Switzerland - Basel, Lauterbrunnen, Interlaken, Lucerne
Original Post: December 15, 2018
Travel: It’s the only thing you can spend money on that makes you richer.
Spending money on hotels, food and excursions, however, makes you much, much less rich - as my friends and I found out after our weekend in Switzerland.
After arriving in the EuroAirport Basel-Mulhouse-Freiburg, we went to the Europcar counter, where we picked up the keys for our rental car. The airport happened to be placed in three countries: Switzerland, France and Germany; so we crossed the French border to get from the car parking lot to our first stop in Switzerland.
After driving around the city of Basel for around 30 minutes with the intention of finding on-street parking, we finally decided to pay for a parking garage near the Basel Christmas Market - considered by many to be one of the ‘prettiest and largest’ in Switzerland.
The market offered a vast amount of booths with food, hot drinks, jewelry, Christmas ornaments, crafts and much more. The majority of booths in the market were cash only, so we quickly ran across the street to an ATM before stopping to buy anything.
We took in the atmosphere that fully embodied the Christmas spirit, with Christmas music, lights and trees surrounding us in every direction. We stopped at a booth in the market for a cup of Gluhwein - a mulled wine served warm - and ate some dinner before heading back on the road.
By the time we arrived in Lauterbrunnen where we had arranged to stay the first two nights in an AirBNB, it was pitch black dark outside. Little did we know, our AirBNB was a 20 minute hike up an immense mountain.
Once we made our way up to the lodge, managing not to fall off the side of a cliff with limited vision, we met the other four girls who - to our surprise - were staying with us in the house. We had one room to ourselves with three beds (one for each of us); the other two rooms were taken by our unplanned roommates. We went to our bedroom and planned out what we would be doing for our next day in Interlaken.
The following day - Saturday - we walked down the mountain from our AirBNB and were able to see the incredible views in the daylight. With no one in sight, our hike was very peaceful with sounds of rushing glacier water and waterfalls.
In Interlaken, we found a $5 all-day parking lot for our rental car. After buying our railway passes for Harder Kulm, a viewing platform to see Lake Brienz, Lake Thurn and all of the surrounding mountain scenery, we walked into the town of Interlaken.
We ate breakfast at Velo Cafe and walked on to Funky Chocolate Club, a store full of chocolate: chocolate bars, cups of strawberries covered in chocolate sauce, hot chocolate, and many more mouth watering chocolate creations.
Needing to walk off all of the chocolate, we went through some shops and returned to Harder Kulm, where we took the railway to the top to over 4,300 feet above sea level - needless to say, the views were incredible.
For dinner, we went to Hotel Krebs in Interlaken, where we had a delicious meal of cheese fondue with an assortment of bread, pears, pickles, peppers and potatoes.
We drove back to our AirBNB, where we met our new house guest - the other four girls only stayed the first night, and were gone by the time we returned home for the evening on Saturday.
Our new roommate was a girl originally from Germany, who had lived in Switzerland for the past two years. She offered us advice on what to see and do in Switzerland - paragliding, tobogganing, hiking. After spending a great deal of time researching prices and reviews, we decided that we would go paragliding the next day.
Sunday morning, we packed up our things and headed out of the AirBNB in Lauterbrunnen. Staubbach Falls, a waterfall that drops just under 1,000 feet, was only a few minutes from our AirBNB on our way to Interlaken, so we were able to see it - although since it was winter, there was significantly less glacier water falling.
Following through with our decision, we bought our tickets for paragliding through Paragliding Interlaken.
Driving up the mountain with twists and turns was the scariest part of the entire experience - running off the mountains was a mess of tripping over my own feet and those of my instructors.
We were in the air for about 15-20 minutes; it was the most impressive and remarkable 15-20 minutes of my entire life. The flight was surprisingly peaceful and the views were unbelievable. The weather was perfect - around that time of year there was usually fog, but we took off early enough in the morning that there was little to no wind, and no fog. The landing was in a big field in the city of Interlaken.
To end our time in Interlaken, we went to Lake Brienz and skipped rocks on the crystal clear water.
From there, we drove to Lucerne - every 500 feet driving through the mountains there was a winding road with twists and turns; the roads became extremely foggy.
We arrived at our AirBNB, a beautiful modern apartment on the penthouse floor. We walked across the Chapel Bridge to eat lunch and Bahnhofli Urban Food Station. Spending some time exploring the city in the cold, we stumbled upon an ice skating rink with Christmas music playing; a large decorated Christmas tree was nearby.
To get out of the cold, we walked in and out of stores; we then came across a large church - the Court Church of St. Leodegar - and walked inside. The church held gold plated statues of biblical scenes and very intricate designs throughout.
Our evening ended with our return to the AirBNB in Lucerne. We awoke the next morning and headed back to the airport in Basel for our returning flight to Ireland.
Although we spent money on hotels, food and excursions, we definitely ended our travel much richer.