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If you live in München, what do you do for a vacation? Our German friends go further afield to places like Crete...

Hiking tour in Switzerland [1]

Dave Hood
2004-02-22 18:10:16

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Foreword

If you live in München, what do you do for a vacation? Our German friends go further afield to places like Crete, but Jacky and I had not seen Switzerland, so we decided on a hiking tour there. We signed up for a self-guided tour, which meant the route was defined, and we had maps and a place to stay every night. The touring company carried our luggage… we had only to walk and enjoy. An added attraction of the Bear Trail route was that it went over Große Scheidegg pass, below Wetterhorn, which is featured on a large cycling poster I’ve had for years.

Since we hadn’t been to Switzerland before, we took an extra day or two to explore Bern and Thun before the real hike. Naturally we took the train.

Thursday, August 31, 1995, to Bern

To my surprise, this rail route is not electrified – I thought all major routes were electric. Riding behind a Diesel locomotive is pretty unpleasant: the fumes are a real irritant to eyes and nose. We sure get spoiled quickly! As far as Lindau, we sat next to a Finnish man and his son, the son perhaps 20. Learned something about Finnish geography and culture (famous Finns: Sibelius, Saarinen). Finland joined the EC this year; most people have seen no change, except that food is about 10% cheaper, so they’re happy.

The father recommended Lindau and Bodensee (Lake Constance) as well worth seeing. He had been there many times, was introducing his son to it. He does a lot of Euro-travel, seems to like rural England best, says he’s been there maybe thirty times. We saw our first mountains of the day at Lindau, but it was cloudy and rainy. Bodensee, what we could see from the train, does look nice.

There’s a short stretch through Austria, and we had border police from all three countries walking through the train, checking some or all passports, showing the flag. The train itself was Swiss. These trains are marked SBB, CFF, FFS. ...