27th July 2009

We left Zermatt on 27th morning with the excitement of travelling 7.5 hours at the scenic train which is popularly known as Glacier Express. Glacier express passes thru various cities of swiss literally from west to east. There was not much the entire journey. Its kind of bit tiring but worth trying once. May be as the first thing in Swiss.

Better version of images. Download at Glacier Express

Matterhorn Peak Just before we left Zermatt.

Cute Cap.

Glacier Express. 7.5 hours journey from Zermatt to St.Moritz

Glacier Express Train

1000s of Streams

Sweet Italian aged couple gave us awesome company.

We talked much in monacting. Language issues. :))

Funny isnt it?

The post Glacier Express | Swiss appeared first on Travelogue of a daydreamer.

We quickly collected our luggages from Zurich luggage lockers and caught our train to Lucern. Plan was another train from there to Engeberg. After a quick dark tunnel music concert, train bulleted out to breath normal air. We reached Engelberg around 5ish (pm). Engelberg is a small charming town. People generally stay at Lucerne and day trip this Mt.Titlis. Having much information about this place didnt allow me to do that. So at the foot of Mt.Titlis to stay. ;-). It was between cool and cold and learned that snow will be knee level at winters. Thanks that this is summer.

We took a quick walk after refreshing as the town feels sleepy after 6:30 and I wont find food anywhere. So we quickly grabbed some fruits and visited a Pizzaria (restaurent). oooh the Pizza they served was awesome and I still could say the differences. Having Italy as the border this is no wonder, but to eat such a good Pizza, we felt good and even my wife ignored her usual “Chesse again?” blames for a while.

After that, having 3 long hours to sunset made us to take small walk to the ‘ends’ of the town and to the foot of the Mt.Titlis cable car. As the cold wanted to test our tolerences further we deviated our walking to hotel and hugged our biggest mattresses.

Next day morning we headed to Mt.Titlis with the hope to have clear weather and it was at it best. Thank God. The best thing about the Swiss is, they are dedicated for tourists and they have too many ways to inform tourists. One is Live channels to hotels which telecasts nearby peaks, places weather with Live cam feed. Whatelse I need.

First trip to Trubsee a small meadow and the the journey with a slow rotating gondala which can hold 40 persons but thats not so great these days. Bad thing is the windows of the gondolas are not any more crystal clear. They have scratches and I think they need to replace now. Still the view was breathtaking and I didnt bother about the scratches on those gondalas.

All of a sudden, cold breeze hit us and we took our weapons. Windcheater, glows, snowcap and most importantly UV filtered goggles. I repeat they are very important.

View was awesome and breathtaking. Worth every penny we spend for the cable cars. Swiss is famous for their adventurous projects like this everywhere. They drill hillls, run railway or keep cable cars or cog wheel trains. They makesure we can reach easily. :-p

There is a snow park. Where you could play with Snow tubes and other Snow toys at free of cost. Snow tube was most thrilling. I wish I had my guys to double the fun. And a Ice flyer on which you sit like sitting on a bench and travel almost a mile and thats more thrilling especially when you carry heavy DSLR and a bag with tripod.

It was totally good time we spent there. Then we got some lovely(?!) Indian food right at Mt.Titlis (ofcourse at highcosts). Then we went back to Trubsee and took Trotti bike to the base of the Engelberg. That even more thrilling and a must do for all travellers. Its very safe, easy to ride and funny. Views are breathtaking all the way. It was awsome, however my wife fell once and the rest of the day she blamed me for that. saying, I didnt “teach” her.

Hmmmm.. Having such good experiences we started to Interlaken from Engelberg. There were 2 trains from engelberg to Lucern at just 11 mins interval. I was so curious to know why this hourly service and 11 mins gap between two. Later I learned that both the trains are same, just to reach foothills they run it as two trains and once it reach foothills both the trains to be joined. Interesting isnt it?

Catch you at Interlaken one..

