Grindelwald - Lauterbutten - Grindelwald

The plague continues to lay waste to each and all it encounters taking Nicki down today.  So far, of Switzerland, Nicki has seen the inside of our apartment, the bathroom and the bedroom ceiling (and not in a good way). 

Meanwhile soldiering on and waiting for the inevitable to catch up with me I took the lads out to a place called Lauterbrunnen which is a town set between 2 massive walls of rock that go on for miles.  In mountain speak I guess you'd call that a valley.  

View from under Trummelbach Falls.           

Anyway it was raining all morning so we didn't head out until after lunch in the miserable weather but it was well worth it in the end as there were heaps of waterfalls coming down the sheer cliff faces due to the overnight rain.  I've read, though we didn't see any, that this is a bit of a base jumping mecca due to the aforementioned verticality of the rocks.  

The biggest and best waterfall is Trummelbach.  Some clever Swiss blokes have carved a tunnel into the rock face to let you get closer to the falls so we did that.

Trummelbach Falls.

Saw heaps of young Aussies in thongs (of course) looking seedy as buggery.  Wandered back down the path, past a campground and spied a Contiki bus which cleared up that little mystery. 

After that I took the kids ice skating in Grindelwald which was a like watching a herd of giraffes on ice.  Funny stuff but they slowly started to get the hang of it by the end.  My super manly roller blading experience left me in good stead on the ice.  Then we saw some under 11's (?) play an actual game for about 15 minutes.  Not as many fights as I'd hoped.

Came home to a very ill wife who had hardly moved all day from the bed.  Cooked dinner and saw Harry bolt past me and the toilet (why?) to park a massive tiger on our verandah!  And thence 3 more times during the night.

At 2.30am I woke to hear Max joining the club, though at least he found some parts of the toilet giving him slightly favoured son status for that day.

Stray observations:  Vomit is only funny in movies or when it happens to your mates.  It is not funny when you have to clean it up.  Three or four times.  

And my kids complain when they
 have to mow the front yard.

Viewing point carved into the rock. Look closely.

Grindelwald - Switzerland.

Firstly I think I have fixed up the comments section so anybody can comment now instead of only a "privileged" few but if not email me and I'll have a fiddle with the blog settings again.

Secondly, ding ding it's round 2, the plague is back.  This time, like the new iPhone 5, it boasts new features including mad fevers, aches like you've been run over by a truck and projectile vomiting.  Bloody champion.

Gondolas - gold bullion accepted.

Ryan spent the night sick as a dog so this morning Nicki did the motherly thing and took one for the team.  Harry, Max and meanwhile I took the cable car up a thousand metres to a gondola station called First (pronounced Feerst, 2168m elevation) and off we went.   

I'm glad we took the gondola because it would have been a killer walk up but bloody hell the Swiss don't miss with their prices as discussed yesterday.  $32 for me and $16 each for the kids.  ($64 all up.)  Just as well Nicki and Ryan didn't go otherwise a lovely stroll in the Swiss Alps would have cost us $112.  That's one-way!! And they saying walking is cheap exercise. (In Germany something similar cost about $40 for the 5 of us.)

View from Gondola.

Walked up to 2 alpine lakes called Bachalpsee (2265m) which were pretty and then decided to take the trail up to the summit of a mountain called Faulhorn (2686m) which I'd heard had 360 degree views.  Quite a climb but well worth it in the end.  Had a bit of a picnic up there as well as some chocolate for the lads and a celebratory beer for myself. 

There was still some remnant snow on the ground at about the 2300m mark which thrilled the kids to bits.  Needless to say they took full advantage and made snowballs to peg at myself and each other. 

I exhausted my mountain knowledge with the sage advice to the kids of "never eat the yellow snow."

Lake Bachalpsee.

Trail to Faulhorn.

Faulhorn. 

View of the Alps.

Massive walk back to Grindelwald descending some 1700m which killed the knees by the end of it.  All up we walked for easily 4 hours solid so I'm estimating we covered roughly 12km if not more.

Schlitach - Grindewald, Switzerland

Our first view of beautiful picturesque Switzerland.

Packed the night before in an effort to get to our new destination by lunchtime rather than arriving by mid afternoon and blowing a whole day travelling.

All good and left by 7.20am but thwarted by roadworks and a stop at Aldi.  

We had been advised to stock up on groceries before crossing the border as Switzerland is expensive and apparently loads of Swiss shop over the border to save dollars/francs.

After arriving in Switzerland I understand why the Swiss shop in Germany.  The days of us living at half price are definitely over for the next few days with everything costing more.  Luckily the Australian dollar is still kicking arse at the moment and the pain is somewhat dulled.

