First full day in Lenk

We left for Lenk on Friday lunchtime, and after a very, very long travel "day" we were finally almost there by Sunday morning. Maybe I'll blog our travel day later, but for now let's get to the good stuff.

Dad rented a car (a Citroen mid sized van, which in reality is smaller than our Outlander, but does the trick). We stopped in Zweisimmen to stretch our legs. And parked right across from the Cafe Pony. We remembered Cafe Pony with fond memories (we stopped here with Rob, Dave and Dad in 2008 and had delicious ice creams here).

I think I try to get a picture of this bear every time, and it's never quite right. Here's this year's try.

We saw a telephone booth (they still have them here!) and so we had to snap a picture.

It was before 9 on Sunday morning, so the village was very quiet. Everything is closed on Sundays (in fact, everything was already closed on Saturday evening!) We had been hoping to pick up some groceries somewhere, but no such luck. So we settled for the rabid photo taking.

This is me trying to get a good picture of these three. Take one:

And take two. If only I could overlap 'em.

The thing about Switzerland is that every where you look, it's so beautiful. Pride of ownership is evident in almost every square inch.

Which makes it hard to respect people's front lawns. "Hey Lizzie, can you sit on their front step so I can take a picture?

Actually, I needed her in the picture so I could show you how interesting the woodwork is on the house. Here's a close up...it was like fish scales. So beautiful and intricate.

As always, I'm obsessed with the cars.

We met Dad by the train station and these two persuaded him they needed to catch the train the rest of the way home.

So here they are in front of the Lenker train.

And inside it (yes, Grosspapa bought them (us) tickets. David is about a billion times more excited than he looks :)

Hey! It's me and Andy.

Not really sure what's going on here...

Once in Lenk, we said hello to my grosspapa, grossmeuti and Uncle Reudi.

And then we four walked up to Chalet Neuoertli and met Dad and Anny.

After unpacking quickly, we were off on our first adventure - up the Metsch Bahn.

Last summer they opened a new gondola - instead of the old standing room only ones (a lot like the gondola up to Grouse Mountain), they have new ten seater gondolas which take you past the old Metsch station all the way to the top of the mountain - in ten minutes.

So there's the old Metsch (although that's the new station!)

And we passed this guy working.

There's another shot of him.Crazy, insect looking piece of machinery.

And here's dad and Anny nearly dying in the heat of the sun as we continue to make our way up to the top of the mountain.

At the mountain top, we had lunch.

Elisabeth wasn't sure she liked anything on the restaurant menu, so we left them there and went to the self serve area where she got wienerli and pomme frites. I made myself a salad.

Yum!

This was the view to our left.We decided we wanted to walk along that trail.

I may have pulled out Imagine Dragons 'On top of the world' while were here taking pictures.

You can't tell how many beautiful flowers were growing in amongst the grass. But it was absolutely lovely.

We walked right out to that little hill at the end, where we could peer over the edge and make out the Sieben Brunneli waaaaaaaaay down in the distance. We hiked up to the Sieben Brunneli in '08 and it felt like a long way up.

David desperately wanted to hike this trail, but I had to tell him to come back in a few years.

He was bitterly disappointed.

But that's the hike from a different angle. Can you get an idea of how steep it is?

How bout if I show you from this angle (yes, that is a human up there).

Anyway, there was no way we were doing that hike yesterday. Not in our crappy runners and jet lag. Probably not ever. I'm too chicken!

The Metsch summit is about 2500 metres above sea level.

 
After we'd hiked around the top of the mountain, we took the tram down to the mittelstation and walked out to the Egge. Here it is below - my grandparents used to own this chalet it was lovely. Then some woman bought it and changed the name to Fort Notte and made it very hokey. At least she takes care of it.

Because after David, Elisabeth and I walked the hour down from middle station home, we stopped at Old Oertli and seeing it look so unloved and uncared for was awful. I only took one picture, but it was pretty heartbreaking.

So let's end with a shot of David colouring.