Sunrise on Ober Gabelhorn (4,063m), Wellenkuppe (3,093m) and Zinalrothon (4,221m) from Rothorn (3,103m)Canon EOS 5D Mark III, 84mm, f6.3, 1/200s, ISO 100

I've just returned from another trip to Zermatt in the Valais Alps in Switzerland, where I had the opportunity to combine my passions of hiking and photography again.

Last year, I managed to capture the sunrise on the Matterhorn from Riffelsee below the summit of Gornergrat, and this year I was hoping to repeat the experience, but from the summit of Rothorn (3,103m), which is further away and would provide the more familiar north-east view of the Matterhorn and the opportunity to capture other peaks such as Klein Matterhorn, Breithorn et al. when using a wide-angle lens.

I had taken this sunrise photo from Rothorn in 2007 using a Canon S60 Powershot compact digital camera, but as this only had a 5MP sensor, and I wanted to shoot the scene again using my full-frame Canon 5D Mark III with a Canon 17-40mm f4L wide-angle lens.  

However, it was only when I reached the the summit of Rothorn just before 6am, I found that it wasn't to be, as the unsettled weather had left quite a lot of cloud cover on the Matterhorn and the surrounding peaks. However, this did provide the opportunity to take some moody shots of Zinalrothorn, Ober Gabelhorn in cloud (above), with the transient light providing some nice effects on the snow and rock, and also this shot of Weisshorn.

This summer is also the 150th anniversary of the first ascent of the Matterhorn led by Edward Whymper on 14th July 1865. One of the ways which this was commemorated was by the illumination of the route of the first ascent each evening at 9.15pm. I took a telephoto shot of the Matterhorn and a wide angle shot including Zermatt from the balcony of my hotel using a tripod and long exposures.

I hope to upload more photos of my latest Zermatt trip to the Swiss Alps gallery in the coming days when I can find some spare time!