PhillyFan

We spent a wonderful week in beautiful Switzerland. Here is what we did:

PHL-ATL-ZUR

We flew from Philadelphia to Zurich via Atlanta on Delta for only $411(!) It wasn’t the most convenient way, but it was $411! Flights went well (seats were tiny!) and we arrived early in Zurich – at 8:15am.

Lucerne Lakes Cruise

We were going to just wander around Lucerne on our first sleep-deprived day, but the weather was looking very wet and rainy the next day, so we switched our plans to do the lakes cruise on our arrival day. This turned out to be a great plan – not only did we have nice sunny weather for the cruise, but sitting on a boat watching beautiful scenery turned out to be a perfect thing to do when one is really tired!

This cruise was so beautiful. We started in Lucerne and took the boat all the way to the end of Lake Urnersee at Fluelen – almost 3 hours. We passed green mountains and charming small towns. The further we went, the more beautifully turquoise the water became. Toward the end, William Tell’s chapel was very picturesque. This was one of the (many) highlights of our trip.

At Fluelen, we took the train back to Lucerne. We also learned something very important for the rest of our travels – many Swiss restaurants close between the hours of 2pm – 6pm. It was 2:05pm, so we were out of luck for lunch. We got prepackaged sandwiches at a tiny convenience store next to the train station.

Back in Lucerne, we wandered around and discovered that Lucerne is a lovely, pretty town. Many of the buildings have painted facades. We walked across both Chapel and Spreuer Bridges. The eaves of both bridges have triangular shaped paintings lining the length of the bridge. On Spreuer Bridge, the paintings have a dance of death theme.

PhillyFan

Lucerne Day 2

It rained pretty much the whole day, as expected, so we planned to visit several museums (which weren’t on our original itinerary, but worthwhile). Our first stop was to the Rosengart Collection. This was quite an impressive collection – they have a lot of works by Picasso and Klee. Next was the Lucerne art museum. This featured mostly works by Swiss artists. We ate lunch in the nice café within this building. We then headed over to the Lucerne History Museum. This wasn’t a huge museum, but it had an interesting collection of all sorts of different stuff. Some trip advisor reviews claim, not unfairly, that it’s more a collection of different stuff than an actual history museum, but I liked it.

We wandered the attractive streets some more, and then went over to find the Lion Monument, which has a picturesque setting with a pond in front of it. I never noticed this before I read about it - the outline surrounding the lion figure has the shape of a pig. (Check it out, it does look like a pig!)

We noticed that, despite the rain (which was steady but light) that we could still see nice views across the waterfront, so we decided to hop back on the boats and go to a town on the lake for dinner. That wasn’t the best idea. We chose Weggis. We arrived at about 4:30pm (on a Saturday) and no exaggeration – the entire town appeared to be closed. We wandered around and saw maybe 6 other people. We then decided to check the returning boat schedule, which was a good idea, b/c we realized that if we did actually eat dinner there, there would be no boat to take us home! We found a hotel whose restaurant agreed to make us a quick pizza and we caught a boat back to Lucerne.

(This boat was an older steamer with an engine, I believe, from about 1906. How do I know this? My husband was fascinated by the engine, which was on view as it worked. The engine was so incredibly clean that it looked like it was just installed an hour ago. My husband took a picture and a video of it. I noticed that when we exited, the engine area was surrounded by about a dozen people, some taking videos of the engine. It did not surprise me that all those people were men. Lol

PhillyFan

Day 3 Lucerne to Wengen; hiking

We took 3 trains to get to Wengen from Lucerne. The views along the way were incredibly scenic. We passed beautiful blue lakes and numerous waterfalls. Just when you think the scenery along the way is amazing, you reach the beautiful Lauterbrunnen valley with its towering waterfalls. And then you get on the cog train to Wengen and see even more amazing views, and more waterfalls. The view of the Lauterbrunnen Valley from Wengen is definitely one of the most scenic views we’ve seen in all our travels.

The last time we were in Wengen, about 10 years ago, it rained solidly for 2.5 days. We didn’t get to do any of our planned hiking. This day was sunny, so we decided to go up to Mannlichen and hike to Kleine Scheidegg. (The last time we were here, we decided to hike despite the rain. But that July we were told that the rain in Wengen was snow in Mannlichen, so that didn’t work!)

