The day-to-day adventure of traversing all those kilometers and climbing hundreds of summits will provide plenty of personal excitement. As a lifelong climber, backpacker, kayaker, mountain biker, and wilderness enthusiast, I am tremendously excited about the upcoming adventure. I can’t imagine anything I’d rather do.

    The physical challenges and psychological rewards of traversing all those kilometers should be clear. But it’s the people I’ll meet and the stories I’ll learn that I most look forward to sharing.

    Below are a few of the themes I know will be interesting. Of course they’re merely a tease, as there are so many more, most of which will surprise me en route.

The Borderline

    They joined despite conflicting languages, religions, and cultures. Some were accepted into the union, others rejected. If there’s one underlying theme to this project, it’s “Why is this territory Switzerland instead of pieces of France, Germany, Austria, and Italy?” Not just to understand Switzerland for its own sake, but also to better know Europe at large.

Trans-boundary Conservation

    A huge part of my mission will be to watch countries coordinate their conservation, whether it’s on migration corridors for wildlife, trans-boundary parks, or developing ecological networks that span the entire Alpine Arc and beyond. I’d like to bring attention to these projects so that people who live in other mountain chains might learn from the Swiss and their neighbors.

Swiss Military

    Then there’s the obsession itself: Until very recently, nearly all bridges were rigged to explode; large populations could barricade themselves into valleys; vast hospitals and barracks were carved into mountain tunnels; every male citizen had been drafted and trained annually with his unit; by law each male citizen kept his military guns and equipment inside his own house; grassy knolls in flat-bottomed valleys hid fighter jets between training sorties (Swiss pilots were famed for shooting down Nazi planes that strayed into Switzerland during WWII). Many of these are still true, others are finally relaxing.

    I’ll see anti-tank barriers, booby-trapped roads, and how the defense network is intended to work. But I’ll also see how anachronistic such defenses are in a modern Western Europe without military conflict (or even border checkpoints), and will learn how Switzerland’s famous defenses are evolving.

Changing Landscapes

    And then there are the fast-shrinking Swiss glaciers, which are as essential to the Alpine image as they are valuable for water storage. They’ve shrunk by kilometers already, but as the earth warms they’re predicted to melt nearly into oblivion by the end of this century. Only the uppermost reaches will remain cold enough for snow to compress into ice.

The Great Passes of History

    Many colorful stories have taken place on Swiss passes, including Hannibal and his elephants on their way toward an invasion of Rome. Much later came Napoleon and his army en route to Italy and Austria, after which he squashed and then reinvented Switzerland.

    Ironically, in my journey I’ll be dropping down to the passes—often for a good night’s sleep and a meal—before climbing up the next day to continue walking the border.

And So Much More...

Four languages with dozens of dialects, direct democracy with rotating presidencies, rival guides with bad attitudes, chocolates and cheese. There’s no end of good stories.

Post-expedition note: The themes below were all written in anticipation of the journey itself. As expected, I encountered them all, and so much more. I’m now in the process of editing my daily reports into an ebook, which will be available on John Harlin Media.