Lucerne, Titlis, Zurich narrations
Arriving by train in Lucerne Switzerland one of the most attractive towns in all of Europe
and recently listed in Condé Nast travel as one of the top 20 cities of the world.
You'll see it's a great place to visit.
The heart of the old town is a pedestrians with wooden bridges in cobblestone lanes in
line with shops and banners and really festive wonderful place.
There’s the signature of Lucerne the water tower and the Chapel Bridge, the Kappelbrucke.
The other major landmark in Lucerne to seek out is the huge Lion Monument.
There’s the signature of Lucerne the water tower and the Chapel Bridge, the Kappelbrucke.
The River Reuss is very scenic flowing right through the middle of town lots of swans and
walkways on both sides and fortunately our hotel the Balances is right on the river.
Up the next morning for another terrific meal this time it’s breakfast at the hotel des
Balances, which is one of the great moments of our tour of Europe the buffet breakfast
has eggs and sausage and bacon and this is typical of what you’ll find in any good
quality hotel throughout Switzerland breads, cheeses fruits juices and great coffee
See the laundry bags, yes were heading for a laundromat -- it’s very convenient we
drop the laundry off in the morning and go out Fridays activities and pick it up in the
afternoon.
Another nice attraction of this side of town is our favorite chocolate shop, Au Cachet.
iThe stuffed chocolates of Lucerne rival those of Belgium and they’ll stay fresh for a
few weeks so they are excellent presence to bring home.
The most exciting convenient excursion out of town is to mount Titlis and it's very easy
to get there -- you take the scenic train from Lucerne on a one hour journey to Engleberg.
You can get up to Mount Titlis by tour bus, but as usual we find it's a lot more pleasant
to go by train.
The scenery is among the most spectacular you'll find in all of central Switzerland
-- enjoying beautiful views of the mountains farms and villages along the way.
As we go by some of the typical chalets -- you find this kind of housing all over the countryside
of Switzerland.
And then the scenery opens up with this vista of mountains and forests and glaciers up on
the peaks -- it's really a lovely ride were going from Lucerne to the town of Engleberg
takes about one hour for that train ride.
When you get to Engelberg just follow the signs and walk a couple of hundred very pleasant
yards to the cable car lift that will take you on a 45-minute cable car ride up to the
mountaintop -- you change cable cars two times, so it's three separate cable cars that will
finally get you up to the mountaintop, and your train ticket is also good it's a combination
ticket so use the same to get up in the cable car.
You can walk right onto the glacier from the panorama Terrace and frolic in the snow -- it's
cold enough that the snow never melts but in the summer with typical sunshine you feel
comfortable with just a light jacket.
The latest attraction up here is this sky bridge it's really a little spooky for people
are afraid of heights.
It’s this open metallic very sturdy walkway and you are just suspended between the peaks.
Surprisingly the temperatures are comfortable, anytime between April and September -- well
it's going to be freezing just barely but you're out in the sun in your moving around
and you really don't feel the cold.
From the top we get a fine view looking into the heart of what's called the Bernese Overland.
These mountain peaks range from about 10,000 feet high, we’re standing now to as high
as 12,000 and 13,000 feet in the far distance.
Mt Titlis is 10,500 feet high which makes it the tallest mountain in this part of central
Switzerland.
Activity while you're at the top of Mount Titlis is the glacier tunnel -- it's an ice
tunnel that they've carved right into the foundation of the glacier itself, and there's
lighting inside, they have some ice sculptures inside and there’s secure footing and it
goes around in a small loop circle just takes a few minutes but be sure to look for the
ice grotto while you're up top but that complex of cafeterias, cafés and gift shops up in
the mountaintop.
And of course you can get some terrific hot chocolate and pastries up here, after all
we’re in the heart of Switzerland, famous for their chocolates.
It's really a beautiful sight and a lot of fun.
It takes about half a day altogether to go up to the top come back down, and then back
into Lucerne.
When you finish with Mt.
Titlis you return to town the same way by train enjoying the scenery a second time.
We decided to keep going and take another train to Zürich just one hour away, a great
city.
In the train station they had a little festival going on serving traditional bratwurst, which
really hit the spot, we were pretty hungry so this made a terrific standup lunch for
us.
They even had weisswurst, the traditional white sausage of Bavaria.
Well they were celebrating Oktoberfest -- normally Switzerland doesn't get too much into Oktoberfest
but was a very festive atmosphere in this great hall of the train station -- it's one
of the largest enclosed spaces in all of Europe.
The local folks were out in traditional Bavarian costumes wearing the drindle and lederhosen,
something that's gotten very popular in Germany and now we find it even in Switzerland.
Zurich is the world’s best city to live in, with the highest quality of life, according
to recent studies -- so it is also a perfect place to visit.
Duck inside door marked Number 4, and there you will find a free display of Zurich’s
history including a scale model of the Old Town’s evolution, and really demonstrating
how the buildings and the patterns of the streets that we see today in the old town
are just about the same as they were back in the middle ages.
One food shop you would enjoy is Schwartzenbach, selling dried fruits, nuts, fresh-roasted
coffee beans, chocolate and many gourmet treats, with a casual café on the corner and sidewalk
tables.
We continued walking along Niederdorfstrasse, the main street of the old town passing the
Munster, the great cathedral and then crossing the river to the Schipf, which is the oldest
part of Zürich.
And then we ran into an Alpine horn concert -- quite a surprise to find them out on a
public street performing in the middle of a road, the kind of thing you might expect
to see in a nightclub show.
It turns out they were performing for a small party at a restaurant nearby and so we had
to listen for a while and then we went up to the Lindenhof for a view across the old
town.
Linderhof is a park up on a small hill with a view and a history going back to the Romans.
It still used today is a very active park by the locals -- they play chess with these
big chess pieces.
It's quite a spectator sport as folks gather around to watch the moves.
Exit Lindenhof down the south steps which will lead you past one of the few Roman ruins
visible in town -- a simple marble column on your right with inscriptions containing
the first known mention of the Latin name for Zurich.
Walk along the elegant Bahnhofstrasse, one of Europe’s finest boulevards, lined with
thriving, modern retail frontage from end to end.
No cars or trucks disrupt this pleasant shopping atmosphere -- only pedestrians and quiet electric
trams gliding by.
Well that completes our brief look at Zürich -- it's time to go already, off to the train
station and back to Lucerne.
Sunrise in Lucerne is very often beautiful and you get a great view from the balcony
of your room at the hotel des Balances.
We've enjoyed our couple of days here in Lucerne, and now it's time to head over to the train
station.
We have a lot more movies about Lucerne and Zürich and the rest of Switzerland on our
YouTube channel, take a look.