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      Trip Report Wrenwood's 2nd ( but not last!) Trip to Switzerland

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      6/14
      Left 40 minutes late from IAD to Geneva, but arrived 10 minutes early. For the first time we did Economy plus and those 5 extra inches are BIG! I actually slept a little! Disappointed as very cloudy coming into Europe although I did see Cornwall, England where we will be in September/October, I thought that was very exciting! .............not so DH when I smacked him awake :)

      6/15
      Arrived at Geneva Airport, collected our 2 SMALL suitcases ( I did it!) and headed for the railway office where they stamped and activated our Swiss Rail Passes. So on to Gate 3 to pick up our train headed towards Brig. The trip was very pretty, the lake, with the “pre-Alps” beyond, and Vineyards everywhere!!!!! All those Vineyards, how come the Swiss only export about 3% of their wine, truly unfair!

      Got off at Visp and picked up the Matterhorn Gotthard Bahn to Zermatt. I hadn’t really read very much about this part of the trip, but we thought it was pretty spectacular. We had the windows down and kept going from side to side. Incredibly deep gorge/canyon, the 1991 landslide outside Randa, and always those snow covered peaks in the distance. Incredibly green, lots of wildflowers. More wildflowers. More wildflowers. Lots of wildflowers.

      Got into Zermatt and called Bella Vista Hotel on our new E-kit global cell phone. Franz picked us up in the Hotel’s electric car and off we went. The Hotel is everything nice said about it on Trip Advisor, the owners warm and welcoming. They took us up to our room, and we immediately walked out on our balcony to gawk at the Matterhorn, of course, partially hidden by clouds. We decided we would eat at the Hotel later that night ......... although I did tell Franz that I just couldn’t eat bunny, so I got pork instead.

      In the meantime we walked into town to grab a small pizza and some CHOCOLATE. Walked around town, visited the small English Church. We loved the paintings on the walls inside.............

      : O : YE : ICE & SNOW : BLESS : YE : THE : LORD :

      : O : YE : FROST & COLD : BLESS : YE : THE : LORD :

      Outside were many headstones of people who perished on the Matterhorn or climbing.

      We went back to Bella Vista, had a short nap, and then a very nice simple dinner cooked by Franz. And some Swiss wine, oh yum.

      6/16
      Up early for a marvelous breakfast. Put the oranges in the machine and you have fresh squeezed OJ. Huge selection of cheeses, meats, bread, yogurts, jams, nice fresh fruit cup, cereals etc. They would also cook eggs for you if you liked. Steaming hot coffee and milk, and hot chocolate. My favorite was a Croissant with a Quince jam.

      So, we left one suitcase and a small bottle of Vanilla Plum Liqueur I bought in our room, took the other suitcase, camera etc. and Franz took us back into town to get the 9:15 Glacier Express to St. Moritz. We went to the bakery right by the train station and got some sparkling water and some sandwiches. We already had some apples courtesy of Bella Vista, and some chocolate purchased the day before so we were set.

      We really enjoyed the Glacier Express as a second day, it was so relaxing! We had first class reservations, and as we were beginning to realize, the trains in Switzerland are just wonderful. Byron at BETS made our reservations, and he made sure we had 2 window seats with no one next to us. We had good clear weather except for at Oberalp Pass, which was socked in with clouds and fog. The scenery was varied and for the most part gorgeous, and the commentary on the headphones nice. I would do this again as a first or second day.

      Once we arrived in St. Moritz we called Waldhaus who sent their shuttle to pick us up. I think it was Ingo who said it was a very special experience (altho expensive) and he was right. Like Ashford Castle in Ireland I would recommend Waldhaus to anyone who wants to spend some money and remember the experience of spending it. They greeted us by name, gave us a choice of 2 rooms ( I had emailed them my priorities, they have so many rooms they don’t “describe” them but ask you what is important to you) We chose a small double, with the original 1908 furniture, no balcony, but a very pleasant view. A nice bathroom with a wonderful shower....or shall I say two showers ~ a rain shower and a hand/wall shower. We walked around the Hotel (lovely) and down into Sils Maria (lovely again) I took a lot of pictures of wildflowers the area is very beautiful. Wildflowers. Wildflowers. Sigh.

      And I couldn’t believe it ~ our last Daffodils are finished blooming the end of April ~ and here it was almost the end of June and they still had some Daffodils blooming!

      Dinner that night was very good, although DH thought the service not quite as attentive as Ashford Castle. They had an awesome salad bar (they don’t have it all the time) One of the owners circulated at dinner talking to all of the guests. He immediately apologized to us for not having an “English Menu” ~ the menu was in German, French and Italian. He said he did the menu each morning as the Chef was always changing things and the English menu was the hardest, so he apologized again for being “lazy.” He then proceeded to interpret the whole menu to us! We had a special pork from pigs fed only on acorns ( I think it was acorns...........anyway it was excellent) We couldn’t finish all of our red wine, so we asked if we could take the bottle back to our room to finish. No problem, but more on that later.

      So off to bed and the next day on to SOGLIO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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