Switzerland 2018: Day 5

We woke up to absolutely amazing views and a clear sky around the Matterhorn.  I just kept taking picture after picture and watching as the sun rose and the light went lower down the mountain.  Finally, once everything was illuminated the clouds slowly started to come in filter around the mountain.  The views remained fantastic until around 3 when the mountain clouded over and it got dark and stormy.  It was a beautiful day.

The picture series below is from our balcony and it starts at dawn and goes to 11 when we went on our hike and then continues around 3:30 in the afternoon when we got back.

Since we have had Wren, Jeff and I decided that we should each have one day during vacation to do something by ourselves, in other words, a day to do something that is not kid friendly.  Jeff’s kid free day was a day of down hill mountain biking. He rented a full suspension mountain bike, hired a guide and got a lift pass and had one of the “most epic days” of mountain biking in his life.  He took 7 lifts and had an amazing day of riding with incredible views.  I might be able to convince him to write up a little thing about his day, but the gist of it was that it was fantastic riding, he was really glad he got the guide so that he knew which trails were the best riding and how to navigate the transitions between trails.  He thinks without the guide he would have had fun but wasted a lot of time looking at maps and scratching his head.  This way he just has fun fun fun.

I had the kiddos from wake up around 8:20 until about 4:30 on my own. We kept the morning calm with breakfast in the apartment and a little bit of play.  We finally managed to make it out the door around 11.  I put Flynt in the frame pack and Wren was on foot.  We walked to the funicular station and went up to Sunnegga and from there took a gondola up to Blauherd.  At Blauherd we hiked the Marmelweg trail 3.8km to Lake Leisee. So what that all translates to is we took a really steep cable train that is underground up a mountain, popped out of the ground and took one of those enclosed things that go up hills at ski resorts and then hiked down a trail that has a bunch of marmots living along it.  The hike was 2.4 miles all down hill but it was pretty steep for a “kid friendly” trail.  I had to hold Wren’s hand the whole way so between her and Flynt on my back it was a pretty good workout.  The trail was pretty rocky and had some pretty steep drop-offs so I really wanted to hold Wren’s hand to keep her safe anyway.  

Going up the gondola.

Hiking down the trail.

Some people were nice enough to take our picture for us.  This is about half way down.

Beautiful!  If you look down on the hillside, those squarish lumps are houses to put things in scale.  it drops pretty quickly.

The awesome part was once we got to the bottom there was a special kids tram that looked like a mini roller coaster with a cartoon sheep on it that took us to a lake with a playground next to it.  It has to be the best view at a playground in the entire world.  It was incredible!  Wren loved the "Wolli car".  I took Flynt out of the pack and dumped him in his little hexagon to wiggle around and let Wren play.  There were 2 other families at the park and a few people at the lake but it was really uncrowded.  We hung out there for a good 2 hours and had a fantastic time. Wren is currently obsessed with the story of the three billygoats Gruff and since the playground had a bridge, I was a troll.  We also played the three little pigs and I was the wolf but I wasn’t supposed to gobble her, she invited me in her house to play.  Flynt got some lap time and a bottle, too.  He wasn’t completely ignored, lol.

Playground with a view.

Flynt in his hexagon and Wren on the "troll bridge".

Smile and pretend you like your brother!

Awesome water play for kids.  There are all different ways to move the water around and re-route the flow.  Such a fun way to play and learn.

We finished up by walking around the lake and playing on the tire swing and the slide that were on the other side.  Flynt was due for another nap and it seemed like a good time to call it a day and head back to town. 

We had a quick lunch outside at the top of the Sunnegga lift and watched the clouds roll around the top of the mountains.  It was really quite beautiful and I enjoyed it despite juggling and feeding 2 little people.

Flynt eating my hat while I'm trying to eat lunch.

Clouding up.  The view from lunch.

Jeff rolled in a little after 4:30.  He was tired after his amazing day of biking.  After getting cleaned up he read a book to Wren but she complained because Papa fell asleep in the middle of her story.

We decided to hit the easy button for dinner and eat in the apartment.  We just grabbed a pizza, a bottle of wine and some chocolate.