Sunday, 12 October 2014

Swiss Holiday 2 - Into Switzerland

Sunday October 12th
We arose at some ungodly hour this morning, so as to have breakfast and be packed and downstairs by 8.15. I rather overestimated the time it would take us, and must remember that an hour and a half will be sufficient for showering, packing and breakfasting in future! Fortunately, there's no need for such an early start tomorrow.

We walked back across the square to Cologne station to catch our train into Switzerland, which was late and then came in on a different platform to the one advertised, where we had been standing for about 20 minutes. So we had a mad dash down one huge set of stairs and up another - just like what's always happening at London Bridge, especially when you're carrying a big suitcase!

The journey took all day, from 9 until 5, and I'm afraid parts of it weren't very interesting. After we left Cologne, the train went along the banks of the Rhine, so there would have been an opportunity to see all the castles again, had it not been for the very heavy mist. Visibility was low, and the tops of the hills couldn't be seen at all.


I suspect this town could be Konigswinter, but I'm far from sure, as you couldn't possibly see if Drachenfels castle was looming over it or not.

I had another disappointment with the Lorelei, as you can see.


This one was even more foggy than the last time we went past it, when we were on the boat. I seem doomed never to get a very clear photo of it!

As we passed further along the Rhine, I took a number of photos of Die Pfalz, the sweet little castle in the middle of the river. Most of them were terrible, but I did get one very good one. Then when I was deleting all the poor ones, I deleted the good one by mistake! This is the town just below Die Pfalz.


I think I'm correct in saying that it's Kaub, the town which became very rich as a result of all the customs duty charged by Die Pfalz.

We continued on until we made another stop in Mainz. After Mainz, we turned away from the Rhine and headed towards Switzerland. The weather improved, but the land was largely flat and not very interesting. There was a long stop in Basel, where three carriages on our train were uncoupled and coupled to a different train, and we set off towards Zurich and the Chur.

Zurich is the largest city in Switzerland, and is set at the northern tip of Lake Zurich. The railway passes along the western side of the lake, so there was some opportunity for photos, though there are rather a lot of houses built close to the lake.


Photographs are not easy out of the train window, especially when the train is travelling so fast, so I seem to have taken a lot of photographs of bushes, trees and other trains, all of which leapt into my viewfinder between my pressing the shutter and the camera taking the picture. And of course, I have plenty of photos of the window reflections, like this one above. It does show the lovely calm lake though.

The areas round the lake are quite built up, so it's also hard to see the lake between all the smart houses.


The lake is also extensively used for leisure, so there are marinas all along it, as well as jetties and boat houses like this one. And there are large and small boats.


This one is obviously some sort of excursion boat, and it seems to be absolutely packed - not perhaps surprising on a beautiful sunny Sunday afternoon.

As we progressed further south, we began to see the mountains, and by the time we reached the end of the lake, there were mountains on both sides.



You can see all the wonderful folds in the rocks, and the jagged peaks standing out against the sky. The little beach at this end of the lake is the only beach I have seen - mostly, the lake margins seemed very rocky.

Our train continued on and eventually reached Chur, (which is pronounced 'Coor'.) Here, the hotel staff collected our baggage from the station and took it to our rooms, while we walked the short distance through the town to our hotel, which is in the old part of the town.



Dinner was in the hotel tonight, and was something of a local speciality - a ham cooked inside a loaf of bread. It makes a nice change to eat the food of the country; the food on the boat down the Rhine was lovely, but it was International rather than German. So it makes a nice change to have local specialities.

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