Arrived at our accommodation after travelling through Basel, Berne, Thun and Interlaken.  The drive from Thun to Interlaken along the edge of Lake Thun was a particular highlight.   We are staying in a town called Grindelwald (1073m) at which sits underneath a towering mountain called the Eiger  (3970m.) 

Accom.  Far left.  The Eiger (Eiger the tiger) background.

Checked into our accommodation, bought some groceries and hit up the tourist information centre.  Tomorrow we intend go hiking in the mountains.  Got a hell of a shock at the cost of the gondolas up to the mountains.  $32 each adult and $16 for the monkeys.  That's a total of $112 for a walk in the mountains.  Bloody hell!  We looked at only going halfway up instead to save a few dollars. 

View from balcony.

Schiltach - Triberg - Freiburg - Schiltach

One of the things I promised the boys we would try and do when we got to Europe was to see some local top flight football.  The first weekend we were in Germany there was an international break so none of the teams played that weekend as all the big guns are off playing for their respective countries.  Fortunately for us the next weekend at Freiburg, an hour away from where we were staying, the locals were playing Hoffenheim in the Bundesliga (German Premier League).

SC Freiburg 5 - Hoffenheim 3

With our tickets booked over the internet (€106 all up) off we went for a 3:30pm start.  When you go to these football matches overseas the last thing you want to see is a 0 - 0 draw or worse the home team get a hiding so I confidently predicted a 4 - 3 win for the home side.   Even better than the 4 - 3 prediction the home side SC Freiburg sent the dirty parasitic Hoffenheimers scurrying home 5 - 3.  Great stuff, a veritable goalfest.  Brilliant atmosphere in the sold out little stadium (22 800).

Cafe Schafer - the Black Forest
cake original 

On the way down to Freiburg we travelled through Triberg, home of the world's largest amount of cuckoo clocks and home to the cafe that produced the original Blackforest cake.  The original recipe is still on the wall for all to see.  Of course you don't want to go that far and not partake so being the Terry Tourists we are we did that too.

Home at 7ish to pack for our trip to Switzerland tomorrow. 

A clown in a ridiculous costume and the mascot.

Schiltach is known for these types of houses.

Schiltach - Freudenstadt - Schiltach

  

Germans have the waterfall viewing business down pat.

Attempted to go to see a lake in the Black Forest but unfortunately the road was closed so we checked the map and went and visited a waterfall instead.  Ryan queried as to why we were going to a waterfall when it's just water falling....like out of a tap.  Ryan and I differ on the respective merits of outdoor natural attractions.  (Kids, how good are they?) 

.

Went to Freudenstadst after that which is a town that supposedly has the largest market square in all of Germany.  Not much happening there but lucked upon a wedding that was just finishing up.  Obviously the lucky girl was a horse buff of some sort and I'm guessing from the 12 or so fire trucks lined up the groom was a fireman. What was a good laugh though was when then groom drove off in his hotted up car and every fire truck in town followed him with all of their sirens and lights going off at once.  

Quality humour, though bad luck for Frau Heimlicher in the next village whose house burnt down to the ground that afternoon.

Cruised past the local soccer ground on the way home where some lads were having a kickabout so the boys and I joined in for a good hour.  Harry was pleased as punch as this has been something he has wanted to do since we landed in Europe.

Guard of honour.

The bride.  Bad luck groom.

The groom..  Lucky girl...he's hung like a .....

The happy couple.  Yes dear I won't drive so fast.
And so it starts.....

Schilltach

Harrison sick and vomiting during the night.  That rounds out of all us.  Hopefully that's it sickness wise as it puts a bit of a bummer on the day when you are dragging a sick child up a mountain who for some reason or another does nothing but complain.  

1km from start.  Our house in background on RHS.

Jumped on the mountain bike today and headed into the Black Forest on a 28km epic ride.  

28km's is probably not hard core for proper mountain bikers but for a meat eating, cake consuming, beer scoffing pudge like myself it was fairly hard work.  Hard going up and down the numerous hills but a beautiful 4 hours out on the bike.  The forest is riddled with walking and biking trails and you could stay here for 6 months and not hit the same trail twice.

Where's Wally?

Black forest logging track.  I think.

Some town in the Black Forest.  Looked good from up here.

Since I was out and as Harry was sick Nicki and the kids went walking in the forest ditching sick boy at home. 

Beers and some wines on the terrace of the restaurant at our accommodation rounded the day off nicely.

Stray observations:  What goes down must come up...especially on a mountain bike. And sick kids are whingers.

Untergassen - Schiltach, Black Forest.

Left Familie Greif today fairly late as Ryan is unwell, as am I, and drove into a mountain of traffic on our way to the Black Forest.  What should have been a 3 hour trip turned into a 4 and a half hour ordeal.  

