A Few Last Memories

Back Home in VA - Some Final Thoughts

10 Best Things About the Trip (or maybe 13 - apparently it's mostly about the food)

13. Smooth on-time flights & no lost bags
12. Small Alpine hotels, innkeepers & staff
11. Eating like a hog & not gaining weight
10. Hiking every day - much more fun than Nordic Tracking
9. Salad bars
8. Breakfast buffets - especially Birchermuesli, fresh bread, & soft/hard boiled eggs - but not raw eggs
7. Chocolate
6. Swiss cuisine, especially raclette, rosti, & kaseschnitte
5. "Light" hikes with the Ladies
4. Snacks & lunches @ mountain huttes - except chicken noodle soup
3. Swiss trains, boats, buses, funiculars, cog railways, cable cars, chair lifts, etc.
2. Alpine vistas & wild flower meadows
1. The guides & fellow hikers of the "Three Cultures Tour"


10 Best Things About Being Home Again

13. Not living out of a backpack & duffel bag
12. Driving
11. Air Conditioning
10. Everything in English
9. Smoke-free air
8. Seeing the Valley turned green again
7. My favorite pillow
6. Not having to slather on sun screen every morning
5. Soft tissues & toilet paper
4. Washer & dryer
3. Prices
2. Pictures & memories
1. Together with Jude again

Back in Zurich - Brat research Continues

Easy on-time trip to Zurich. Sat in a "Quiet Car" from Bern to Z. Louise & Katie had to move to another car.

Grey & warm to start. Changed to grey, cool, gusty & drizzle ~ 3:30. Had another, quite different brat @ nice waterside, open-air spot @ the mouth of the river by the tour boat docks. Good potato salad - similar to Jude's & almost as good.

Huge flea market in the square. Peoples old junk looks pretty much the same here as @ home.

Took the short boat tour - really a water taxi. Pretty boring, especially when it turned cold & drizzly. Saw the windows @ Fraumunster (awesome!) walked through the fancy shopping district, bought a beer & chips @ COOP by the train station (unbelievable) & climbed back to my room to get warmed up - can you believe it?

Hope everyone's travels are smooth & homecoming is sweet. Thanks for the memories.

VaYank Wins Coveted "Ladies' Man" Award

A fast pace and steep trails
he does not desire

For him a nice stroll
with good views will inspire

Handle the rigorous
we think he can

But we also know
He likes being the Ladies' Man



First I'd like to thank the Academy...........................

The Last Supper

9 For 9

Perfect weather again for our last day of hiking, making it 9 days out of 9.

And I finally got my first Swiss Brat - with Rosti (Swiss version of home fries) & onion sauce, on another hike up another glacier-fed valley. This one began as a steep slot canyon with the runoff roaring so loudly we could hardly hear each other. Then the valley broadened into meadows with small isolated farms & tiny villages.

Tomorrow - back to Zurich for some more sightseeing & brot research. Then the long ride home on Sunday. Can't wait to see Jude & curl up with my favorite pillow.

Another day, another Alpine Valley

Thought today was going to end our streak of perfect weather. Woke up to overcast @ ~ 300' & light drizzle. Took the train through a long tunnel to the next valley. Started hiking up the valley; patches of blue sky began to appear, & the sunshine continued all day with cooler temps.

Not as dramatic as yesterday, but a beautiful, less developed glacier-fed Eden of waterfalls, roaring streams, meadows of wildflowers, & grazing cattle clanging their Swiss cow bells.

Last day of hiking tomorrow. Then back to Zurich for a day, & home on Sunday. Its been great, the time has flown, but I'm ready for some quiet time in Churchville.

Best Hike Ever

I've done some great hikes in some great places - NZ South Island, The Grand Canyon, Bryce, Zion, Glacier, etc. Today was the best. Perfect weather, great guide, fun companions. Up the gondola, easy walk to alpine lake surrounded by 1000' high stone amphitheater, waterfalls cascading down everywhere from melting glaciers. Then a tough scramble up the rock to a meadow carpeted with wildflowers. Lunch at a mountain hut (pretty bad chicken noodle soup) amongst a flock of chickens & herd of very friendly cows. Then around the bowl on a narrow path through another wildflower carpet, across some tough talus scrambles & back down to the gondola. Pictures can't begin to do justice to the magnificent beauty of this place.

Can't wait for tomorrow.

The Swiss have some set of trains

Rode 7 different trains today from Pontresina near St. Moritz, half way around Switzerland, stopping for lunch at Luzern, to Kandersteg, in the Berner Oberland, near nothing. That makes about 20 different trains since our travels began. Trains were all close to on time (& if late, the connection waited for us), clean, quiet & comfortable. If Churchville were in Switzerland it would have a train station with frequent service, connections to anywhere in the US, & helpful agents who would print out a complete itinerary to anywhere with all connections, arrival & departure times, & track assignments. And, for about 15 dollars (no $ sign on this German keyboard) they would ship your bags any where, within 24 hours.

