May 2012

In May, we went for a hike near Solothurn with friends from Minnesota who are now working at Cambridge University, but were in Switzerland doing research that week. Zak ran four of the six Tour de Canton races, and I nearly photographed him once. We celebrated our second wedding anniversary. And we took a long weekend trip up to southern Germany to visit a friend from our Portland days. Paul took us punting on the Neckar River in Tübingen, to Bebenhausen Abbey, and to Hohenzollern Castle, and shared his encyclopedic knowledge of European church history with us.

Fall rainbow

The hills behind our house are currently very colorful.

Lake Thun

Lake Thun is always the most beautiful shade of blue.

Paraglider

Paragliding is very popular in the Alps. This guy flew right over the hiking party.

Alpine excursion

A few days after we returned from Italy, Zak's whole lab went on an overnight outing to the Alps. The first day: a hike and social activities. The second day: a meeting and factory tour. They started the hike here in Kiental, and ended 6.5 hours later in Blausee in the neighboring valley.

Alpine view

The Eiger, Mönch and Jungfrau, previously seen in this post in May, from the stairs below our house.

Vineyards

A view from the train window of the vineyards along Lake Neuchâtel.

Heron on Lake Geneva

A view of Lake Geneva. On the other side of the lake is France.

Holsteins

A day in the Swiss countryside is a day spent near cows. The lady on the right was having a tough time with flies.

Val-de-Ruz

A view of the valley. Each of the little clusters of homes is a separate town.

Euphoria

Back to Switzerland.
Zak and I encountered this unusual art installation "Euphoria" while riding bikes around the Val-de-Ruz,
which is the valley just over the hills behind Neuchâtel. There were 20+ mannequins painted black or gold
in a field of poppies and other wildflowers.

Lake view

A view of the landscape and Lake Neuchâtel from Bevaix, at the end of the Creux du Van hike.

Creux du Van

 

At the top of the hike.

Alpine trains

On Thursday, we took the train to the Jungfraujoch, the highest train station in Europe at 3454 meters above sea level.

Alpine train tracks consist of two smooth rails and a center climbable rail. The track to the Jungfraujoch runs through 

a tunnel dug into the Eiger and Mönch mountains. Construction on the tunnel began in 1896 and was completed in 1912.

Wengen

We spent two nights in Wengen, a small town of ski chalets. Gimmelwald, the village we stayed in in January,

is down the valley and on the other side of the divide.

 This is the summer map of the area we visited. Wengen is about in the center of the map, with text in black.
The Jungfraujoch is in red at the top. Clicking on the map will make it larger.

Château de Chillon

The Château de Chillon sits about four kilometers south of Montreux. We walked along the 

beautifully landscaped lake shore, stopping along the way for a picnic lunch.

View of France from Montreux

Montreux sits on the eastern end of Lake Geneva, facing France across the lake.

Poppy field

We often walk along this path on Sundays. It's up by the abbey and close to the fields where the sheep graze.

Bubble man

Toward the end of our hike, we encountered this guy, making enormous soapy bubbles on a bridge over the ravine.

Areuse Gorges

We hiked down the Areuse Gorges today from Noiraigue to Boudry along the Areuse River.