Millions of people pour into Switzerland's Jungfrau region every year, and almost all of them stick to the same handful of villages and viewpoints. Berghotel Obersteinberg is not one of them. To get here you climb 850 vertical meters (2,790 feet) above Stechelberg on foot, since no road, cable car, or train has ever reached it, and once you arrive you'll find a 19th-century guesthouse that still runs on candlelight, spring water, and cheese made a few steps from the dining room. It might be the closest thing left to an untouched corner of the Alps.
Location
Berghotel Obersteinberg sits at 1,778 meters (5,833 feet) above sea level, deep in the Bernese Oberland in central Switzerland. It's tucked into the upper reaches of the Lauterbrunnen Valley, one of the most dramatic glacial valleys in the world, where 72 waterfalls spill off the surrounding cliffs into the valley floor below.
The closest village is Stechelberg, reachable by PostBus from Lauterbrunnen train station, but from there the only way onward is uphill, on foot, for around 2.5 hours depending on your pace. There's no road, no cable car, no shortcut. You earn this one.
The trail climbs through a protected nature reserve, past the small guesthouse at Trachsellauenen and a series of switchbacks, before the Swiss flag outside the hotel finally comes into view along with a scattering of farm buildings and grazing cows.
A Hotel Frozen in the 1880s
The hotel has been in the same family for generations, currently run by sisters Dori and Manuela von Allmen, with Manuela's son Julian increasingly involved in day-to-day life at the guesthouse. Until recently, the cows were looked after by their brother Hans and his American wife Vicki - proof that this really is a family operation rather than an inn dressed up to look like one.
Dinner By Candlelight
Dinner here happens at a fixed hour and it happens together. A bell rings at 7pm and everyone sits down to a hearty, all-you-can-eat spread of soup, salad, meat, and some kind of starch. It isn't elaborate, but it's the kind of food that makes complete sense after a long uphill walk, and you won't leave the table hungry.
Milk, cheese, and butter all come from the cows grazing right outside. Breakfast the next morning is simple too: bread, jam, cheese, and coffee, fuel enough for whatever hike comes next.
The Alpine Cheese Dairy
Obersteinberg runs its own alpine cheese dairy, and the process is still done the traditional way from start to finish. Cows are milked daily, and the milk and rennet are heated slowly in a copper cauldron over an open fire. From there, the curd is scooped out by hand using cheesecloth and pressed under a heavy stone weight.
It's worth wandering over to the barn in the morning before setting off to watch this happen - it's a small-scale, unhurried process that has quietly sustained mountain communities like this one for centuries.
Sleeping Without Power
Accommodation comes in two forms. The dormitory-style lodging sleeps a group of travelers together and is the more affordable route into a night at Obersteinberg, though you'll want to bring your own sheet or a silk sleeping bag liner.
The private rooms are simple but full of charm, made up with thick duvets, a small side table, a porcelain washbasin, and a candle for light. There's no electricity anywhere in the hotel, and the bathrooms are down the hall.
Either way, pack a flashlight and a pair of slippers. You'll want both once the candle burns down.
The Schmadribach waterfall, visible from the hotel windows, has attracted landscape painters since the 1820s. Given how remote Obersteinberg is, it's fair to say more people have seen paintings of that waterfall than have actually stood in front of it.
Cows, Ibex, and the Occasional Chamois
The land around Obersteinberg falls within a protected nature reserve, and the wildlife has responded accordingly. Ibex, chamois, and red deer sightings are common, species that were once hunted close to extinction in this part of the Alps.
Meanwhile, sheep and cows still graze the alpine grasses in summer the same way they have for hundreds of years, wandering close enough to the hotel that they become part of the daily scenery.
Trekking From the Doorstep
Obersteinberg works as both a destination and a launchpad. From the hotel, it takes about an hour to reach Oberhornsee, a deep blue glacial lake sitting beneath the snowcapped Grosshorn, Breithorn, and Tschingelhorn. The lake's fate is uncertain: since 1994, no meltwater has flowed into it from the Breithorn glacier, so it has been slowly losing water ever since.
For those continuing on rather than heading back the way they came, one route climbs behind the hotel and follows the mountainside north to Busenalp before dropping into the village of Gimmelwald, roughly three hours away. From there you can catch a tram back to Stechelberg, or keep going toward Mürren and Lauterbrunnen.
Another option loops past Oberhorn and the Schmadrihütte, taking in wild streams, thundering waterfalls, and alpine pastures along the way, before the descent through Alp Schwand and back down to Trachsellauenen and Stechelberg.
3824 Lauterbrunnen, Switzerland
