Wednesday 16 July Seegraben to Freiburg

Ernst was working from home today, so we all had breakfast together in the garden.


Franzi took us for a little walk through the village to see the nearby lake,

then it was off again, detouring past a local crystal/fossil display. We drove to Shaffhausen, to the Rhine Falls. This is the biggest waterfall (by volume) in Europe. It's amazing to see so much water.





We said goodbye to Franzi here, and caught the local bus into Shaffhausen to catch our next series of trains. They took us through the lower Black Forest

to Freiburg. We found the old town to be quite a jewel, with cobbled streets, small water-filled channels running down the streets, and some great 15th and 16th century buildings in narrow winding streets.




A thunderstorm hit while we were having tea (for Kaori - lasagne and roasted vegetables), but it had stopped by the time we finished. At last we have a hotel with working WIFI, so we have caught up on a full week's worth of blogging, to the sounds of a Dixieland Jazz band in the bar downstairs.





Tuesday 15 July Wilderswil to Seegraben

As we left the mountain region, Murphy's Law was alive and well. Glorious sunshine, and snowy mountains everywhere.


But we were on our way, from Wilderswil to Lucerne, via Meirengen.




At Lucerne, we stopped for a couple of hours to check out the city. As all tourists do, we walked across the Kappel Bridge,


and then went up to the old city wall, where we climbed one of the towers.



Then it was off to Zurich.


Here we walked around the old town, then caught a tram up the hill behind Franzi's university and checked out the view.


Back in town we had dinner, then caught another train to Franzi and Ernst's house in Seegraben, where we were able to check emails at last.



Monday 14 July Grindelwald to Wilderswil

Steady rain and heavy cloud greeted us again. We have definitely picked the wrong week to come to Switzerland!

So once again we abandoned our planned train trip up the mountains (saved about $300), and went back down from Grindelwald to Lauterbrunnen, where we caught a bus to the Trimmelbach Falls. This is an amazing series of waterfalls inside caverns in the mountains. Our feet got quite wet and it was very noisy, but it was an interesting walk despite all the vague and unregulatable hordes of tourists.



We left Lauterbrunnen about 14:15,


and were met at Widerswil by Franzi. She drove us to her sister's hotel, then we walked back to the station and caught the train to into Interlaken. We walked around the town, then went up about 1000m in the funicular.


It was a great view, and as we waited for the last ride back, we were sure that the clouds were lifting, and that mountains were appearing in the distance.

Franzi's b-i-law is a well know chef who runs cooking courses in the hotel, and cooks at the best establishments in town when they have important occasions. They were away for their day off, but we still had a 5 course dinner in the dining room. Outside, a school band from UK were giving an open air concert, and we went to see them. But in the other direction the clouds had indeed lifted, the moon was shining, and the mountains were glowing.





Sunday 13 July Zermatt to Wilderswil

It was raining when we got up, just lightly, but there was a lot of thick low cloud about, and we couldn't see a thing. We presumed that it would not be worth going up the mountain early, so took our time to pack up, and on our way down through the town we went to the English Church for their morning service. Lots of good hymn singing.


After morning tea with the locals and visitors, we called back to the souvenir shop where we had purchased the yodelling beaver keyring for new baby Lachlan Hadfield. We had been charged double but the woman behind the counter was totally uninterested and couldn't have been less helpful. I wish now I had just gone and taken another, since we had paid for two.

The Gornergrat railway station was showing a CCTV shots from the mountaintop, total grey,


and the fare was about Fr76, 9=$76), so we decided to cut our losses, and just got the 11:39 ttrain back to Visp.

There we changed to an Italian CisAlpine train en route from Milan to Bern, which wisked us through a very long tunnel in next to no time. We changed again at Spiez and Interlaken, (where it was starting to rain again)


and ended up in Grindelwald by about 5:30.
We found the hostel, waited lose to an hour for their computer to check us in, then went walkbout By now it was raining again. We found a supermarket and bought makings for tea tonight and breakfast. The internet never came good all evening.




Saturday 12 July G;arus to Zermatt

It wasn't quite raining, but there was low cloud about. We had breakfast with Ursi and Chasper, before he went downstairs to the office (they still live above the shop), and Ursi drove us 20 mins to another town where we would have needed to change from the Glarus train - and I think we would have missed our connection if she hadn't. It was sad to have to say goodbye already, but now we can keep in touch from time to time by email. At Chur it had been raining for some time, but nevertheless we boarded the Glacier Express, and then sat back in our first class panorama coach for the 6 hour ride to Zermatt.


As the route is through the valleys, there was always a rushing stream beside us, and little villages and barns along the way. It rained for a lot of the time, which meant that our photos are of spotty windows as well as reflections, but they will remind us of some spectacular scenery.




We reached Zermatt at about 5:45, which gave us some time for window shopping.

Just before we got to the Fondue restaurant recommended by our new landlord, we looked up and caught sight of Matterhorn through the clouds. We took this as a good omen, that though we didn't have the camera, we'd see the mountain again in the morning.



Friday 11 July Fussen to Glarus

Our landlord kindly drove us to the station in time for our 8:05 train. We made our mid-journey interchange ok, or so we thought, until the ticket inspector told us that we had to change again. I couldn't work this out, until we discovered that the train broke in half along the way, and we were in the wrong end. We got to Lindau at about 11:20, which left us only 20 mins to find out where and how to catch the boat across Bodensee (Lake Constance). This was the tightest connection we had to make, and by the time the ticket seller had got rid of some mad tourists who didn't know what they wanted, we made the boat by about 4 mins. (Another traveller who'd come with us from Fussen didn't.) So there we were, boating across Lake Con on a beautiful summer's day, watching the codgers in their sailing boats, and thinking about you know who.


At Rorschach we obtained some Swiss Francs and caught a train to Buschs, where we were met by Ursi (Jenny) Campell, who was a Scout who'd stayed with us prior to the world Jamboree in 1988. It was great to see her again. She drove us through Leichtenstein,


and on to her home in Glarus,

where she and her husband have taken over her family's shoe shops business. We settled into their guest appartment in the garden, then went for a quick walk around a bit of the town.


We were then joined by Franzi (Blauer) Huber, who'd come up from Zurich, and we 4 went out for dinner at a local restaurant by a lake in the mountains

(while Ursi's husband Chasper minded their 15mth boy - girls aged 6 and 4 were away with her parents.) We had a lovely evening. We took the laptop and showed them the very brief slide show I'd put together of our last 10 years, and Franzi had bought her 1988 photo album. The two girls hadn't seen each other for about 12 years, so they also had some catching up to do.

A thunderstorm came up while we were eating, which bodes ill for the days ahead.



Thursday 10 July Fussen

We left our washing with the landlord, and walked into town to catch the local bus back to Hohenschwangau to see the two famous castles. There are so many tourists (esp USA and Jap), and they have worked out a regimented way to deal with them all. Tickets must be bought first, and they give you a tour number and time. You must present yourself at the turnstile when your tour number is displayed and off you go. You visit Hohenschwangau first, which was the family home of King Maximilian of Bavaria,


then 2 hours and a short bus trip later you're at Neuschwanstein, the 'fantasy-land' castle built by Max's son Ludwig.

They are both filled with paintings, furniture and other items - gold and silver, but you can't take photos inside. The views from both are breathtaking.


We finished there in the early afternoon, and back in Fussen walked along the river and through the old town for a while.


We bussed home to collect the computer, then came back to an internet cafe we'd seen and spent 2 hours catching up on mail and a full week's worth of blogging. By the time we'd had tea the buses had stopped so we walked back home again and spread our still wet washing around the room.