Gletsch is hardly a village at all, but a crossroads in a bleak, windswept bowl where the Grimsel and Furka roads meet, and where, for a long time, the Rhône Glacier filled the valley above it. The glacier gives birth to the Rhône, one of the great rivers of Europe, which begins here as a milky meltwater stream before running through the Valais, Lake Geneva and France to the Mediterranean. The glacier was once so large that it reached almost to the hotel, and photographs from a century ago show a wall of ice where there is now a grey, stony slope.
The retreat of the glacier is one of the most visible effects of climate change in the Alps. Today the ice has pulled back up the valley, and its surface is covered with white blankets during the summer to slow the melt. An ice grotto, carved into the glacier, is open to visitors in summer, and walking through it gives a sense of the ice's blue light and the cold. The old Hotel Glacier du Rhône, a grand building from the days of nineteenth-century tourism, stands at the bottom of the hairpins, and its terrace is a place to sit and watch the traffic.
The riding between Gletsch and the Furka is a series of tight hairpins, climbing the head of the valley in tiers, with the glacier on the other side. The road is narrow in places, and the drop is steep, with limited barriers, so take care. The surface is generally good, though frost heave and patches can occur. Traffic is thick in summer, and weekend crowds can slow progress. Avoid the middle of the day, when tour buses are most frequent, and go early or late.
The area was a stop on the old pilgrim and trade routes between the Valais and the Bernese Oberland, and the Grimsel and Furka passes have been crossed since Roman times. The locals, Walser and Valaisans, built their villages and hospices to serve travellers, and the stone architecture of the area reflects the harsh climate.
Fill up before the climb in Andermatt, Meiringen or Obergoms, and bring warm clothes, because the wind from the glacier is bitter even in summer. Check the pass opening dates, as the roads are closed by snow for much of the year.