Hiking in Liechtenstein

Yesterday Kira, Martin, and I went up to Malbun to go hiking in the Alps! Malbun is a town in Liechtenstein that is in the mountains, and is the site of Liechtenstein's only ski resort. During the summer, it is a point of entry to tons of beautiful hiking and mountain climbing. There are a number of ranches up there, so the lower parts of the climb are to the soundtrack of cowbells. There are so many it sounds like a waterfall or wind chime, so it's really lovely.

Kira and a cow. 

A nice easy part of the way up.

We climbed from Malbun all the ways up the the summit, at about 2700 meters (times about three for feet). It was two solid hours of up, and we went from grassy mountainsides through scrubby pines and avalanche barriers, up to a mountain ridge with steep-to-sheer slopes on either side, and finally through sawtooth rocks that we scrabbled up to the summit.

Hiking (this is actually on the way down. There were NO downhills on the way up).

Kira on a mini-summit!

At the summit!

On the way down we went another way that had us starting on a ridge trail, traversing some mini-snowbanks, then walking along another ridge that was the literal border between Austria and Liechtenstein. We stopped again at a hut, then walked down through three valleys before we got to the one that is Malbun. We followed a ski lift down and we had made it!

The hut.

Kira on the border! The right side of this photo is in Austria, the left in Liechenstein.

Scenic valley with snow.

Another gorgeous view! You can really see the fog here.

Nearly down now.

The whole thing was breathtakingly scenic. It was incredibly green in the valleys and absolutely stark on the peaks. There were wildflowers everywhere, and the valleys were stunning. Even the high fog didn't take away from it, and it ended up helping since Kira isn't the biggest fan of heights and it reduced visibility to about 30 feet when we were really up there. 

Flowers!

Dr. Seuss flowers

Kira amongst the flowers. Ski lift in the background.

Looking a bit treacherous.

Malbun! We made it.

I was totally exhausted when we finished, but I can't wait to go again!

Love Katie