Switzerland by Rail (Part 1)
At Gare de L’Est we boarded the TGV train to Strasbourg which takes two hours. Strasbourg was our overnight stop, with the hotel conveniently situated opposite the railway station, although the hotel is set back with a small park in between. In the morning we had some time to explore Strasbourg, whilst the shops were closed being a Sunday morning, it was quite busy. The city centre was quite pleasant to walk around and the architecture of half timbered buildings was very nice. Unfortunately, unable to visit the cathedral inside as preparing for morning service but nice to see the outside.
After a cheeky coffee we returned to the hotel to collect our luggage and meet the rest of the group, ready for our lunchtime departure. We took the train to Zurich where we changed to another to take us to Chur. At Chur we changed to the Rhatische Bahn railway, a narrow gauge railway which would take us to Tiefencastel. On arrival at Tiefencastel our luggage was collected by the hotel we then walked to the hotel which is 10 minutes downhill. Note that there is a local bus which passes the hotel and some in the group took advantage of this.
The hotel Albula & Julier was our base for the next five nights. The hotel was well appointed with friendly staff and some nice meals. A packed lunch was also available to take in the mornings if you wished to. The Monday was a “free day” but we wanted to see as much as we could and took advantage of the 50% discount Swiss Travel Card we were all given to travel to Zurich. We shocked our tour manager as we were the first down for breakfast at 0700. She wasn’t expecting anyone to be up that early!
We made our way to the station and caught the train to Chur where we transferred to the SBB train to Zurich. I have to be honest and say that there is not a great deal to see in Zurich but I’m glad we did visit. After leaving the station we crossed the river and made our way towards the lake, seeing some interesting buildings on the way.
At the lake we discovered a “short lake cruise” and on enquiring at the ticket office the next cruise departed in eight minutes. What was even more surprising was we received 50% off for having the Swiss Travel Card, which made the just over 90 minute cruise good value at CHF9.00 (approx. £7.95).
The cruise stopped at a number of places going up the lake and down the other side. One stop was Kilchberg home of the Lindt chocolate factory. You have to book online to visit the factory, unfortunately for us all slots were full that day, probably not a bad thing we might have spoilt our dinner eating chocolate! There was a snack bar onboard which we shared a sausage and chips which was good value considering where we were.
After the cruise we wondered down what must have been the main shopping street, which was fairly busy. There were a number of chocolate shops and yes, in one of the pictures that box of chocolates is CHF59.00 (about £52.00). We had a nose in the Laderach chocolate shop and bagged some free chocolate as we signed up for their newsletter. We purchased a small package of slab chocolate which contained nuts, raisins etc, there was about eight pieces in squares of about 6cm x 6cm, marked as CHF8.00. At the till the price was just on CHF24.00, we paid and then continued to browse and discovered that the CHF8.00 was per 100g, but shown in very small type. But it was great chocolate.
We made our way back to the station and took the train back to Chur and connected with the train to Tiefencastel, ready for our dinner.
Part Two to follow……
