Tracking the Zermatt weather for the past week, we were convinced that the weather would be pristene on our trip to see the famous Matterhorn. We had heard, and Travis had experienced, that often the weather around the Matterhorn is foggy and hazy and there is not really a good view of the mountain; however, while we sat and stared at the mountain, there was not even one cloud in the bright blue sky. I think the pictures are the best way for you to vicariously experience the mountain jutting straight up. After spending about two hours in Zermatt, we jumped on the train and headed back down the mountain toward a town called Interlaken.
Interlaken means "between lakes," so we made a point to see one. But Interlaken is also a very touristy area, so we made a point to browse a few souveneir shops on the way. After walking on the main shopping street for a kilometer or two, we veered off the main road and found the Aare River which connects the Thunersee and Brienzersee (the two lakes) and followed it to Brienzersee. We soaked in the scenery—the huge blue lake with a bunch of mountains in the background framed by the big blue sky—from a small dock. Actually, just go and look at the pictures for this one, too.
Zurich, although it was not on the original itinerary, has a great place to buy Doner Kabobs in the train station, so, since we were hungry and since Zurich is almost always on our way back to Winterthur, we decided to grab some of the seasoned lamb. Upon arriving in Zurich, Travis remembered someone telling us earlier that week that it was Zuri-fest, a huge festival. Since it was only 8:00pm, we decided to see what all of the hubbub was about. A few other people also decided to see what it was about, and pretty soon we were in the middle of a huge crowd and could barely move. There was some music, but none that really appealed to either one of us—it was much more fun just to dodge in and out of diverse mob of people present as quickly as possible than to listen to the techno that was blaring on the side streets or the German music on the main stage.
Eventually, we navigated the singing and dancing crowds back to the train station. But the day ended as the rest had gone, in fast forward. We made use of our people-dodging, through-crowd-weaving practice by sprinting through half of Switzerland's busiest train station to catch our Inter-City back to home-sweet-home Winterthur. On the train back we refelected on our wild day—we awoke before dawn, spent a total of 11 hours on trains (luckily we purchased day cards and got more than our money's worth out of them) and saw several of the major Switzerland tourist attractions. The sights made all the travel well worth it, and frankly, we wouldn't have it any other way.
1 comment:
Aside from the tourist traps, Interlaken looks awesome.
By the way, I saw a report on CNN about some rather large and impressive crop circles in Switzerland. Has that been in the news there, too? Or are we Yanks the only interested party?
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