a while, let the wind drop, watch the light shift on the summit — and then continue down the ridge rather than rushing back to the train. The path from Riffelsee towards Riffelberg keeps the Matterhorn in front of you nearly the whole way and is almost entirely downhill, one of the gentlest great walks in the region.

For couples it is quietly romantic: a small, still lake with the most beautiful mountain in the Alps folded into it, reached by a cog railway and a short walk, with no crowds if you come early. Pack a flask and something to eat, and let the morning be the destination rather than a stop on the way to the summit.