Better version of images. Download at Mt.Titlis

Zurich to Engelberg

Zurich to Engelberg

Zurich to Engelberg

Zurich to Engelberg

Zurich to Engelberg

Zurich to Engelberg

Zurich to Engelberg

Zurich to Engelberg

Zurich to Engelberg

Zurich to Engelberg

Zurich to Engelberg

Zurich to Engelberg

Zurich to Engelberg

Zurich to Engelberg

Zurich to Engelberg

Near our hotel

Damn crane

Mt.Titlis

There is a cross at top, almost at all nearby peaks.

Time is 9PM and I took a walk not to miss the cold breeze.

Engelberg

Engelberg town

Engelberg park :))

Titlis at focus distance..

Testing my skills

Testing my skills

Testing my skills

Testing my skills

Testing my skills

Testing my skills

“Its late and cold. I cant pose”

okay – for orkut sake..

well – I have a huge penthouse there and I would like to rent..

Engelberg

Engelberg outskirts, in 5 mins walk. But sweet little charming town.

No way I get the name of the flowers.

Engelberg

Engelberg

Early morning.. on the way to Mt.Titlis

@Mt.Titlis

Snow groomer at its work.

We with the shutter..

Well – cant afford to show this pic to Tom Cruise as he might loose next MI.. (ok… no more tomatoes)..

In reality Snow is strong and one hit you could really feel the pain.. :))

@Mt.Titlis

@Mt.Titlis

@Mt.Titlis

Ice Flyer

Trübsee and Jochpass

Trübsee and Jochpass

Glacier park. We with Snowtubes.

Glacier park. We with Snowtubes.

Glacier park. We with Snowtubes.

@Mt.Titlis

Just saving myself not get hit with a snowcake.

View from the Rotaair cable car

View from the Rotaair cable car

View from the Rotaair cable car

From Trübsee.

From Trübsee lake

From Trübsee lake

Trotti bike.

:->

Poor girl, fell down once and Grrrrrrrrr with me..

Trubsee to Engelberg

Trubsee to Engelberg

View halfway

View of Engelberg

View of Engelberg

View of Engelberg

One for the road!

The post Mt. Titlis and Engelberg| Swiss appeared first on Travelogue of a daydreamer.

Let me start from the interesting point here..

Hope you are finished reading Paris the previous article, ‘coz this continues from there. Having done with the nasty kiddish work of Air-France with our Luggage, we wanted rest of the trip to be smooth and so good. Infact It was. Little uneasy start but rest were awesome. Great infact.

We reached Zurich around 8:30 PM on 19th of July 2009. I got my Swiss first class saver Swiss rail pass activated for the next 8 days. Buy Swiss pass from the country you start or buy online which is upto 40% lower than there. Interesting fact is Europe (EU) citizens cant use these Swiss passes, just we could. ;-). As it was a new place, I was hoping for newer things eventhough I was well equipped personal timetables, train numbers etc. But Swiss railyways are the easiest and simplest ones in terms of understanding. Note Gate (gleis), Time thats all you need at stations. Then if you have first class (like us), stand near the right wagon to hop on easily.

We had our reservations at Hotel Atlantis Guest house. Note Atlantis Hotel was there 5 years ago which was Sheroton’s chain. Now its being run by others. Guesthouse acts as hotel now and the old hotel for the past 5 years as asylum. I had google maps, navigator apps, printouts of hotel, hotel path and what not. This sweet hotel is 3 mins walk from Triemli station. We reached Triemli station around 10:30pm and it was pitch dark. (I wish I made it by 9:30 or bit later before the sunset). We walked little further and crossed the tracks and as it was so dark, couldnt identify the right route (yes, for 3 mins walk).

Luckily 2 youngsters came and we just told them we are going to Hotel Atlantis guesthouse. They didnt speak english but managed to understand that we were looking for the hotel. But what they told us back was… “They dont open for tourists.. Its asylum now. Only for refugees” with their slaughtered english. I was still little confident that they misunderstood and trusted my google map images and addresses. We walked uphill for 2 mins at pitch dark. Nearby was a stream and I was not sure what it adds to my ears. :D. Then we deviated to the rough path towards a very big building and all the way those lovely youngsters were talking with us and offered to take Thenmozhi’s suitcase. Poor girl having almost lost to Air-france told she is okay to drag at that mud road which was quite steep. I understood that big building (old Sheraton chain hotel) is now a asylum and swiss govt uses it as refugee camp for those who cross the borders wihtout valid papers. They allow few of them to get proper papers to work there. One of the guys who told us that we are lucky to get those guys because those others in the asylums are drug sellers and the list went on. I was comfortable even after and learned that they were from Cerbia. Interesting. We passed that big building and saw signs to our hotel. These poor guys walked again almost a KM for us to safely leave us in the hotel. It was very funny to recollect that we took 15 mins of walk uphills and mudroad route for a clean 3 min walk from station. Those lovely guys, were caring and walked long at that time for us and made sure to drop us at the hotel. No matter what, few are very good by heart despite their outfit!!

