Here comes Switzerland!

Finally, the last leg of our journey is here... documented for all of posterity to read. Switzerland (Heidi Land) a place where the grass IS greener on the other side. If I had to describe Switzerland in three words it would be cute, clean and cozy! Switzerland would be a place I could live for ever...if I lived in the mountains not Zurich!

While in Switzerland we rented a car and drove almost the whole country. I must say that my 1st experience driving in Switzerland was not my favorite, let me tell you why.....

The morning started out lovely with a taxi to the airport to pick up our rental car (Mercedes), Lee acted as pilot and Rand was our ever trusty navigator. Charlene and I accepted our positions as back street drivers graciously. We began our journey with tooling. If you are not familiar with this term it is what tourist do. "Tooling -Tourists driving slower then normal, gawking at landscape and thinking they are the lucky for not being at work right now". As we were tooling along the Swiss Countryside we saw a man driving a motorcycle who was not tooling so we took our place in the right lane and he passed us going very fast. I was just a happy little camper in the backseat eating my weird egg mcmuffin from McDonald's (may I add this was not a "normal" USA MC Muffin) anyhow, back to the story..there I was just chatting and eating and taking in the picturesque scenery when Lee from the front seat says, "that guy just died"! Let me mention that if I ever said a sentence like, "that man just died" it would not be in a calm and collected voice like unto Lee. If I ever made a statement like that it would sound something like this, "ahh, ooh, oh my hec, haa, can you believe it, oh my hec, ahh, ooh"! As I looked up I saw a motorcycle one way a man on the ground in the other direction and then I don't really know what I saw. According to Rand and Lee the movement I saw was a movement your body can make as it goes from shock to dying. We didn't have a place to stop for a minute so when we finally got pulled over and backed up some other people were already on the scene. Apparently the man passed us and then realized he was going to miss his exit so when he tried to cut back over he didn't quite make it and hit the sign.

I could not stop visualizing this scene in my head all day. It was so freaky... not the actual accident but if you know me you know I never stop analyzing. All day I kept wondering about this man and his family and if they were waiting at home and if he was late for work for a job he loved or hated? What if he had plans with someone and they spent all day wondering why he did not show up? I kept wondering what this man thought about as he got on his motorcycle that morning? Did he have a clue that he would die that day, was his last thought profound or was he just mad at a bunch of slow tourist tooling around in a Mercedes eating Swiss Mc Muffins? I hope his last thought was profound and not anger. I think I will strive to have more pleasant thoughts in my day!

The more pleasant parts of Switzerland........
Rand was obsessed with this mountain range, Mt. Eiger, Mt. Junfrau, and Mt. Monch make up the mountain range. For those of you who have ever had Evian Water these three mountains make up the picture on the front of the bottle. FYI, Climbers climb Mt. Eiger's technical North Face and this is where Rand's favorite line of clothing comes from..."The North Face".

Our first picture in Zurich after a crazy 10 hr train ride that was supposed to be 5!

I am to Castle as Rand is to Lamborghini, can you say fat chance??????????


We took a tram up about 8,000 feet and found little villages, Gimmewald and Muren. Do you bale hay on a cliff? We saw little families hand raking up fields of grass to bale and loading them into trucks parked on cliffs. I think routine break checks would be a good idea in this little village.

Rand has now touched the top of Mt. Eiger even if he didn't climb it.


I even found a place to shop @ 8000 feet. Click to make the picture bigger, you will notice the word "shop" above the door, it wasn't a hard find. Darling homemade gifts. I am feeling quite satisfied!


As this darling man ventures down the road, I have to say goodbye as well to our vacation. Until next year!