After our usual ‘stuff ourselves to the brim’ breakfast we hit the road. I took my strongest hayfever meds and didn’t suffer too badly in the morning. At about 12pm we cycled through Landeck, a larger town than any we’d seen so far.
We cycled past Jane and Rutherford, who stopped for a chat and said they’d just been to a chemist! So I went in and bought two replacement bottles of nasal spray and two bottles of eye drops, which now brings my total quantity of hay fever meds to seven.
We stopped at a cafe for a drink which turned out to be more like a dessert – a very ice cream heavy iced chocolate and iced coffee. They came with three long wafers to scoop up the icecream. Delicious!
Heading out of Landeck was a bit of road riding, then gravel, then a lovely tarmac bike path.
Not far out of Landeck we saw this interesting ruin. Imagine living up there! You certainly wouldn’t be popular with the postman.
Lots of horses around, particularly palominos.
We stopped in a little village to refill our soft water bottles and found this curious religious statue. Is it Mary or Eve? Or is this a commentary on how all the women in the bible are either mothers or of ill repute?
A little further along we decided to stop at what looked like a charming little cafe.
It seemed small but was like the tardis as we went in.
Hundreds of seats and a dozen different shops. From the other side it was clearly a Highway service station. We ended up buying ice cream and sitting outside. Coconut for me, caramel for Luke.
The day’s ride was pretty easy compared to the previous days and, apart from a wrong turn down an extremely low and creepy (probably haunted) tunnel, we made it to our hotel without too many worries.
So many cobwebs!No fun!
The path was a lot easier in every way and so we made pretty good time, arriving around 3pm.
Time for a drink at the restaurant.
Most of our discussion over drinks revolved around the excessive number of flies in Switzerland and Austria and the complete lack of flyscreens. No matter where you sit they are landing on your plate and no one else seems terribly bothered by them.
We ended up having dinner at 6, knudels (mac and cheese) and salad for me, cordon Bleu and chips for Luke. mine had dried caramelised onions on top, which I will have to try at home because it was a great combo.
Prices continue to become more reasonable the further we get from St Moritz
I’d like to say we went out partying but I was asleep by 7pm and didn’t wake up until after 5am. I think the relief of having enough medication to make the trip enjoyable was such a great weight of my mind I could properly relax.
Our room at the hotel was nice too, spacious with a balcony lined with purple petunias.
Roomy!Mountain views
Poor Luke was up until 11 playing games with his headphones in.
I’d like to say we slept well but for no good reason that I can think of, the church in Zernez rings the bells on the hour 24 hours a day. I definitely heard the 11pm, midnight, 2am and 4am bells. Also the pillows were terrible, which we are coming to expect. Complain complain! I know, but travel isn’t all fun and I think the bad bits are often more memorable or notable.
Anyhow, breakfast was not newsworthy at all (basic Scandinavian breakfast of cold meats, cheeses, yogurt etc), apart from seeing Jane and Rutherford in the breakfast room and learning that they too are Wordle players.
Goodbye Zernez, with your excellent pool and your terrible church.
The church bells rang for 9am just as we cycled out of Zernez.
The morning’s ride began with gravel, some steep ups and downs that were made much easier with the e-bikes. Rutherford had pointed out that all the gravel would be much easier going if we’d had better tyres and I couldn’t help thinking about this as I juddered along. It was nowhere near as bad as the previous day though.
We saw our first covered bridges, which were difficult to photograph in the bright sunlight.
Initially our ride was fairly low in the valley and close to the river.
We rode through very picturesque little villages and along quiet roads. Usually I have to angle my camera to get shots without people, but that hasn’t been a problem since we left Zürich – the Engardin valley seems almost deserted. There’s the Swiss version of the Tour de France next weekend – for those who find the original too easy perhaps? So it will no doubt get busier soon. We’re very lucky to have the paths and tracks almost to ourselves.
Halfway through the morning we were very much not on the valley floor but halfway up the side. In most places there were no rails or fences and having to ride on the right side and close to the edge made me quite anxious. It’s very strange to be somewhere so beautiful and dramatic but not be able to look at it without stopping.
Of course we did stop quite frequently to take photos, and only having to travel 30km meant we didn’t have far to go. I was glad of the early start though as my hayfever wasn’t great and my eyes were watering quite a bit.
The third last village we went through, Ardez, was so beautiful! The houses were very traditional and had some amazing art painted on them that seemed very Gaelic to me.
Look at the detail!
The whole town was lovely, if completely silent. Switzerland has frequently reminded me of Japan and the quietness is another of those attributes. The others are the proliferation of natural springs, wood-based architecture and high prices. Both also suffer from frequent and devastating natural disasters (earthquakes and avalanches) as well as warmongering neighbours. Also both are places where you’ll regularly see everyday people in traditional costume. The more I think about it, the more similarities there are!
