Salzburg, Austria – 9 June, 2005

We are writing this on the train going through the Alps Mountains from Interlaken, Switzerland to Salzburg, Austria on 8 June and will update the blog with it tomorrow. As I look out the window, here in Austria, I expect someone the jump out of the woods and sing “the hills are alive with the sound of music”.

The train trip from Lake Como to Interlaken went well, except we missed our first connection from Verenna to Milan because the ferry for the ten-minute ride from Menaggio to Verenna was late. After we got off the ferry at Verenna we ran up the hill to the train station, pulling our luggage as fast as we could, but just as we got within 50 feet of the station the train pulled away. What a sinking feeling! In the end we got a taxi to Milan and left about a half-hour later and since it was Sunday morning it took an hour and 15 minutes to get to Milan and we still had 45 minutes before the train to Interlaken left. We had a few less Euros in our pockets than we planned, but we made it. The train trip to Interlaken, through the Alps Mountains was incredible, including going through the 15-mile long Simplon tunnel, and going along cliffs up the sides of snow capped mountains. The view was from a calendar, with chalets with blooming flower boxes and cows with cowbells high up in the pastures (straight out of Heidi).

Switzerland is like a different planet from Italy. First, because of the altitude the temperature is really chilly. When we left Italy it was hot (80-90 F) and people were on the beaches at the lakes, in Switzerland we were back to sweaters and jackets (50-60 F) and the flowers are just starting to come out. Secondly, since Switzerland has the highest per capita income it Europe it has much better infrastructure. The roads are wider, there are more bridges and tunnels, the trains are new and clean. One of the biggest contrasts was the post office were you take and electronically printed number and look a screen to see when your number comes up and what booth to go to. Everything is clean and organized. Although Switzerland is charming it is not as quaint as Italy.

Interlaken is at the base of some of the highest of the Alps Mountains peaks and has a complex series of full and narrow gauge trains, cog rail trains, funiculars and cable cars to take people into the mountains. We took a trip a to the Jungfraujoch which is called the “Top of Europe”, located at 3,454 m (11,300 ft). We had to change trains about three times to get there going from a regular train to a cog railroad to a second very powerful cog railroad. This last railroad then took us through a long tunnel with a very steep grade carved out of solid rock and leads to one of the highest peaks in the Alps. At the end there is a railroad station in the tunnels with walking tunnels that lead to outside and inside observation decks, restaurants and a place called the “Ice Palace”. The altitude was so high that we both felt very dizzy and had to walk very slowly to avoid getting out of breath. The view outside was spectacular; with ice and snow and huge cliffs and mountain peaks all around. We could look down on a huge glacier streaming miles down a valley between the mountains. The temperature was around the freezing point, the wind was howling and it was an exhilarating experience. A tunnel in the granite led to the “Ice Palace” where the floor and walls suddenly were ice. We were inside the glacier! There were long hallways and galleries with ice carving in them; another incredible experience.