We got on the gondala and took some great pictures of Wengen and the Lauterbrunnen Valley as we began our ascent. And then, not 4 minutes later, it started to rain! We arrived in Mannlichen to a steady, but light rain and views that were of a lot of clouds. We paid a considerable sum for our tickets to do this (one of the only things not covered by our Swiss Pass), so we went for our hike. The one view to our right was almost entirely socked in by clouds except for one opening where you could actually see a sunny area beyond. The other side view was the green meadow, so we did have some views. We passed wildflowers and some still-remaining-snow along the way. After the hike, we took the cog train back to Wengen, where it was still sunny!

PalenQ

marking for later digestion for what skimming seems to be a very informative and neat report - yes that weather can be so so fickle.

Sue81

Maybe that is the difference between October and July? it was sunny and lovely the whole 3 days we were in Wengen and Mannlichen. Sue

Melnq8

$411! What a deal!

Adelaidean

We must have crossed paths, PhillyFan �� and had the same "where to eat lunch" problem as you, saved by the Manor store cafeteria!

I've got photos with my TR..maybe we were on the same steamer..

PhillyFan

I will go look for for your TR, Adelaidean! I really liked that lake cruise.

To continue.....

Murren/Lauterbrunnen

PhillyFan

Day 4 Lauterbrunnen, Murren and the wrong gondola

This day was sunny so we headed over to the Murren area to do the walk from Grutschalp to Murren. We took the cog railway to Grutschalp for the start of this hike. This walk was great – it featured amazing views of snow covered mountains, cowbells and some pretty patches of forest. We enjoyed walking around the small town of Murren (more great views!) and then we went to catch the railway back to Lauterbrunnen.

We got on the gondola, turned around and WOAH. We were not going back the same way we came – this gondola was really STEEP! It was quite a ride. I am not sure how we managed to get on the wrong gondola - it’s not as if we were in Grand Central Station – I believe there were only 3 choices in tiny Murren. Somehow, we picked a wrong one (which actually turned out well, b/c the ride down was pretty cool). We ended up on the Murren – Gimmelwald – Stechelberg cable car. So, we get out at Stechelberg, having no idea where we were. We noticed from the signs that we were fairly close to Lauterbrunnen and that we could catch a bus into town. Because this was Switzerland, the bus arrived exactly at the posted time. (I don’t think a Philadelphia SEPTA bus has ever arrived at its posted time haha).

We took the bus into Lauterbrunnen, where we walked around a bit. We had a great lunch and then walked over to the base area of Staubbach falls. We saw a trail heading up, so we took it. It was quite steep (later found the ascent was over 500’) with several switchbacks. We then went through a tunnel and walked along the edge of a cliff. We weren’t sure where we were going, but thought we were going to get a really great view of the bottom of the falls. I am sure this is much more impressive during a time when the falls are more full (although they appeared pretty full to me)….the trail took us to an area behind the falls, but all we saw were a few drips of water. It was very anti-climatic! Oh well.

We headed back to Wengen, where we had a nice dinner at our hotel, and then went for a walk. The last time we were here with our kids, we took a nice picture of them with a great view of Lauterbrunnen down below. We went in search of that view, but didn’t find it. We walked to Mary’s Café, and then took a short trail up through some woods, ending up a bit above Wengen, so we just headed back to our hotel.

PalenQ

Yes Staubbach Falls fall totally dry in summer often! Nice to know about the trail.

Great report!

annhig

thanks for the TR, PhillyFan. I think that you were a month or so behind us and did things in a slightly different order, but overall i think our experiences were pretty similar. I was sold on the transport system, the wonderful boats [your husband would not have been amongst a men-only group filming and admiring the engine had I been on the same boat - I have pictures and a video of the engine on the steam ship we were on too to prove it], and the support-punctual trains.

A lovely experience - I'd love to go again should circumstances allow.

travelchat

PhillyFan:
Good info about the Lucerne lakes cruises. I'll be there next May for two days prior to a river cruise and a lakes cruise is definitely on my agenda. Thanks for the detail.

Trophywife007

Bookmarking.

annhig

travelchat - I agree with Phillyfan about the boats in Lucerne - they are really great.