Next thing.. Swiss is expensive. Expensive enough that even a European or American will say Swiss is expensive. :-p. Who bothers. Swiss lives to all that beauty. Ask yourself what are you for here. And you wont even bother about the cost. ;-). And the hotel was I was looking at lower ends (around 3 stars) and sounded so much to me when I booked. Note, star hotels costs upto 1000 USD per night here. dont get bothered. Do your home work to get a good hotel. And Atlantis Guesthouse was soooooo good. Quite compact and it looked so fresh and new. Thats all I require. We called it a day with the dreams’ of following days.

Morning we laughed at each other to see how close it was to station. We checked out and dumped our luggages at Zurich lockers (Station). Its so helpful to have coinbased lockers to dump our luggages (almost all your luggages). They cost 7 Swiss franc for larger luggages which can hold a lappy, a big suitcase and a small one. We dumped them and caught the next train to Schaffhausen where river Rhine has a little pit to turn that into europe’s largest waterfalls.

In 48 mins, we were at the Schaffhausen station. We avoided 2 hours of walk along the river by catching a bus (1,6 goes there) (with swiss pass everything is free.. ;). We got down at Neuhausen and then we gotto walk for 5 mins. You know what, Swiss people are proud and happy. Their words might sound rugged but its totally of their proud nature.Yet very kind to tourists. At the station, a granny came to us and told us that the bus will stop little away from us where the “door” of the bus could stop. We were just 10 foot away,still she wanted to tell us about the bus, in German. I was touched. And at the bus stop at Neuhausen, another aged couple got down, waited till we were got down from the bus and told us the direction to the falls. We didnt even ask a question. How lovely & caring people they are.

It was a quite simple walk from there (Follow the yellow foot marks), to reach the falls.It looks small (obviously because of its “height”). But trust me guys, I have never seen any falls at that height with such a force. Gosh! Its a real thril. Its massive. Thats the right word.

Falls is soo beautiful and I swear if you are there when the night falls on evening it would be the best sight of all your wild imaginations. We walked along the water and reached boat-house to go to the roch which is right at the centre of the falls. It was a simple ride of 5 mins to reach there. At top of the rock, it looks scary, unbalanced and “we are nothing” feeling. Great nature. Wont forgive as well if you take it granted.

With some pics and OMG moments, we got down and waited to take the boat to the bank. We felt as if we were on a leaf in front of that massive falls. With something in the name of lunch, (you will get french fries and chicken nuggets everywhere. And great pizzas from the neighbor who introduced it, what else you need??) we headed back to Zurich.

Catch the Interlaken entries next!!

Better version of images. Download at Rhine Falls

Zurich to Schaffhausen (Rhine falls)

Schaffhausen : Sweet little town

They are known for these and the best unknown is their punctuality. Trains leave exactly at the planned minute.

NDTV news reporter : (almost the same – my wife).. :))

Nat Geo traveller : None shot and none telecasted.. poor me.

World traveller : Passport free people.

Honey taster : Happy at his work

Rhine falls. Biggest of Europe . Its 150 Metrers wide end to end.

Rhine falls

Duck : Mom, save me shark is chasing meeeee!!!

Who dares a plunge here?

Snow capped mountains’ courtesy.

We are just on a leaf to the might of the falls.

Well time to pat on my photography.. But for me? :(((((

Am wondering what it would be beneath the boat with a oxygen cylinder..

When am on it, didnt realize how scary is this.

Little touch for dramatic effect.. :-p

Trees are still thinking to change to brown shirts..

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