Lucerne...a typical Swiss city

We spent our last day in Lucerne taking in some of the sights and as usual doing a lot of walking, though Lucerne is definitely not as hilly as Lausanne or Murren. It is located in the German speaking section of Switzerland in the Central West of the country. It is only a small city with a population of around 76,000.

This city is also located on a lake and surrounded by mountains...

 

These are a few pictures taken from the ferry as we were coming into Lucerne.

It is also a big tourist Center as everywhere we looked the place was full of tour groups and huge tour buses, again mostly Asian visitors.

We visited a couple of interesting sites...this one is called the Dying Lion Monument. This monument is carved into the side of a mountain and is huge as well as quite moving, the detail is unbelievable. This monument is in memory of hundreds of Swiss Guards working as mercenaries who were killed in the French Revolution.

The Bourbaki Panorama was also very interesting. It is a large circular painting measuring 112 by 100 meters and is one of the few such paintings left from the 19th century. It depicts the internment of the French Army in Switzerland in the late 1800s. The newly formed Red Cross with the help of the Swiss citizens cared for the defeated army until a ceasefire was called and they returned home to France. The story is told through this picture and really speaks to the role of Switzerland as a neutral,humanitarian country. Again this was quite striking and my pictures do not give the full impact of the structure.

Carrying for the wounded.

The French surrendering their weapons.

Another view....

One of the pleasures of travelling is the delight in seeing things that I never knew existed and what a great way to depict history.

The most famous site in Lucerne however is the Chapel Bridge and Water Tower. It was built in 1333 and is the largest covered bridge in Europe.

 

Me from the other side.

Inside the bridge there are a series of paintings done in the 17th century, unfortunately due to a fire set in 1993 most of them have been destroyed.

The Reuss River runs through Lucerne from the mountains down into Lake Lucerne. The flow is manually controlled by a system called the Needle. Don says it reminds of the men in the mill who did the same thing but it was called " on the boards".

Lucerne was a city that fought the Reformation movement and remains mostly Catholic so it has some wonderful churches. This one is the main Catholic Cathedral in the city...

And Don gets to light a candle!

The wood working on the door, churches here are amazing buildings.

A view down the steps down to the Center of the city, as you can see it has been raining the last few days.

The Jesuit Church...one of the oldest in the city...

Many of the building facades in the city are painted, some from hundreds of years ago...

Others seem to be newer...

Many people including us enjoyed lunch by the river.

Others were just enjoying the view.

There were outdoor markets.

Beautiful river views...

Cafes to have your expresso...

And of course stairs to climb.

As we walked we also window shopped, how about this chair for 10,000.00?

Colourful display in a chocolate shop window.

This cafe sign advertises the most popular Swiss beer we have seen here...Feldschlosschen. Swiss beer is very light, lots of lagers.

We finished our day by going to a Swiss restaurant that featured a Swiss music and folk traditional show. It was done for tourists but we enjoyed ourselves. It was in a big hall so couldn't get many pictures. Here are a few...

The young couple next to us were honeymooners from California and our other neighbours were Japanese.

The show consisted of traditional instruments, yodelling, flag throwing, and lots of lively music and dancing.

 

Here they are playing the bowls with coins inside.

And oh yes the food was good...

Swiss fondue...

And ice cream with meringues which I see a lot on the menus here.

So that is it for our visit to Lucerne and tomorrow we are off to the south of the country to Lugano. On reflection though I should have booked our last three days here into another mountain area such as Zermatt. Oh well!!

 

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To the mountain and back again...

A bit of a sleep in this morning and then a decision as what to do today. We so enjoyed the mountains we decided that we would visit another one nearby. There are two popular ones in this area, Pilatus and Rigi and for no particular reason we chose to do Mt. Pilatus.

Even though it was a wet day the weather forecast called for clearing so we walked to the train station.

Stopping into COOP restaurant for breakfast...

We caught a bus to Kriens, a small town about 15 minutes away and then started our climb to the top, and of course everything was uphill including the walk to get there. Our legs should be good and strong by the time we leave this country!

 

Mt. Pilatus is about 7000 feet high, 3000 less than the last mountain summit we visited but the journey there and back is an interesting one. We started on a gondola to go up the mountain and they were tiny, just the two of us.Then we switched to an aerial cable car. We always marvel at Swiss engineering and how they don't let a mountain stop them from getting to where they want to go.

The cable cars built in 1954 give access to small towns on the mountain as well as to visitors to the top of the mountain.

As we climbed the mountain we could see that fall was setting across the forest.

Far below us we could hear the cow bells and we could see the shepherds herding the cows down the mountain..

Zipliners passed us going down as well.

 

As we started to go higher the views over the cliffs started to appear..

At the top of the mountain there is a large visitors center as well as hotels and restaurants. There are also some hiking trails that go up to some of the peaks.

Here you can see the edge of the center as well as the sun peaking through to the valley below. The colours of the rocks, valleys and lakes were beautiful.

There was entertainment as well...

A bird lady that stood around feeding the birds from her hand.( didn't quite get that).

 

A couple of alphorn players, there horns sounded fabulous as they echoed off the mountain. I was just in for a closer look.

 

 

As we walked around to see the panoramic view it was wonderful. No snow but plenty of beauty especially the lakes.

 

 

 

 

We hiked up to a higher peak and by this time the wind and rain had started...

 

Our photo op!

After a few more walk arounds we headed back on the cog wheel railway, again another engineering marvel. This railway was built in 1889 and started as a steam engine but now runs on electricity. It is the world's steepest cogwheel railway.

 

Here are some pictures going down...

Some hikers almost to the top, now that is what I call a hike, 5000 feet straight up!

 

 

We could see the winding railway track as it went down through the valley.

 

This valley was very rocky and looked as if there might have been a landslide many years ago.It was a quite rugged and striking landscape.

The railway cars could seat about 8 people and we were in with a group of South Korean tourists with a guide and one other guy who could speak English. They are very personable people and started to break out the food and drink. They had boiled eggs which they ate and then used the cup to pass around their traditional drink. Of course to refuse was to seem impolite so we downed the drink which tastes like gin. It is called soju and warms you up real fast! Dawn, do you recognize this drink from you time in Korea?

Don taking a taste out of the tetra pack. I drank out of the egg shell.

It took about half an hour to go down the mountain so we had a great laugh with these wonderful people. Before we got to the bottom they were offering us their drink and food to take with us. We took one of the drinks but politely refused their food. At the bottom they wanted to take our picture and insisted we take theirs.

 

They told us they were friends and family from a small village and they were doing a grand tour of Europe.

 

A closer look at the cog railway coming into the station.

 

So we were up the mountain, down the mountain and now needed to get back to Lucerne. We opted to take the ferry back across Lake Lucerne which took a little over an hour and again a lovely way to travel. Lake Lucerne is the fourth largest lake in Switzerland being 30 km long and 20 km wide. It is also an irregular shape with arms and bends into and around the surrounding mountains.

 

 

A beautiful fall day by the lake.

 

 

The ferry coming into the dock...

Enjoying the ferry ride...

 

Getting the photos...

 

Isn't this country just gorgeous?

 

The clouds were gathering over the lake as we approached Lucerne.

 

 

Even the dock is nice and tidy with beautiful flowers.

 

 

 

So ends another day in Lucerne, we were beat from being on the go all day so we stayed in the flat and ate our salads, cheese and bread we had bought earlier. When we are travelling we get tired of eating out and sometimes just can't take another restaurant meal no matter how good. So it was great to have a clean and tidy kitchen in which to enjoy our meal. Tomorrow is our day to explore the city of Lucerne so we are hoping for another good day.

 

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