As well as a simple cruise round the lake you could do what we did and get the boat across the lake, and take the funicular to the top of Mount Pilatus; you can then get a cable car and gondola down the other side and catch a bus back to the city. It makes a terrific day out and I'm sure that there are others.

We also spend our last night on a jazz cruise which was loads of fun. [Friday nights only i think].

PalenQ

It makes a terrific day out and I'm sure that there are others.>

Nothing right from the lake as thrilling but from Vitznau or Weggis you can take mountain train or gondola respectively up Mt Rigi- known more for its views over the spine of central Switzerland than anything else =fairly low elevation.

PhillyFan though describes the boats so well - don't matter where you go - it's all beautiful.

PhillyFan

annhig, yes, we did have a remarkably similar itinerary! I chuckled about what you said about the steam engine - it looked brand new (and so clean!)

And agree with Palen, this is a very pretty area - scenic views are all over the place.

Continuing...

Day 5 Castle day on Lake Thun

The forecast for Wengen for this day was a high of 48 (brr) and rainy. I had planned on hiking around the First area on this day, but I was afraid to even check the weather up there, so we went to Plan B.

We went over to Lake Thun, where it was sunnier and warmer.

We took the train to Thun, where we transferred to a boat to take us to Castle Oberhofen. When we first checked the schedule, we noticed that there was only 7 minutes from the train’s arrival in Thun to when the boat left the dock across the way. In the US, we would assume it would be likely we would miss such a tight connection. At first we wondered the same in this instance. But, we quickly realized that one could set their (Swiss) watch to the train schedules and we figured we could make this work. And, because it was Switzerland, where everything is remarkably on time, we did!

The approach to the castle at Oberhofen by boat was incredibly scenic – we passed some castles (Schloss Hunegg) and stately buildings on the way. The approach to Schloss Oberhofen was scenic – the castle has a turret that sticks out into the water. We did a self guided tour – the castle was interesting, and the gardens were beautiful. They were manicured and very colorful. We walked around the grounds, had lunch and decided to explore another place on the lake. We chose Spiez.

We got on the boat and got off at Spiez. There is a castle here, so we went to explore that. The castle had great views of the blue lake – one window view showed the lake and the next door 11th century Romanesque church. The self guided tour here also had us stepping back in time. The “bathroom” (a nook with a wooden seat and chute) also had a holder filled with hay. It made me so grateful for modern plumbing – and toilet paper!

The gardens here were were also very pretty – they featured a fountain and a lot of color. We found the train station (it wasn’t near the boat dock, as it was in Thun) and we headed back to Wengen.

Back in overcast Wengen, we headed to our hotel. In our room, we noticed the sun was coming back out. We looked out to window to see a fully arched rainbow! It didn’t last long and it was such a remarkable sight. We ate dinner (dinner and breakfast were included in our hotel rate). And since the weather had cleared, we went off again in search of the Lauterbrunnen Valley view we photographed over a decade ago. We walked down what a appeared to be a tiny side street (not that any streets were big in Wengen), and after only a tiny bit – there was the view! It was so close to our hotel. Two guys were there and wanted us to take their picture, and they returned the favor while listening with at least feigned interest to our story about how we were looking all over for this view where we took a picture of our kids 10 years ago – and found it on our last night.

annhig

Glad you found good weather on Lake Thun, PhillyFan. Sadly we didn't but we still had a nice ride on the boat from Interlaken to Thun and back, spending a couple of hours in Thun having lunch and a rather damp wander round, somewhat hampered it must be said by DH's lack of mobility.

Sorry we missed the castles - but glad you found "your" view.

PhillyFan

annhig - I would have liked to have wandered around Thun, but there was just too much to try to fit in.

Continuing....

Bern

We really liked exploring Bern. It was an attractive, walkable city. We arrived in town, dropped our suitcases at the hotel and went off on foot. We walked down one of the main thoroughfares, which was lined with fountains. The fountains featured a painted figure and a lot of flowers – they were very attractive. We wandered in the direction of the rose garden and to get there, we crossed a fairly long bridge. We looked down and saw….BEARS!

We later learned, from touring their really nice historical museum, that Bern was named after the bear. (The legend goes that the early settlers of the town went on a hunt and the first animal to be killed would determine the name of the town. I guess Bern is fortunate that it wasn’t a squirrel).

