A return to Switzerland – land of mountains, museums and moos! COMPLETED 12/4 - Page 51 - PassPorter - A Community of Walt Disney World, Disneyland, Disney Cruise Line, and General Travel Forums
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There are other changes as well.
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Tuesday 3 September – part six: learning about the history of Jungfraujoch
We saw a paraglider…
… got some neat shots of the shadow of the observatory…
… and the hanging snow.
We headed around to the other side, where we could see people out walking on the glacier…
… or tobogganing.
We’d talked about all these extra activities that are offered on the way up here, as they’d showcased them on the train, and we’d decided (oddly enough ) that we wouldn’t be participating. This was literally what we came here for.
We also saw a plane fly over while we were there, so there was certainly lots of activity.
I was fascinated by the shapes in the snow on this side of the viewing platform…
Eventually, we headed back inside, getting a few final shots on the way..
Then we descended back to ground level, and continued our tour. The next section was the alpine spectacular, which really wasn’t much, but it was interesting to see..
I liked the next section. It was going slightly uphill, and they’d put in a moving walkway, which I thought was a very good idea and alongside it, you could see drawings of Switzerland, which was neat.
The next section paid tribute to those who lost their lives constructing the railway. Mark counted up the names, and it came to 30, which surprised us, as we had expected it to be a lot more, given the work they’d had to do in creating this.
Work started on the railway in 1896, with the line opening as far as the Eigergletscher railway station at the foot of the Eiger a staggering two years later. The section up to Eigerwand station opened in 1903, with the section to the Eismeer station opening two years after that. Bearing in mind the relatively quick progress that they’d made to date, I think it says everything the section up to the Jungfraujoch station didn’t open until 1912, seven years later.
Tuesday 3 September – part seven: will it be third time lucky with the trains
Soon we were given the choice of going out on to the plateau or continuing back to the station. I think you can probably tell which one we chose? We had a quick look in the shop on the way out, but to be honest, it was a bit disappointing. I was expecting a lot more stuff saying “Top of Europe”, but if anything, I think the selection was better in Kleine Scheidegg…
We made our way to the train, and snagged left hand seats, which would give us the best view going back down, all the time keeping our fingers crossed that we didn’t end up with another tour group. Thankfully we didn’t.. third time lucky! Phew…
We were hungry by now, but this is what we saw when we got our crisps (chips) out – a result of the altitude we’d been at.
We ended up with a young Australian couple sitting next to us, and got chatting away to them. He was 24, but looked about 15, and was a policeman. What is it they say about policemen looking younger these days? They were lovely, and the tunnel portion of the journey just flew by chatting to them. We were one of the few ones awake in the carriage. We noticed on the way up that every train we passed seemed to have lots of people sleeping in it, and we figured that was a result of the high altitude. Now we were seeing it for ourselves!
When we came out of the tunnel, that woke everyone up, as the sunshine was piercing, after having been in the darkness for so long. We got some stunning views…
… and saw some Swiss cows up close and personal by the tracks!
The best thing was the Australian girl (we didn’t get their names) also loved cows, so we were both in our element, snapping away, and then comparing who’d got the best photo!
When we got back down to Kleine Scheidegg, we said our goodbyes to them, as they were going to get a coffee, and we were heading straight back.
As you’d expect, there was a train waiting for us, and we managed to find two single seats opposite each other on the prized left hand side with the best views. And once again, we were free of any travel groups, making the whole journey down much more pleasant than on the way up.
The cows that we saw close up just a few moments earlier And some others we found nearby!
A MUCH more pleasant trip down the mountain than up! I love all those cow photos. My next life I think I'd like to spend as a Swiss cow. Well, maybe not, but for a cow it does look like a wonderful life.
Stunning views is right! Wow, the mountains were in all their glory. It gave me goosebumps! Those cows are so cute! I have to tell you, I thought of you as my mother took my kids to a dairy on Friday. They milk 3,000 cows, 3 x a day! They have a birthing barn there and they saw the cutest newborns! I knew you would have loved it!
A MUCH more pleasant trip down the mountain than up! I love all those cow photos. My next life I think I'd like to spend as a Swiss cow. Well, maybe not, but for a cow it does look like a wonderful life.
It does look like a great life, doesn't it? Maybe if you could be a dairy cow, then perhaps that would be the life...
Stunning views is right! Wow, the mountains were in all their glory. It gave me goosebumps! Those cows are so cute! I have to tell you, I thought of you as my mother took my kids to a dairy on Friday. They milk 3,000 cows, 3 x a day! They have a birthing barn there and they saw the cutest newborns! I knew you would have loved it!
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) that we wouldn’t be participating. This was literally what we came here for. 
The section up to Eigerwand station opened in 1903, with the section to the Eismeer station opening two years after that. Bearing in mind the relatively quick progress that they’d made to date, I think it says everything the section up to the Jungfraujoch station didn’t open until 1912, seven years later. 
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