The two towns are comparable, each a resort town, each at the base of a tightly encased valley, each at the foot of its respective country's highest peak. Chamonix: Mont Blanc. Zermatt: the Matterhorn.
At least Chamonix seemed to have a soul. Zermatt I'm not quite too sure, though to be fair I only spent just over 24 hours there. The town of Zermatt is spread no more than a mile long at the base of a valley. Its storybook 16th and 17th century wooden buildings seem today terribly out of place, surrounded by a sea of cloned hotel complexes, copied and pasted dozens of times over. It takes less than 15 minutes to walk from one end of the town to the other, yet the list of hotels in the village brochure, set in alphabetical order, boasts a page long of 'A's, let alone the rest of the alphabet...
The streets buzz with electric buggies that cart tourists from train station to hotel, a novelty of a town where no cars are permitted. The streets are lined with outlandishly priced shops and filled with tourists from all over the world.
In the photo below, along Zematt's main strip, filled with shops and tourists:
One of the many electric cars in town:
some of the old wooden buildings, an area devoid of shops, and consequently, tourists...
If, like me, you aren't interested in spending your day shopping, or if your wallet doesn't permit you to do so, then I would encourage you to head into the surrounding hills as quickly as possible. And that's where all the beauty of Zermatt lies: literally surrounded by Europe's highest peaks, a 360° glacial paradise of grandiose proportions. A very expensive but excellent system of cablecars and lifts permit just about anyone to enjoy hikes up in altitude.
During my first hike it rained and even snowed a while, but I was rewarded with this beautiful sight:
The following morning I took the cablecar up to the Rothorn, 3100m metres in altitude. From here a path leads to the top of the summit seen in the photo below, the Oberrothorn. It is touted as the "highest walking trail in Europe", really meaning the highest trail not needing technical alpine gear. The path zigzags gently up the slope, the only true difficulty being the thin air. It takes about an hour and a half to reach the top.
And from the summit the views are spectacular. Below is Monte Rosa, Italy's highest peak, at over 4600m, with its glacial lakes and valleys. The Monte Rosa chain marks the Swiss/Italian border
But all the fuss is about the mountain below: the Matterhorn. Though not as tall as its French or Italian counterparts, it stands alone, a sharp pinnacle reaching toward the heavens, clear above any of its neighbouring peaks.
A panorama from the Oberrothorn, with a zoom on the cloud-covered Matterhorn at the end.