In the area under the bridge, several bears live and wander around and we watched them amble around for a bit, before heading up to the rose garden. The garden is on top of a hill, which provided sweeping views of the town.

We then headed in search of the Bern Munster (cathedral). The tympanum features a Last Judgment scene of many painted figures – the hell scene was especially interesting.

Next was the Historical Museum. This was a fascinating place. My husband and I split up here – he went up to the entire floor dedicated to Albert Einstein, who lived in Bern for a while. He said that part was really interesting – I never got there.

I was on the bottom floor for quite a while – it covered the early history of Bern (where I learned about the bear), and had statuary, figures and items from the Munster (it was a lot easier to see the details of the figures this way). The town used to have a monastery with walls painted with numerous Dance of Death scenes – these were destroyed, but copies were made and the museum has a series of these. They were pretty fascinating. The museum has numerous items from Renaissance and medieval Bern, and covers the city from prehistoric times to the present. It also has items from Asia and Egypt. On the top floor, there were great views above Bern, with distant snow capped mountains in the distance.

We had a dinner at a place with fondue (yum) and then we wandered around the city some more. The many shops under the covered arcades were closed by now.

As a side observation, Bern has an attractive clock tower – and the bells ring throughout the night.

travelchat

Annhig:
As it happens, Mount Pilatus is an included excursion with Avalon during the two days in Lucerne. The boat excursion on Lake Lucerne, however, will be on my own and I definitely plan on doing that. Thanks for commenting!

PhillyFan

Last day: Stein am Rhein and Zurich

When I saw pictures of old town Stein am Rhein, with its timbered buildings and all the painted facades, I knew I wanted to include this in our itinerary. It wasn’t a super convenient stop on the way to the Zurich airport from Bern, but I wanted to include it. I researched that the train station had lockers and we figured out which trains to take.

We arrived in town in a steady rain and found the lockers. Which were so small there was no way our smaller-sized suitcase was going to fit! And I had doubts that even our carry-on would fit. (They were the kind of lockers you’d find in museums for people to stash their backpacks and larger handbags). DRAT. We didn’t want to walk in the rain and get our suitcases soaked. My husband suggested we just go eat lunch at the restaurant adjacent to the train station, hop back on the next train and spend the rest of the day in Zurich. I really wanted to see this town! So while he ate lunch and kept his eye on our dry suitcases, I found my way into the medieval town. It was worth a stop, even for less than an hour and in the rain! It was such a picturesque, “stepping back into time” kind of place. I gawked at the painted facades – even the overhangs of the roofs and windows were painted on their undersides. I hustled back over the bridge over the river to the train station, where we caught the train to the Zurich airport.

We dropped out suitcases off at the airport hotel and headed into Zurich. Zurich’s airport is close to town, so getting to Zurich was an easy thing to do (there was a train station within walking distance of our hotel). By now the rain had cleared and it was sunny in Zurich. (If only that happened 4 hours earlier!!)

We had been to Zurich before and knew it wasn’t the greatest of all the places in Europe we’ve been to. I noticed the Swiss National Museum was next door to the main train station, and we figured that would be a great thing to do. We only fairly recently “discovered” national museums and found every one we went to pretty fascinating, so we were looking forward to this one as well. This one was a let down b/c extensive renovations were going on and much of it was closed off. The part that was open was around the perimeter of the large building and very awkward to get to – in one area we climbed a huge (not exaggerating) flight of steps, only to be led back downstairs a few yards later. Some of the exhibits were interesting (jewelry) but overall I would have skipped this one until renovations are completed.

We went out to walk around, across the bridges, with no plan except to find some small interesting streets. I have learned to research restaurants b/c without some knowledge, we too often have ended up at disappointing tourist traps. I didn’t do that for Zurich, since we didn’t plan on coming into town. My husband saw one with a good looking menu, so we stopped in. It was a tourist restaurant – but it was very atmospheric and the food was good. It was a former ammunition storage facility and had a lot of old time ambience. It looked like it could get quite crowded, but we had a nice meal. It was a good find!

Thus ended our wonderful week in Switzerland.

(Next I will post about logistics - hotels, etc.)....