Kandersteg is the quintessential Swiss alpine village. Nestled among soaring peaks, with traditional Alpine architecture. Tomorrow we find out what the hiking is like.

Easy Day

An easy hike through the woods to a lake & back. Then a concert in the park. Now for a nap & packing for a day on & off trains tomorrow with a stop in Luzern for lunch. Then on to the Berner Oberland for our last 3 days of hiking.

Bernina Day

No hiking today. Rode the Bernina Line over Bernina Pass to the Italian side of the Alps. Lots of stuff named Bernina around here except, apparently, the Bernina Sewing Machine Company. Did confirm that it's somewhere in Switzerland.

Worst meal since leaving the States. The Swiss seem to think that a pannini is a slice of meat on a cold bun.

On the way back over the Alps, rode a cable car to the top of a glacier near Bernina Peak.

Last day of hiking near St. Moritz tomorrow. Then Tuesday, 8 trains to a small remote village in the Berner Oberland, Rick Steves' favorite part of Switzerland.

A New Way to Eat Cheese

Another beautiful day for hiking. 1000' up a cable car from Sils Maria, a village just south of St. Moritz. 8 miles/1500' of hiking through snow fields & alpine ponds & streams to a frigid lake for picnic lunch. Then back down the cable car just beating a torrential thunder storm - the first rain since leaving Zurich.

Unique Swiss meal for dinner - Raclette. A 2 lb. block of cheese is melted & browned under a heat lamp in the center of the table. The molten cheese is then scraped over new potatoes & eaten with a variety of condiments including sweet pickels, pickeled onions, tomatoe slices, etc.. really much more appitizing than it sounds.

Tomorrow is a free day. Planning to ride the Bernina Express ofer a high pass to the Italian side of Switzerland.

Glacier Express - First hike in Pontresina

Yesterday, rode the Glacier Express traveling from west to east across most of Southern Switzerland from Zermatt to Chur (pronounced Coor), then local trains to Pontresina, a smaller village very near to St. Moritz. ~ 150 miles, 100 or so tunnels, many viaducts like the one in the picture, & dramatic mountain views at every turn. Today, funicular up ~ 2000', 8 miles of hiking between mountain huts serving yummy kuchen, then down a chair lift back to town. This region, known as the Engadine, is just as dramatic as the Matterhorn area, but greener, and with wider, sweeping, U-shaped valleys, vs. the steep, V-shaped valleys surrounding the Matterhorn. Still clear, breezy weather, chilly in the morning & high 70's in the afternoon. Tomorrow, hiking above the lakes east of St. Moritz.

A cowboy's work is never done

Another "Chamber of Commerce" day, our last in Zermatt. Rode the Gornergrat cog-railway up ~ 3000' & hiked another 900' to over-look the Gornergrat Glacier. Marmots, ibex, & alpine meadows blazing with wild flowers. Lunch of dark chocolate, & a crusty baguette sandwich. Then another short hike to an alpine lake. Tomorrow - the Glacier Express to St. Moritz.

Another perfect day

Except my calves are really sore from 2600 vertical feet of downhill hiking over 2 days. Hiked the other side of the valley today, up a steep canyon to a little inn for some mid-morning rhubarb kuchen. They along the slope through groves of Larch (what we called tamarack in Granby) & meadows of alpine wildflowers, many new and some that we see in Churchville. Glaciers, snow-capped peaks, & the Matterhorn continuously the backdrop. As beautiful a place as I have ever seen. Pedometer said 8.6 miles. My calves say lots of vertical.

The Matterhorn From every Angle

A perfect day for hiking - low 70's, clear & breezy. They say you get a clear view of the Matterhorn only ~ 60 days a year. Today was one of those days. Rode an underground funicular up ~ 2000', then hiked another 1100' to an inn with panoramic views including the Matterhorn. Then back down for a pint. Now awaiting dinner @ the lodge. Another sweet forecast for tomorrow.

In Zermatt after 5 trains & 1 boat

The Swiss public transit system is like a giant Rolex. From Zurich through rolling farm land, quick tour of Bern (national capital), boat across an alpine lake, into the Alps. 1st hiking today with views on the Matterhorn, if it,s out.

Hopefully, more tonight.

Made it to Zurich

Smooth travel all the way. Even got some sleep on the planes. Breakfast of creamy scrambled eggs, smoked salmon & toast in Heathrow.

90 F & humid here. Who knew? Huge street festival going on & I desperately need a beir.

Packing is always the hardest part.

Today's the day of my final confrontation with this mess. This time I'm trying to pack smarter by using a smaller duffel. Wish me luck. Tomorrow starts with a 5-hour drive to PHL. Then 7-hour over-night flight to London, 3 hours for breakfast & nap, and 2-hour flight to Zurich, arriving ~ noon, 6 hours ahead of EDST.
Overnight in Zurich, then meeting guides, Justin & Bekka (from New Hampshire) & traveling to Zermatt on trains & boat. Check out the itinerary at hikingswitzerland.com - "Three Cultures Tour".