Nov 17, 2012 - Lauterbrunnen

Lauterbrunnen was our first stop in Switzerland. As you can see from the pictures, we had a beautiful view of the Alps. It is here that we picked up a tram and then a train to go up into the mountains. We did figure out why you never hear about Switzerland having economic problems. We stopped for lunch along the way. I got a small salad and a Coke and Mike got a braut, fries, and a Coke - it cost 50 Swiss francs (~52 US dollars!)A small tuc was 75Swiss francs! I guess one pays for the view!

Oct 11, 2012 - Hiking in the Swiss Alps!

At 10:45 we walked to the Tourist Info Center to buy tickets we'd need for today's outing: bus from Lauterbrunnen to the cable car up to Gimmelwald (Rick Steves' favorite Swiss Alps village); cable car over to Murren; and cable car from Grutschalp back down to Lauterbrunnen. With our Eurailpass discount we paid 38.60 Swiss francs (about the same in dollars). Not too bad for a whole day seeing and hiking in the Alps! The full bus left town at 11:06 and took us through the pretty L. valley to the cable car station. We had to wait about 30...

Oct 10, 2012 - Day 3 in Lauterbrunnen

Another leisurely morning; what can I say but “this is the life”! Turned cold and rainy so ditched my plan to cut Ivan's hair on the balcony and to go for a long walk in the valley. We ventured out to the post office to mail our last packet of travel brochures and maps to Sequim. Another chance to lighten our luggage a bit. If we were just traveling for a couple of months in one season we could be toting fewer bags but since we left in Feb. and returning in Nov., traveling from the tropics to the Swiss Alps, we needed more layers and...

Oct 9, 2012 - Day 2 in Lauterbrunnen

It rained last night and continues today so now the waterfalls are twice as big and there are twice as many on the cliff walls on both sides of this beautiful valley. We enjoyed another leisurely breakfast followed by reading the daily newspaper. This afternoon we put on our raincoats to go to the local bank to exchange 150 euros for 173.15 Swiss francs. Then it was on to the grocery coop we learned had moved further down the road. There we bought some veggies, meat, cheese (to be stored on the cold balcony), bread, mustard, cereal for...

Oct 8, 2012 - 1st full day in Lauterbrunnen

Ahhh, a leisurely morning; tasty breakfast buffet (with crispy (!) bacon and good coffee); cheerful and helpful waitress; morning newspaper in English. Now THIS is how to start our vacation from our vacation! Although it s a gorgeous sunny day and perfect for getting out and up into the Alps around us, we are not feeling very energetic today. Can't blame it on jet lag so will say it is the let down from the go-go pace of 3 Rick Steves tours in succession. We elected to stay in the hotel to read over the information about trains, funiculars,...

Oct 7, 2012 - 4, oops 5, trains to Lauterbrunnen, CH

We enjoyed visiting with 7 of our group at breakfast. (We didn't all have to leave early.) This group certainly has been a fun and compatible bunch! As we had until our 12:30 taxi to repack we also had time to so some computer work this morning. The taxi ride was all of 5 min. (and cost 15 euros!) to get us to the train station. We were the only ones waiting until 1:06 to catch the train north for Domossola. In Domossola we had plenty of time to make our connection but could not determine if the train on our track was indeed our train. It...

Jun 6, 2012 - Hiking in the Alpines

Alarm went off at 6:30 and I couldn't wait for my 8-hour trek that I mapped out through different towns up the mountains.....it was freezing cold and pouring rain. ;( so sad. Won't back to sleep, depressed. Got up a little later and went with the backup plan: bus-train-bus-5 hour hike. Went up to the Lauterbrunnen, population 2558. Neat little town in the valley. I went to one of the main, continuous waterfalls, draining from the glaciers and hiked up to the top...the waterfall is 900 feet tall and it was loud and in charge. It was neat to...

May 31, 2011 - Switzerland 2

OK, who told the northwest weather how to find us in Europe?! The rains arrived this afternoon, and our clear blue skies are but a memory—at least we have the pictures to prove it was that way when we got here. Today we drove own the valley to the Ballenburg open air museum with buildings from all over Switzerland. We enjoyed comparing to the previous ones in northern Germany and the Black Forest. Families and animals also shared a roof here, but the layouts were a bit different, and there were more wood shingles. Lots of animals of all...

May 30, 2011 - Switzerland

Switzerland…and the blessings of blue skies, white mountains and green hills. We left the Black Forest and returned to the autobahn heading south to Switzerland. We stopped at the border crossing, not to show our passports, but to get the window sticker permitting us to drive on Swiss freeways ($40). Switzerland is expensive, and the franc/dollar are about equal, but prices are higher, period. Almost in the same league as Norway! As we headed to Interlaken and the Alps, I looked in vain for the ‘room with a view’ motel Karen and I found in...

May 20, 2011 - Lauterbrunnen

We are in Lauterbrunnen, which is a little village in the Alps. Yesterday we road the Glacier Express from St. Moritz to Brig. In Brig we switched trains, actually we road on five different trains yesterday to get here. Left at 9:15am got here at 5:30pm. The Glacier Express was incredible. We did share our car with a tour from Taiwan, we were the only occidentals and there was lots of chattering. But we met a few that spoke English and as soon as we said we were from Las Vegas...they smiled and said we love Las Vegas. The train goes very...

Dec 26, 2010 - Lauterbrunnen

Skydiving was called off due to snow!! Bugger so ended up going to Jungfrau instead. So we took a walk into town then caught the train up the Kleine Schdeigg then switched to another train up to Jungfrau - when we were waiting for the 2nd train it was already minus 7 degrees and I was starting to doubt if it was a good idea to go up or not. 15 minutes later the train arrived & we got on and the scenery is amazing! Winter wonderland pictures all the way. when we got up to the top I had some altitude sickness, very hard to catch my breath and...

Dec 25, 2010 - Paris to Lauterbrunnen (Switzerland)

Today we set off from Paris to Lauterbrunnen with some Christmas Carols to start with and followed with a Christmas movie which was Bad Santa. We almost didn't get any lunch today being that it was Christmas Day there wasn't very many places open but we managed to find a little restaurant and all 45 of us went in for lunch. We didn't get into Lauterbrunnen until about 7pm and we had a turkey Christmas dinner which was not too bad, and I wasn't planning on having a big night at all but once we got the drinks started it was quite easy to just...