We're on the third floor.  The one with the balcony.

Got here in the end and we are staying at a beautiful house overlooking the valley surrounded by masses of trees everywhere you look.  ( €52 a night for 5 of us.)  

Have the mountain bike unpacked and will be hitting some trails tomorrow.

Had dinner at our accommodation and the local speciality which is bread topped with ham, cheese and then eggs.  Sort of a full English breakfast but at dinner.  The salad part of dinner consisted of 1 quarter of a tomato per plate of food.  Let's just say vegetarians would struggle in Germany.



Stray observations:  The German food pyramid differs slightly from the Australian one I've grown up with.  Over here it is broken into 5 levels and consists of meat (predominately pork) at the base, sausages one level up, bread, butter, lard, oil for the middle level, potato salad second from the top.  Topping out the German food pyramid you would find salads, fruits, vegetables, cereals and whole grains.  

How all Germans are not the size of houses we do not know.

Untergassen - Neuschwanstein - Untergassen

Cloudy and rainy for the first time since we started our trip.  Was to be expected  but still a bit of a shock after being so hot yesterday and then freezing today.

Went to Neuschwanstein Castle today which was the inspiration for the Disneyland fairy-tale castle.

Built by King Ludwig II (one of 4 castles he was constructing) it was only partly completed as the government of the day had him declared “mentally impaired” and retired him to an institution.  One day later Old King Ludwig (actually only 40 years of age) was found dead in the lake.  Along with his psychiatrist. 

Moral of the story.   Don’t build castles willy nilly.  Or something.

Home early-ish and gave the kids an economics lesson and a shock as they have been spending their money hand over fist.  It seems there is a huge gap between perception and reality when it comes to a child’s souvenir buying habits.

Stray observations:  Declaring your monarch mentally ill may be detrimental to your health.

Untergassen - Bad Hildelang - Untergassen

Beautiful sunny day in Southern Bavaria and off to the Viescheld at Bad Hildelang.  Roughly translated Viescheld means “cows come down from the mountain” or “cows come home”.  Ostensibly a celebration to mark the end of summer and presumably  a marking of the cows coming down from the mountains for the coming winter.  Or an excuse to eat, drink big steins of beer and be merry.

Had a great day cruising the markets and enjoying the ambience.  Watched the cows come in and then ditched the kids by the river to make mischief whilst we hit the beer tent to watch the traditional German band and enjoy a bit of the local brew.  Full traditional kit on loads of the locals.  Leather pants (lederhosen), felt hats and plenty of cleavage on the bigger frau’s around the place. 

6.60 Euro for a 1 litre stein or about $8.60 AUD.

Have a break, have a kit kat stein of beer.

The perks of being in charge.

Stray observations:  Speaking German to the locals in a beer tent seems to be easier if you have downed three 1 litre steins of beer.  

And…..you can never have a big enough cowbell. (With Christmas tree on head.)

Legoland Deutschland

Made it with one cross to spare.  Two months of cajoling, bribing, threatening and pleading with Ryan to behave came to fruition today.  Legoland has been the Holy Grail of Ryan’s life ever since we found out there was one in Germany 2 months ago.   Ryan’s behaviour at home, on the plane over, in the car, with his brothers has all been predicated on the fact that if he reached 3 crosses there’d be no Legoland.

The crowds at Legoland are like Wet and Wild at the Gold Coast in the middle of the school holidays on the hottest day of the year with 2 for 1 entry thrown in.  Millions of people everywhere.  Still a good laugh and the kids loved it.  A few queues here and there but that’s to be expected with so many people about and in the last few days of their school holidays.

Ryan’s behaviour now?  HELP!!!  

Stray observations.  Besides casinos, the Legoland shop at the exit must surely rank in the top two “license to print money” establishments in the Western world.  

Alliance Stadium. 4209 man hours.

Lego Frankfurt

Lego humour

Untergassen - Bad Hildelang - Untergassen

Hit up the local bloke at the mountain bike shop at Sulzburg who suggested I head out to Bad Hildelang to go to the mountain bike there complete with chairlift.  Unfortunately the tracks there were geared towards downhillers so it wasn't the best for the cross country riding I do.  Still ok though and some impressive views from the top of the mountain.



Nicki and the kids took the cable car up and went for a walk down the mountain.  Poor Max was dragged along even though he was a ill.













Saw some locals in some traditional gear and followed them to a little amphitheatre in the forest.  Apparently it's a part of a festival to celebrate the cows coming home from the mountains. 

Horn blowing, choir singing, traditional dancing including loads of foot slapping and even some Chevy Chase style face slapping.  Good stuff.