You say Luzern, I say Lucerne

We spent the 2nd and 3rd of January visiting beautiful Lucerne.  We briefly visited Lucerne 5 years ago, but it was excellent to be able to take a little longer to savour its delights this time .

It was pretty cold and wet both days, so while we did spend some time wandering around, we also spent quite a lot of time in cafes and restaurants where the true delights are to be found.

We were also lucky to be able to spend the first day catching up with Martin, a friend of Manuela's, with whom we traveled in Argentina in 2011.

  Snow dusted little boat on Lake Lucerne near the snow dusted 14th century Kapellbrucke bridge

  Part of the medieval city ramparts. You can walk around them, but not in winter.

 

 In front of the Lion Monument Memorial

We didn't know about this important tourist attraction but plenty of other tourists did.  It apparently commemorates the Swiss soldiers who died defending King Louis XVI during the French Revolution.

 Martin, Dale and me enjoying kafee and kuchen in a very chic Lucerne cafe, selected by Manuela.  Photo is also by Manuela.

At Martin's suggestion we went to the Bourbaki Panorama, which was excellent as a piece of artwork and very interesting historically.  It is an 1100 square metre painting that encircles the room, with real diorama elements in front of the painting to provide a 3D feel.  The panorama vividly depicts the miserable state of retreating French troops during the 1870-71 Franco-Prussian war.  These troops were taken in by the Swiss and looked after until they were well enough to return to France.  This was probably the first major international mission undertaken by the Red Cross and had a big impact on Swiss society.

An effective mix of modelling and painted scenery

 A building stunningly decorated as an advent calendar

We had dinner with Martin and then we walked around taking photos of the enchantingly lit up city. 

Here is a selection of some of those photos.

 The 15th century Spreuerbrucke Bridge with the Hotel Chateau Gutsch lit up in the background

More of the Spreuerbrucke Bridge

 

More beautiful street lighting, this time in Zug

We went back to Lucerne on the second day to visit the Sammlung Rosengart Art Gallery, which is described as Lucerne's blockbuster cultural attraction.  It is the collection of a Swiss art dealer, Angela Rosengart.  She was a friend of Picasso's and amassed an awesome collection of paintings by Picasso and Klee.  There are also works by Cezanne, Kandinsky, Miro, Matisse and Monet in the collection.  However, we were most amazed by two small studies that were done by Georges Seurat as preparation for his works 'A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte' (Dale's favourite painting) and 'Bathing at Asnieres'.

We didn't take many noteworthy photos on the second day although we did take the one below of one of the boats that can ferry you around Lake Lucerne.  We'd like to do this on a nice sunny day.

Goodbye 14 , hello 15

On New Year's Eve we spent the afternoon wandering around Zurich before going to Guido's apartment, where we celebrated.

We had a brief look around the main shopping district before visiting the Swiss National Museum and then walking around two former working class inner suburbs, Kreis 4 and Kreis 5.  Guido lives in Kreis 4 and it still has the reputation for being Zurich's red light district. 

Zurich's vertiginous church steeples.

and trams.

 I

I loved the sight of these snow covered bikes.  I'm just glad that i didn't need to ride one.

Some unsanctioned, premature New Year's Eve fireworks

We had some wonderful food and plenty of wine at Guido's lovely apartment with Manuela and their friends Carmen and Reto.  

Immediately after celebrating at midnight we caught a couple of trams into central Zurich and walked down Bahnhofstrasse to get as close as possible to Lake Zurich, from where the city's new year fireworks were being launched.

The centre of Zurich, shortly after midnight

There was a great atmosphere.  There were a lot of people around but I didn't ever feel claustrophobic. We took along some gluhvein in a flask but most people seemed to be drinking champagne.

How great are these fireworks?

and these.....

 

Manuela, Dale and I stayed at Guido's place overnight and after a leisurely breakfast, we headed off on quite a long drive to a ski station just outside Altdorf.  Carmen and Reto rejoined us and we took 2 gondolas up to a way station that was way above the clouds covering the valley below.  We stopped to have a drink - the schnapps with coffee went down really well in the cold but sunny weather.

After Conny and Biat joined us we headed off on a 2 and a half hour trek to a remote little restaurant called Allp Selez.

  

Views of the valley below from the first way station (half way up)

and of the lower slopes

The moon was up even before we started the trek at 3.30 pm

 

We trekked steeply uphill but the views along the way were stunning.  We loved the way the snow was offset by these sunlit craggy rocks.

 

Manuela...and in the other photo a train of us following in Biat's wake.  Biat and I discovered that we were born on exactly the same day but I think he's a little bit fitter than me

 

We continued to trek uphill

and uphill - look at how deep the snow was.

And still uphill.  We had trekked past those buildings below.

We finally reached the mountain pass

We were deliriously happy to reach the pass...and we loved the sunset view that awaited us.