The church was perhaps the most plain building in the place.
The best part of the day was between the third and second last villages. It was a pristine stretch of asphalt that didn’t allow motorised vehicles. Only bikes and hikers! It also had a barrier between us and the vertical drop down the side most of the time so I could relax a little.
We stopped at a cafe at the second last village and had a drink, trying to delay our arrival at the hotel until a reasonable hour.
A very frothy cappuccino Cafe in Ftan and no, I do not know how to pronounce it.
The last stretch was great quality road but steep hairpin bends and more traffic, including a number of trucks. I sat on my brakes the whole way down – sitting on the right again meant being on the edge of a drop. I didn’t love it (I hated it) but the hotel wasn’t far from the end of the descent.
The hotel was lovely, the staff were friendly, the immediate surrounds smelled like a mound of freshly-produced cow manure. Not a small amount of manure either, like a herd of a thousand cows had all gathered here to poop for a month. Still, the place did have an indoor pool.
But first, our room. It was magnificent.
If you’ve been to my house or followed our renovations, you’ll know how much I love wood panelling.
The quilts (you always get one each) were in a heart shape! Aww!
We even had a little lounge area. The views from the windows were excellent too.
The cable car run is right outside.Mountains!
It was delightful. Also we had places to plug in all our devices, which we hadn’t in the last hotel. We did some hand washing of undies then headed to the hotel’s pool.
We had it to ourselves for most of the time and it was 27 degrees, very nice!
I wasn’t keen to go outside in the late afternoon and reignite my hayfever (also… manure smell) so Luke went for a walk while I had a rest. He discovered that everything was downhill from the hotel, which made walking back a bit exhausting.
We had dinner booked in the hotel at 7. I had carbonara but Luke had schnitzel, which he’d been looking forward to since we got to Switzerland. And it was only $70 AUD (ouch) but cheaper than Zürich prices and a very generous serve.
Not pictured: a bowl of chips. Which I ate half of because I like to help Luke out when I can. Yes, I’m a Samaritan, guilty as charged!
I splashed out on TWO glasses (100ml each, wtf) of wine that at $12 each were almost at Melbourne prices.
Now we’re lying in bed watching YouTube videos and sending thoughts and prayers to our washing so it dries by morning.
A few more photos of the day to finish.
Luke doing a weird pose.Classic SwitzerlandMore tractorsDetailed signage. Beautiful buildings with charming detail.
I’m hoping tomorrow will be less hectic than the last few days… it’s a 51km day so fingers crossed for us and our sore hindquarters!
We had left ourselves a free day in Lauterbrunnen to see things in the area that caught our eye. First up was a Swiss culture festival that was being held up a nearby mountain.
We caught the usual assortment of trains and cable cars and arrived at Männlichen on a bright and sunny morning.
It turns out that there’s nothing but a hotel, playground and viewing point at the top, plus a herd of cows with bells to make it all one hundred percent Swiss. You could hear everyone stepping out of the cable car station making ‘oooh’ noises because the scene was just so pretty.
Wildflowers everywhere, snow-capped mountains all around and Grindelwald visible down the valley in the distance. We took some photos and had a wander then made our way to the hotel, where all kind of Swiss things were happening on the deck.
Alpenhorn!
Whip cracking demonstration. I don’t know if it’s actually easy or he was just really good at it.
We watched for a while and took some photos but it was all pretty similar to the music we’d seen in the last two days so we headed to our next activity, a cog-wheel train to Schynnige Platt. Even though this train had been on the map as an activity, it had looked pretty short and so we expected it to go to a low plateau where the Alpine Botanical Garden was reputed to be.
It turned out to be probably the most scenic ride we took in our whole time there! The sides of the little train were open, which meant it was much better for taking photos and videos (no reflection) and it took about forty minutes to get to the top.
There was not a whole lot there but we had a quick look at the Alpine Garden and then sat and had some lunch at the hotel. It was a perfect day with amazing visibility and pleasantly cool at that altitude.
If you go up Schynige Platt go to the top level of the hotel restaurant.
We had thought about trying to make it to Trümmelbach Falls afterwards but ran out of time so Luke visited them the next morning before we left while I packed my bag.
View from the Schynige Platt railway
We were very sad to leave the Bernese Oberland. By far our favorite place that we’d visited so far and it had raised a very high (unfairly high, some would say) bar for Geneva to reach. I don’t often go to countries and think that I would happily move there but Switzerland makes the list. One day we’ll come back and see it in a different season and visit more of its cities. One day!
Here Comes The Planet 