The Grimsel is one of the great Alpine passes, and it is also one of the least wild. At 2,164 metres it joins the Bernese Oberland and the upper Valais, and the landscape it crosses is a bare, glaciated bowl of grey granite, scoured smooth by ice and then dammed by engineers. There are three reservoirs in the immediate area, and the water in them is a startling turquoise or slate depending on the sky.
The lakes are the key to the place. They belong to a huge hydropower system, built mostly in the twentieth century, which uses the water from glaciers and snowmelt to run turbines far below in the Haslital. The Grimsel lake sits right beside the road, held by a long curved dam, and a smaller lake at the summit, the Totesee, lies in a hollow where the mountain seems to have given up.
The ride is excellent from either side. From the north the road climbs out of Innertkirchen past the roaring gorge at Handegg, then through a series of long galleries and bends carved into the rock. From the south the climb out of Gletsch is a set of tight hairpins that give you views back toward the Rhône glacier, which is retreating year after year. At the top the air is thin and cold, even in August, and the wind can take your breath.
Fill the tank at Meiringen or Innertkirchen on the north side, or at Brig and Naters in the south. The pass is open from about June to October, depending on snow, and the closing dates vary by the year. Mornings are best: the road is quiet, the light is sharp, and the reservoirs are glassy before the wind comes up.