Swiss Family C - 2008

Family
Originally uploaded by writerinresidence

The holiday's eight days were each and all more than ably planned by our own personal travel expert T - such that we had a taste of city delights, and to paraphrase the Osmonds, a little bit country, a little bit rock and roll, and a lot of death-defying rides in cable cars and alpine mountain trains.

We flew into Zurich and hopped on the train for Lucerne - just 40 minutes away. That first day, we did a walking tour of the city, feeding the swans and mallards on the lake, and crossing the old bridge across the river, seeing the lion monument and climbing a hill to a castle that offered amazing views of the lake, the picturesque city and its breathtaking snow-capped alps.There we spent three nights, taking day trips to the mountains - Engleberg for Tetlis - an awesome 3000m above c-level and even a lake cruise to Viznau so we could climb Mt. Rigi. Day 4, we transferred to the tiny town of Lauterbrunnen via Interlacken. T found a very well-priced flat just next to glacial falls. There we spent another three nights - including new year's eve - and went up to the alpine villages of Murren and Wengen. At Murren, we even went all the way up to the peak of Mt. Schilthorn for spectacular views of the trio of alps - Monch, Eiger and Jungfrau. On January 2, we ran for the trains for a day trip in the beautiful medieval town of Bern to see two bear mascots in the pits, finally ending up once more in Zurich and catching our flight home at noon on the 3rd. In all, three cities and four mountain villages.

The other good thing was being stress - (strasse!) free with no driving at all. As T rightly pointed out, the Swiss train system is excellent - clean, well kept and run frighteningly on the dot. And as we packed with consummate skill (just one roller and one backpack each), moving from spot to spot was fairly easy, giving us only the very slightest difficulty.

Apart from all those alps, these were the high points, pun intended: there was a terrific sled ride on Mount Pilatus, a terrifyingly treacherous sled ride down the slopes of Tetlis' surrounding hills all the way down to the town of Engleberg, during which we actually opted to park the kids' sleds and take one each on ours. Finally, there was a nicely manageable ride down from the Allmend hills to the village Wengen. There were also the real pleasures of a lake cruise and a hardy snow mountain hike - in particular the 55 minute jaunt down Mt Rigi.

Now, it's onto the next adventure of the new year...