A daytrip though the mountains

Train though Lotschberg Tunnel

Not such a cold night, and all the sinks stayed unblocked this morning. After doing our housework jobs, we set off for Interlaken. This meant, driving down into the valley at Visp, then West along the motorway for a few kilometres, then up into the mountains on the North side of the valley towards Kandersteg. A lot of this road is through a tunnel which was quite steep, and along galleries such as we had seen in the Simplon Pass.

Kander Valley

At the end of the road, we drove onto a car train, which would take us through the Lotschberg Tunnel. This proved to be much easier than we had imagined, although we were very glad that we had decided to not try taking the caravan through this route, as it would probably have not fitted very easily. Within a few minutes, the train set off. It was a strange experience, especially when we entered the tunnel and there were no lights. As we could not switch on the car engine, the car started to steam up as the temperature dropped. The journey only took fifteen minutes, and we were quickly off the train and driving through Goppenstein into the Kander Valley.

McDonalds exercise room

McDonalds play room

In this valley it was snowing, and there was a lot of snow already on the ground. As we neared the lakes, we found a new mini shopping centre next to the motorway, and am embarrassed to say that we had another McDonalds. But it was the poshest one we had ever seen. It was spotlessly clean, with a huge area upstairs overlooking the main road, with a children's exercise area and play area. The food was great, and although more expensive than Italy, cheaper than the bistro next door. We popped into the Lidl next door for some milk, and then drove onto to Interlaken.

It was still snowing as we left, but as the road dropped down, the snow turned to rain. The road took us right next to the lake, which seemed just inches from the road. We headed for the centre and found some great parking on the main road next to a park. The parking meters were very clever; each bay was numbered, you choose the correct number at the machine, put your money in, and then there was no need for a paper ticket, as the machine could tell you how much time was left in each bay.

The first shop we found was a chocolate shop, where we picked up a few bits. Then we walked around the casino down to the river, which was a very strange aqua marine colour. As we only had a hour, we circled back to the main road, past the Grand Hotel, tried to do a cache, but failed, in the park, and back to car.

We drove through the modern part of Interlaken, over the island and into the old part where we found another great parking right next to the river. Here we managed to find a cache, some munzees and lots of ducks. We walked along one side of the river, crossed it, and back along the other side, which included a old wooden bridge over a weir. We also found a nice little bakery where we picked up a few bits, and then back to the car. It was getting dark, so we set off back to the tunnel and home.
It was a very easy drive home, just filled up with fuel, and back in the Valais valley there was no snow or rain.

Route off the train