The Eiger Trail

In the Bernese Alps region of Switzerland, which feature more than 600 kilometers of walks and mountain bike paths, one of the more beautifully haunting is the Eiger Trail. Running underneath the daunting North Face of the Eiger, the 8-kilometer trail extends from a receding glacier beneath the towering mantle of the Jungfrau to the community of Grindelwald.

By CBSNews.com producer David Morgan

The Eiger is one of the most challenging peaks for mountain climbers - at least 64 climbers have died while attempting to reach its summit via the treacherous North Face, nicknamed Mordwand, "Wall of Death." But hikers who walk its base can also bask in the beauty of the nearly vertical limestone cliffs, shooting up amidst rolling pastureland, spiked by gushing waterfalls and streams. The Eiger Trail give non-mountaineers a close look at the rugged Alpine peaks and the sweeping vistas that make this area one of the most popular stomping grounds for walkers.

The Eiger Trail begins (or ends, depending upon your direction of travel) at the rail station Eigergletscher - the first stop between Kleine Sheidegg (pictured here) and the Jungfraujoch, the highest train station in Europe.

The Jungfraujoch rail line, completed in 1912, takes visitors to an altitude of 3,454 meters (11,332 feet), and to stunning scenes of glaciers.

The Jungfraujoch, at the top of Europe.

Just short of entering the tunnels that burrow though the Eiger and Monch mountains on its way to Jungfraujoch, the train lets you off at Eigersgletscher.

When first opened the station was located on the very edge of a monumental glacier. The Monch is in the background.

Due to global warming the glacier has receded dramatically in recent decades. It's lost about 300 meters - about 3 football fields in length - in just five years.

As the glacier melts into runoff, rocks, boulders and silt carried by the ice are deposited on the ground, leaving a lunar-like landscape of shale fragments.

An archive photo of visitors on the Eigergletscher c. 1900.

The Eigergletscher in August 2011.

When rockfalls cover the ice, shielding it from the sun's rays, the protected ice instead becomes prone to erosion from underneath. Here a tunnel has been burrowed into the ice sheet by a stream of runoff from the mountain.

The area is a Mecca for climbers from around the world, and many leave a testimony to the mountains with these rock cairns.

One must now walk pretty far up the mountainside to reach a patch of ice.

Lesson to self: When stepping onto a patch of ice that covers a flow of mountain runoff, do not expect it to hold your weight. Here a large slab of ice about 20 feet long and 3-4 feet thick cracked and fell into the torrent of water below my feet, not far from the ice-tunnel. After scrambling up onto the ground, and realizing I was about a kilometer from the nearest human being, I failed to keep "127 Hours" out of my mind.

Retracing my steps to the Eigergletscher rail station, I picked up the start of the Eiger Trail - elevation 2,320 meters (7,611 feet).

Above, the rock face stretched straight up into the clouds.

On this day there were few other souls on the trail, and most were traveling up to Eigergletscher - hiking uphill being a little easier on the knees, though adding a half-hour to the two-hour trek.

Boulders sprinkled the ground beneath the Eiger's North Face.

The sun broke through, then retreated several times, as the drizzle made for a slippery walk down.

With heavy rains that morning, the waterfalls were especially bountiful.

Pyrite (fool's gold) - a tempting-looking nugget in the raging stream.

More cairns dot the landscape, including near where an Austrian-German team made the first successful climb of the Eiger's North Face in 1938 - and where so many others failed.

Walking so closely to the mountain's edge gives a strong impression of its seeming insurmountability.

A rushing waterfall.

There were many waterfalls and streams cutting across the trail, and only a couple of man-made bridges to ford them.

Waterfalls reach down the mountain's slope like tentacles.

The clouds taunted with fleeting views of the Eiger's summit.

Blue sky broke through the mists to reveal the surrounding mountainside.

Weather conditions in the Alps are highly changeable, very quickly.

As the sky cleared, Grindelwald could be viewed in the valley below.

The trail breaks to Alpiglen, elevation 1,616 meters (5,300 feet) - a steep trek down a rocky trail to a train stop - or continues on to Grindelwald.

Having descended 2,300 feet, the train at Alpiglen helps ease the descent further.