Switzerland: climbing the Alps, chocolate and cheese

Switzerland is one of my new favorite places in the world. This past weekend, Kevin and I traveled to this land filled of mountains, clocks, and of course, chocolate. We left Friday night with the whole walk to bus to bus to airport thing. We spent the night there which is actually not as bad as I thought; however I did have the last Harry Potter book on hand to pass the time. We flew to Zürich the next morning at 6 am.

 

Zürich is located in the center of the nation and is the the largest city in Switzerland. It's a really cool place to walk around. Most of sites are all around the downtown train station.

The Fraumünster and St. Peter's which has the largest clock face in Europe

After a few hours in Zürich, we traveled by train to Luzern/Lucerne. Luzern is a smallish city about an hour away from Zürich. 

There is quite a lot to see in Luzern including Mt. Pilatus and Lake Luzern. The entire city is walkable.

The Kapellbrücke, or Chapel Bridge was built in 1333 and is the oldest covered wooden bridge in Europe. Sadly, the bridge caught fire in 1993 and destroyed a majority of the original bridge.

The Lion Monument was created to honour the fallen Swiss guards who protected the royal family during the French Revolution in 1792.

View from the city walls built in 1386

On Sunday morning, we went hiking towards Mt. Pilatus. The mountain is named after a local legend which says Pontus Pilate was buried there and haunts the mountaintop. There are cable cars and the world's steepest cogwheel railway to get up. It was a foggy and rainy day so it wasn't really worth going. We would see white, and more white. So we decided hiked up to Kreisenregg, which is about a third up the mountain.
We passed lush Swiss hills and mountains.

Then through a forest changing its colors for autumn.

On our way down, the Forbidden Forest from Harry Potter appeared. I was looking around for centaurs and You-know-who. 

Things I have learned about Switzerland

1) It is a beautiful country full of lush green mountains, forests turning into rich reds, yellows and oranges and crystal clear lakes complete with swans.

2) The fountains all over the cities have water free for drinking. It's pretty tasty too.

3) It is expensive. Although the dollar is about equal to the Swiss franc, the prices still got lost in conversion. Try $12 for a big mac or $7.50 for a tall hot chocolate. We went to the local grocery store and cooked most of our food. Of course, we got some chocolate and cheese. I'll post on Salt & Spatula soon.

Colorful Swiss Francs

We ended our trip sitting by Lake Zurich feeding the ducks and swans. This was such a great trip. I would really love to come back and do some more hiking in the Alps. We were able to see the wonders of God's creation all around us. We're staying in Southern England this weekend, maybe a day trip to Dover or Whitstable is in order. We'll see.