Seriously, Just WOW!
Last weekend we headed for the village of Grindelwald in the Jungfrau Region of the Alps. The train ride was a little more interesting than the ones that we have had in the past as it required two connections, but hey, it’s Switzerland, and things are almost always on time so even a 6 minute connection is doable. Upon our arrival at the station, we were taken to our guest hours by the mother of one of the owner’s of the house. She was about 85 and the drive was reminiscent of the scenes of Peter Sellers driving the delivery cars down the hill (without the crashing into the pool part). But, she got us there safely and it turns out she makes a mean Linzer Torte – so good!
I am going to keep the rest of my narrative pretty short, because the pictures can tell you so much more than I can. Saturday was rainy with total cloud cover above 1,500m. We did a hike up the east side of the valley to the middle tram station on the Firstbahn, and took the gondola down after some much needed coffee and time by the fire. We walked around the town a bit (I needed a winter hat because I was downright cold), and then headed out to the bird rescue. They had several different breeds of owls, some ravens, and another bird that we have yet to identify. The owls and ravens were fed a pretty generous supply of chicks. It was a little odd, yet fascinating to watch them eat (fortunately it had been a while since we had our tasty fondue lunch). Even in the cold and cloudy weather, the valley was incredibly beautiful! We had dinner at the guesthouse/restaurant and it was delicious!
Sunday the weather was clear, so after being dropped off at the train station and putting our big bag in a locker, we headed off on the hiking trails up along the Eiger Wall to Eigergletscher and then down to Kleine Scheidigg. The hike was absolutely amazing! When we got to Kleine Scheidigg we had a late lunch and some well deserved beers. We took the train back to Grindelwald station and from there caught our connections back to Zurich. We will have to make it back to Grindelwald some day soon. It was just so cool! The skiing here looks like it should also be amazing, so I think that will have to be added to the list of things to do.