We’ll be back to Germany for more posts but I wanted to write a little bit about our drive into Switzerland. We took the car ferry from Meersburg to the other side of the Bodensee where we were quickly in Swiss territory.
The Swiss love their well-constructed highways (labeled as “A-Roads”) but we were seriously warned by several Germans not to speed on these gold-plated highways. We traveled with our trusty navigation device which was very, very handy. We started calling it “Myron” in honor of the accordion player on the Lawrence Welk Show. It announced this highway as “Ah-one, Ah-four”. We briefly contemplated finding where the highway was both A1 and A2 so it would announced “Ah-one, Ah-two”. Yes, we’re easily amused…
What’s the first thing you expect to see when you enter Switzerland? Certainly not a car advertising “Restaurant Milwaukee” in a city called Gotzis. Judging from the license plate, Gotzis is in Austria. I wonder what a Milwaukee-themed restaurant in Austria serves….
Doug had researched a more scenic route and we were soon on these smaller roads which still had a uncomfortably brisk speed limit considering the narrowness.
We decided to stop for lunch in the town of Schwyz without knowing a thing about it. Turns out it is a very picturesque town. We ate lunch on a town square where we could see the mountains in the background and historic buildings in the foreground. The view improved when a couple pulled up in a classic Mini. They too were flummoxed by the parking situation and made several passes.
It wouldn’t be a blog entry without a picture of Doug eating something, right?!?!
For a multilingual country where most people speak several of the four national languages (German, French, Italian and Romanish), there was surprisingly little English spoken at the restaurant where we had lunch. We were able to decipher the menu and get by with bits of German and English. Doug did order “Lunch Menu 3” without knowing any more about it than it was probably beef. I stuck with the international word “pizza”. The server directed us in German to the “Salatbuffet” “inklusive” with our lunch special. I had a feeling she used the same simple German vocabulary with her 2 year old nephew or perhaps her cat. We have committed to learning German before our next trip.
The Swiss are master tunnel builders and we were in a lot of them! They probably preserve cute little towns like Schwyz and save many a tourist from having more gray hair from driving on hairpin turns in the mountains with these well-built masterpieces. As far as tunnels go, they were fascinating.
These tunnels are probably funded through the sale of the ‘vignette’ needed to drive on the Swiss highways. We were lucky our rental car already had the yearly pass or we would have had to purchase one at the border for 40 swiss francs or risk “severe fines” from the Swiss polizei.
Our destination was the city of Interlaken in the Berner Oberland region. Interlaken is between two lakes – you know, inter-lake. I didn’t get it at first either. The water in both lakes was this Disney-esque blue color and very, very clear.
The farther we got into the mountains, the smaller and curvier the roads became. This section of the road came BEFORE the “curvy road” sign. The “curvy road” sign was also precisely when the rain started. We met trucks, tour buses and speedy Europeans who apparently hadn’t received the serious warning about Swiss speed limits that we had on these roads. Doug is an excellent navigator and patient passenger while I appreciate the opportunity to drive.
Our hotel in Interlaken was the Post Hardermannli which looked like it should be run by Uncle Duke and Aunt Mary. Flowers everywhere, hand-carved boards…so adorable!
After checking into our hotel, we drove to the village of Lauterbrunnen which lies in the valley with great mountain peeks on each side. It’s a common place for tourists to leave their car here and take a train or cablecar to one of the many car-free towns in the mountains. We decided to do a warm up hike and found some steep steps with a convenient railing up and behind this waterfall.
Time to step carefully – no need to fall off a cliff in the first hour in the mountains.
Doug studied the dreaded “cartoon map” to plot our next course of action while under the waterfall. The course of action was “go back to where we came from and take another trail”.
We hiked up a trail that led through a residential part of Lauterbrunnen. It’s impossible to believe there can be so many cute houses and beautiful flowers in one place until you see it for yourself.
We arrived back at our hotel and eased our way into a prime parking place directly in front of our hotel (not as easy as you would think). We had a nice view of the Jungfrau mountain from our balcony and our very own flower box.
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