When we arrived in Interlaken, Switzerland I thought to myself, "I am HOME!" Mountains, mountains, and more mountains. The Alps are like the Rockies with the exception of the fact that the Alps seem to have a steeper climb in elevation. We stayed in a cute little Cuckoo clock chalet looking hotel surrounded by Alps.
We wandered around Interlaken and then headed to the "Ballenberg Open Air Museum."
The Open Air Museum is a collection of homes that have been placed as the village would have been 100+ years ago. In many of the houses they have people working the trades of the time. This village is architecturally magnificent. I loved seeing all of the different styled homes, barns, and shops.
Church
Chapel in the church.
My modern day "Heidi."
Family residence
A lady was weaving on a loom and selling goods inside the home. The Pink One was fascinated by her weaving.
I loved this cradle and the threading across the top to keep the baby from rolling out.
Feeding the bunnies.
Chasing chickens with the other children.
The Blue One feeding the bunnies.
The Blue One chasing chickens.
"Ride in the stroller? HA! Catch me if you can."
Most of the family centered attractions in Europe have parks in them. The piggies found it a nice break to run and play on the toys.
Alps anyone?
Had we known that you could bring matches and sausages to cook a fine cuisine over an open fire and enjoy a picnic, then we would have come better prepared. As it turns out, we bought a couple of chocolate bars and snacked away in the car on our way to Lausanne.
Honestly and seriously, the kids are playing in a pig pen. Why do you think I call them piggies?
This little fellow was weaving a basket. It looked like it was a wicker basket, but I am not 100% positive. I couldn't believe just how perfect and magnificent his basket looked, he was good.
This building was a large barn, immaculately cleaned and preserved. It was still functional filled with hay and feed.
Beautiful little vegetable garden.
Still hiding from dad and the stroller.
My favourite little house, look at how perfectly the wood is arranged under the deck.
Now a restaurant, then a house.
Looks like a vineyard in the front garden.
Huge water wheel next to a huge grain grind stone. The Pink One loved climbing up and peeking in.
We left Ballenberg and headed to Lausanne, Switzerland where we would be staying the night. When we arrived at our hotel in Lausanne we feared for our lives! It was a ghetto. Do NOT stay in historic Lausanne. How the Intl. Olympic Committee chose this forsaken place to be their home I will NEVER know. I have 0 pictures because I didn't dare bring my camera out with me......that bad.
The Hubby decided that since we were in Switzerland we HAD to have fondue for dinner. We walked through the town center looking for a place to eat fondue. We finally arrived at a restaurant that was not yet serving dinner, but they invited us in and told us they would put on a cheese fondue for us. Perfect, that was all we really wanted anyway. We sipped our Coke, ate plate of cold cuts, and then enjoyed our half decent tasting cheese fondue. When the kids were finished I took them out to the piazza to play in the fountain leaving Hubby 100 francs to pay for dinner. Pretty soon Hubby comes wandering out to find me, "Do you have any more money?" WHAT! More than 100? Yep. We'll just say that what would be $180.00 US dollars later, we had payed for dinner and were on our way. Just a little side note to those of you planning to travel abroad, ALWAYS ask to see a menu and a price list or they will charge you whatever in the he*^ they want :) Lesson learned.
I am sure you can now tell that I hated everything about Lausanne. We headed back to the hotel anxious for morning to come so that we could leave and head to Lyon, France. I adore Interlaken, and the Ballenberg museum is very much worth seeing, Lausanne is a sweaty stinky armpit.
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