It has been an incredibly busy week for all of us! Work has been busy for me and Brooklyn had more babysitting and dog duties lined up. Matt worked on getting registered for school and Ryan has stayed busy on the Xbox 😂.
On top of everything, we’ve been having a heat wave here. It’s been in the 90s all week and Thursday got up to 100F. With no A/C it’s been so hot and uncomfortable. We are looking forward to some cooler temps!
Friday was my day off and by that point, we were ready to get out of town. We dropped the dogs at a friend’s house and headed to Lucerne, Switzerland.
The weather forecast was calling for thunderstorms all weekend but it was sunny and hot when we arrived. We checked into our Airbnb and did some walking around the city.
To our surprise, our apartment was right on the river inlet by the Chapel Bridge so we didn’t have to walk far.
After some walking, Matt scoped out a burger place for lunch, which happened to be in the city’s train station. Food and drink in Switzerland is expensive! Our four burgers came to about $70 and at this point, we were glad we had brought enough food to be able to cook some meals at the apartment.
After lunch, we walked back through the city, to the old city walls, that you can hike and see views of the city from above.
When we were done with our hike, we went back to the apartment for dinner and about 20 rounds of Uno with the kids. Afterwards, Matt and I went out for a drink at the Weissachaf (White Sheep). A friend had recommended the place and said they had the best cocktails they’ve ever had and they definitely did not disappoint. I had an Apricot Bellini and Matt had a Cuban Espresso and we would both definitely say they are some of the best drinks we’ve ever had.
On Saturday we had planned to do the Golden Circle of Mt. Pilatus. It had thunderstormed most of the night and unfortunately, it was cloudy in the morning. We could not see the peak of Pilatus as we could the day before so knew we wouldn’t be catching any spectacular views. But, as this was our only chance to take the trip, we decided to go ahead with it.
The Golden Circle starts in Lucerne with a steamboat boat ride up Lake Lucerne to Alpnach, where you catch the worlds steepest cogwheel train up to the peak of Pitalus. After you spend some time at the top, you take a series of cable cars back down the mountain to the town of Kriens, where a bus takes you back to Lucerne.
After about an hour long boat ride, we reached Alpnach, where we boarded the cogwheel train. There was no line for the train and the ride took about 45 minutes. It took us through forests, tunnels, and alpine meadows, complete with cows wearing their Swiss cowbells.
As expected, when we got to the top pthere was zero visibility. There is a hotel, cliff walk, and short hikes that can be done at the top but as we couldn’t see anything, we decided to give the outdoor stuff a pass. We grabbed some food and looked around the gift shop and got on the cable car to head back down.
There are two different cable cars that take you back down Pilatus. The first stops at Fränkmüntegg, a tiny village on the way down. At this stop there is also a ropes course, mountain coaster, and treetops walk. The mountain coaster was closed due to fog but we did do the treetop walk while we were there. The kids had fun playing hike and seek in the fog. Then, it was on to the next cable car.
The second cable car took us back to the town of Kriens, where we grabbed a bus back to Lucerne. We were back in Lucerne by 2pm, having left on the 9:38 boat to Alpnach. I had read that doing the Golden Route usually took five hours but due to weather, we didn’t have to wait in any lines for the train or cable cars and we also didn’t spend a lot of time at the top. If it had been sunny, I could see this stretched out to a six or seven hour trip.
When we got to Lucerne, we did some more walking around the town, which is actually really cute.
We actually had enough time in the afternoon for a nap, and then dinner at the apartment and some more Uno.
Sunday morning, the weather was still pretty crappy so we decided to head back towards Germany. We had a couple ideas for places we wanted to stop off in, but the weather never cleared up until we crossed the border back into Germany (ironically). So, we decided to just head back home to the puppies.
Overall, we had a good time in Lucerne. It is a beautiful city and you could fill a day just walking around the old town, and more days doing day trips up the surrounding mountains and cruising on the lake. The weather did put a small damper on things (literally) for us. But, Lucerne is so close, we know we will definitely be back when we have visitors with us so we are looking forward to experiencing it again. We also got in a lot of quality family time and were able to unwind from a stressful week so it ended up being perfect despite the weather.
We’ve got another busy week ahead and then heading back to Wiesbaden next weekend for another visit with some friends.
Gilcrests Abroad 