View Point: Suone Oberriederi

From the Holzji above Blatten near Naters you overlook the striking rock head of the Stockflüe on the opposite side of the valley. If you search carefully with a telescope or binocular, on the steep meadows and rock faces, you can discover traces of the bisse "Oberriederi", abandoned more than 400 years ago. On small rock ledges in vertiginous altitudes, stones were piled on stones to dry stone walls. Hollowed tree trunks, the water channels, were laid on the stone walls. At the vertical rock faces, where no stone walls could be built, girders had to be anchored in rectangular holes, the “Toggenlöcher”. The channels were laid on the girders and fastened with wicker and wooden pegs. Such Toggenlöcher can be seen as well at the Stockflüe. The dry stone walls were built very skillfully and witness the enormous courage and the skilled craftsmanship of the former inhabitants of the valley in a constant struggle for the precious water!