Swiss Trip (2005 Aug 26-29)

I had been thinking about putting a travelogue, but was just deferring due to laziness. So finally here it goes about our (means me and my wife) Swiss trip during the August long weekend.

Switzerland - Country famous for alps, scenic pictures of all types, bears, a whole town being given the status of world heritage, cuckoo clocks, knives, watches and what not.
Before landing into this country, there were apprehensions on the weather conditions because of recent floods that flooded the cities of Lucern and overflowing of lakes at the Interlaken. But that was put to rest when we finally landed, the weather was pleasant during all our outings adding to the beautiful sun shine and clement breeze.

I am basically a little lazy in setting up things and so when my wife wished to go to Swiss, I was just thinking of how to plan for this. As God is great and I am lucky, one of my newly married friend was also interested in going to Swiss with wife and he found out that there is a tour operator (of Indian origin) having a planned tour to Swiss. We booked for the trip together. A good amount of pounds need to be paid but served my purpose of not having to plan anything about accomodation or travel tickets for places to visit.

Our trip was starting on Aug 26th and were supposed to return on Aug 29. Aug 29 was a bank holiday and I took a leave off on 26th. We reached the airport and realised that we were wrong about flight timings. We reached the airport around 4:30 for the flight at 5:30 am. But, the flight was actually at 8:30 am. Alas! we missed a good 3 hour sleep which would have lightened the head before a trip.
As such we did an early check in as soon as the tour manager contacted the check-in counter with details of tour passengers.
As I observed, most of the tourists with us were of Indian origin. We boarded the upper floor of one of the two double decker buses in Zurich.
Our outing started off from Zurich town with a lunch at McDonald's. Zurich town was quite neat and clean unlike the high streets of London. Zurich town's conspicuous things were all types of teddy bear mascots along the streets. The bears wore the outfits of the popular figures of world like Mickey, Donald, Sherlock holmes, spacetraveller etc. It was Zurich's way of paying tribute to all and at the same time adding a beauty to the gorgeous town.
Next alighting was at 'Rhein Falls'. It was not so much great as I thought the falls I had seen in Kerala and near Bangalore were more exhilarating in experience. The good part was the boat ride taking just near the falls and the boat shaking and receiving bumps with change of force as water falls erradically. Took some snaps with my new camera 'Canon Powershot S2-Is' that I bought for this trip. Finally the bus took us to our resting grounds on the end of first day and we checked in to our rooms in the hotel Novotel near the Zurich airport. Some time later all were taken to Dinner at an Indian restaurant called the Maharani. Food was good and the hunger made it more tasty.

2nd Day was a trip to Mt. Pilatus. The bus ride to the railway station ALPANACHSTAD was great with both sides of the roads with total verdure and mountains alike. Tour manager handed over the route ticket of train journey from Alpanachstad to Pilatus and from Pilatus to Einfach through ropeway(gondolas). The highlight of the train journey was that this was 'The world's steepest cogwheel railway' about 45 degree grade setup just for tourism purposes. Way to go by Swiss govt and hats off to the tourism department there. If our government/people also thought taking such risks in Kashmir, Himachal and Uttaranchal it would have done a great lot of good to our people, states and country. Anyway that is a different thought for a separate post. The journey up with superb views around with the subtle sounds of the cow bells on the cows, sheeps were all fascinating. The view from the different peaks of the Pilatus were astounding. One can see many snow capped mountains or mountains flooded with grass.
As it was afternoon time we went to the restaurant to have our lunch. Being a vegetarian my wife found some vegetarian dishes listed and I asked the waiter on what it contains as I didnt want anything with cheese. The waiter started speaking and boiled vegetables and ended up with some type of fish. Aing! what is fish doing in a vegetarian dish, when enquired the waiter replied that fish is quite vegetarian and has been taken out of fresh lake. When instructed that we dont want fish, the reply was spanked about the guys frustration, he finally said that I would give a plate full of vegetables - will that be okay!..Finally selected one of the vegetarian dishes without a fish or cheese and ordered it. Even more surprisingly the food tasted good.
After lunch our return journey downwards was through gondola for around 45 mins. Obviously the journey was good downwards. Towards evening we were taken to Lucern town for the statue of 'Crying Lion' thing - I don't remember the exact name for the Lion. Then shopped for various swiss specialities like swiss watches, cuckkoo clocks and some souveniers. Had dinner at Indian restaurant in Lucern arranged by the tour manager. Quite okay.

3rd day destination was Jungfraujoch-the top of europe (highest peak of europe at 11782 ft). While going there halted at the famous Interlaken for some good views and little shopping and then at Trummelbach falls. The distinctiveness of this falls was that it was formed with multiple water falls cascading over the rocks and giving a unique look at each point. So caves were built across to give a close look at each cascading point. It also had a corkscrew fall where the water was going down in a 'screwing' style aided by rocks. We reached Jungfraujoch peak by changin two trains. As we were going up, the views of clouds merging with snow, snows melting into water falls on steep sides of mountains and centigrade getting lower were all experienced. At the top the highlights were the snow capped peak, Ice musuem, caves surrounding the peak, trekking paths, miles of snow and kilometres of clouds. A good sunshine, clear sky and snow were god's greatest gift that day. Finally after playing with snow, trying to glide on the snow on a slant were all small adventures were some of the beautiful things etched in the memory. Didnt realise that snow had actually made the trousers wet which kept me cool.
Finally came back through the same route, dinner at Maharani ending the scheduled plan of the tour.
Now the flight was next day evening and we had a whole day to spend, so our tour manager with some over-zealous guys managed to get the required people (including us) for a trip to Swiss capital 'Bern'. So our 4th day was at Bern. Interesting fact about Bern is that the whole of old city has been declared as the 'World Heritage Center' by UNESCO. Good thing is that no vehicles causing pollution are allowed inside. We had a walk around the streets, saw the famous cuckoo clock although it failed to strike at 1:00 pm when we were waiting for it do something. On the sides were Albert Einstein's birth place, a bear pit which actually I didnt like as bears were confined to a small place. Some snaps in front of the parliament and the swiss bank, a visit to botanical gardens(which actually is nothing compared to Ooty's or Lal bagh) was all a part of Bern trip.
Finally we were at Zurich airport in the evening, back home in London after a great great holiday.