Sonja

Beautiful winter scene! Awesome frozen waterfall(s)... Nicely captured =}

This is not even the falls, just a bit run off from the canyon walls, that's the left upper icicle cluster in the previous shot a bit closer and with humans for proportion. Usually, there is just a bit groundwater trickling when it rains, but this sort of sizable icicles appear with interim thawing and freezing from the snow in the slope. The year round falls of the brook are to see best as a whole from the two benches in said previous shot. In winter, they are even more impressive than in summer due to the pilling ice but a somewhat demanding little hike on own responsibility, however mostly safe in recent years due to new fences one can hold onto in the most slippery corners, it's well worth it. In summer it can be hellish, the whole family waterfall adventure costing a very smal entrance fee, complete with waterplant museum, wet playground , petting zoo and snack booth makes it a very popular but overrun tourist magnet. In the middle of winter there is only the safer two overlooks for the big falls open and there is no service, no pet animals in the pens and no access to the loo, still it is near impossible to get any wider angle pics all without a few other people in them, as it is so pretty as soon it is cold enogh for the ice sculpting itself high up.

I am based only close to the alps , not in them, on the northshore of Lake Constance. This is a rather low warm pocket behind the Alpstein Range with a huge nearly never freezing lake, interesting chinook conditions and a fog revealing the famous one in london most often. Our winter is often such that even a few villages away and a tad uphill got sun, but we are below the cloud layer. Scheidegg is southeast of Lindau, already in Bavaria and on the border to Austria, past the lake's eastern end. Provided there is no traffic problems, it is rather easy to reach by car but double in elevation. They get the nicest winter wonderland, but if you look for a view down to the valleys you will be disapointed, just a fluffy white carpet hiding the grey world below -- LOL