Ed and Annette's Excellent European Adventure

We got up and were treated with a slightly cloudy but comfortable day. It is Sunday and all the stores and shops in town will be closed so we decided to have a trip around the beautiful lake and stunning mountains. After a nice breakfast at a bakery right alongside the river, we walked over to the boat landing and started our adventure.

We bought a combination ticket to allow us to boat, train, tram and bus the area for the day. We started on the boat for about an hour cruise across this clear fresh and magnificent alpine lake. Marveling at the views of the Alps and of the residences surrounding. Our boat dropped us off at the base of one of the mountains where we boarded a funicular looking train car, but this one is operated by cog-wheel gears to climb the mountain. It twisted and turned up, sometimes as steep as 50% grade, at a fairly rapid pace. It was about a 30 minute ride to get us to the top of this towering mountain, The views that opened up as we rose we in-describably spectacular. We could see hikers and mountain climbers out there enjoying their sport on these iconic mountains.

Arriving at the top, Pilatus, there is a large glass walled reception area, restaurant and two hotels. We walked out to a trail outside and had a 360 degree view of the area. It was COLD, but the view was worth standing there in our short pants! We had lunch at the restaurant before boarding a large cable tram down from the peak. We got to the next level down and go off. We took a luge ride down the side of the mountain on a twisting and turning steel track. A ski type lift drug us backward to the start. Back onto a smaller cable tram we rode down to the city of Kriens to hop a bus back to Lucern.

Getting back to Lucern, we walked to the ancient wall and climbed one of the towers to take us for a walk along the top of the wall for great views of the city below. We stopped at one point outside the wall and just soaked up the nature and beauty of the area. Back on the wall we headed to an iconic statue that was carved into the rock on the side of the mountain in 1820 to pay tribute to the Swiss Guard that were massacred in the 1792 French Revolution. We found a place for a quick dinner and then headed back to the hotel to pack and prepare for the early start to a 24 hour journey back to home.