But then we had to trek steeply downhill... and downhill...and downhill.  This was technically challenging for first time snowshoers.  Find some fresh snow, lean back and walk on your heals.  But when you start to get the hang of it it seems like you are walking on clouds.  Bliss!

Finally we arrived at the restaurant.  It can only seat about 20 people. We were really really happy to be warm and fed.

Here's the fondue before we started.  We had 2 of these between 8 of us. Hmmm bread, cheese and garlic - if we had died of exhaustion we would have been in heaven.

 

And here's the fondue dish, not so very long later.

After dinner we walked about 15 minutes to another gondola way station.  We had to operate the gondolas ourselves.  Luckily the others had done this before.  The lights of Altdorf, in the valley below, were most beautiful.

The day had been exhausting but it had also been a truly glorious way to celebrate the first day of 2015.

White Christmas (eventually)

We arrived in London at lunch time on Christmas day after a very comfortable journey from Melbourne.  We were upgraded to business class for the leg from Melbourne to Doha, so were able to drink too much good wine and then sleep it off comfortably.

We drove to Highcliffe and were able to spend part of Christmas Day with John and Vera, Dale's great uncle and aunt.  When we arrived they were celebrating at their neighbour's and had only just finished their main course.  Uncle John and Aunty Vera are 95 and 92 respectively and they were celebrating Christmas day with their neighbour, Kath, who is 93 and her sister Jean, who is 91.  In addition Kath's daughter Jennifer and grandson, Peter, were supervising proceedings, making sure that the nonagenarians didn't get out of hand. We spent a lovely couple of hours at Kath's place being stuffed full of Christmas pudding and chocolates and being regaled with very funny stories by Kath and Jean.

On Boxing Day we went for a nice walk that we had also done last year on a lovely sunny autumn morning.  This time it was a little more cold and overcast.

Entrance to the local church

The public footpath through the Highcliffe Golf Course, but beware of the golf balls.  People were out on the golf course earlyish on Boxing Day.  Escaping the family perhaps! 

After crossing the golf course, we walked through a nature reserve before descending the high cliffs down to the beach where you can look across to the Isle of Wight.  Then we reascended via a winding footpath and wandered around the grounds of Highcliffe Castle.
 

We spent the rest of the day at Uncle John and Aunty Vera's place.  In previous years we have always gone out to restaurants for lunch, but they now find it very difficult to go out so we stayed at home instead.

On Saturday we met a friend, Nigel, for breakfast in nearby Christchurch.  Nigel grew up in Christchurch and found us a great cafe for breakfast.  We didn't have a lot of time but after breakfast he gave us an excellent 15 minute tour of central Christchurch. 

 St Martin's Priory in Christchurch

After spending another few hours with John and Vera we drove to London where we met more friends, Andrew and Rhys for dinner. 

The following morning we trained from London to Zurich, via Paris, and then on to Zug. As we got into the French country side snow started appearing on the ground and then in started snowing.   It was still snowing when we arrived in Zug at 7.30 pm.  We were met by Manuela's friend Guido at Zug train station.  We had spent quite a lot of time with Guido when we visited Manuela in 2009 but I didn't recognise him as he has a beard now.  Manuela and Guido cooked us a lovely dinner and served us up lots of lovely wine.

The following morning we wandered down into Zug to re-acquaint ourselves with this beautiful town.  It was freezing even though we were pretty well rugged up. At midday, as we started to walk home, it started to snow and it has only stopped about a day and a half later.  Manuela has said that it is quite unusual to get this much snow in Zug so she has taken the opportunity to take us out walking in the surrounding country side.  I have never seen so much snow.  It is very cold but the scenery is spectacular.

First up, we walked in Steinhauserwald, the forest above Steinhausen, which is a town very nearby to Zug and is where Manuela grew up.

Baby Christmas trees covered in snow in Steinhauserwald

Dale and Manuela enjoying the snow in Steinhauserwald

Yesteday, Manuela introduced us to snowshoeing, which we just loved.  We spent 3 hours walking around Oberwil bei Zug.  We had planned to take a funicular to Zugerberg but it wasn't working - thanks to the snow falls.

The country side was a true winter wonderland.

Beautiful snow covered gate

Spying on the sheep through snow laden branches

Bee hives

Can you believe the amount of snow piled up on the branches?

Manuela's idea of fun. Shower some snow down on David

Exhausted, near the end of the walk

Loved the sight of this fence and gate surrounded by snow and snow covered trees.

We walked up a forested road that Manuela has never seen covered with so much snow

We have also been eating and drinking too much with Manuela's lovely friends.  We had a raclette dinner party at Manuela's place on Monday night.  Manuela has bought a raclette griller that sits in the middle of the table and you grill your own cheese before spreading it over boiled potatoes and adding condiments.  I want one. Last night we were entertained by some more friends in their home and had another wonderful 4 course meal and some lovely Austrian white wine.  It continues tonight with new year's eve celebrations at Guido's place in Zurich.  Hopefully there are some nice fireworks photos to come.