We docked in Basel. We originally signed up for a half day tour in Basel and a half day tour in Lucerne. We found out our new friends were headed to Lucerne for the full day tour and our very kind cruise director was able to change our excursion.
We boarded a bus and headed to Lucerne. I'm so glad we changed to the whole day tour!!
This is from our Ama app -- Set against the backdrop of the Alps, Lucerne fills the heart with wanderlust and awe.
YES! Yes, Lucerne did!
We've been through tunnels like this one before - but look at the fall foilage above. Mid to late October was beautiful.
I've always heard the expression "bucolic farmland." I don't think I had ever seen such bucolic farmland- it was so charming, peaceful, and picturesque.
We could see the Alps . . .and they were beautiful. We stopped at a "rest stop" - not really, but sort of . . .
I was checking our credit card statement the other day and there are all of these small charges . . .
you need a credit card to use most public restrooms! This one was no exception.
When we came out of the building, I almost took a tumble down a huge flight of steps but a really nice guy was standing there and I grabbed his arm. He saved me.
Below is the rock relief - Lion of Lucerne. He is in memory of over 600 Swiss guards who were massacred in 1792 during the French Revolution. Mark Twain said that this is the "most mournful and moving piece of stone in the world."
It is beautiful and very sad.
The details are intricate.
We followed our tour guide on our walking tour. Do you remember that I told y'all about navigating around a marathon at the beginning of our trip? Guess what was happening in Lucerne? A marathon. We had to navigate again.
It took our tour guide a few minutes to figure out how we were going to manage a walking tour around the runners. It was much more relaxed in the fact that young boys were "guarding" the side streets and we would literally run under the rope . . .a few at a time . . .to the other side of the street. I guess that means we technically "ran a marathon" in Lucerne, right? hahaha! nope!
Lucerne is beautiful -- even on a cloudy and cold October morning!
Lucerne's Old Town (Altstadt) is renowned for its numerous
well-preserved medieval buildings with vibrant, frescoed facades, which give
the city a fairy-tale atmosphere. These beautiful painted buildings are found
throughout the pedestrian-only, cobblestone streets and especially in the
historic squares, rather than just one specific side street.
Below is the town hall clock. I found this information online in an article about the clock. "The town-hall of Lucerne on the Kornmarkt was built between
1602 and 1606 by the Italian architect Anton Isenmann from the Prismell region
and is valued as a masterpiece of late Renaissance style. The tower of the
town-hall is older and was erected in the High Middle Ages later serving as
a dungeon and finally housing the town-hall clock. Only little is known
about the old town-hall clocks in general but already in 1408 we can suppose
that there was a clock in the town-hall tower. In 1526 Hansen Luter,
a clock-maker from Zurich, manufactured a new town-hall clock." There are a couple of pieces that have been reconstructed.
Here is a better picture of the top of the clock and you can see that the sky is turning blue.
Here are some of the runners.
Look at the roof on this building (below).
more runners . . .
Lucerne has two famous wooden bridges with paintings: the Chapel
Bridge (Kapellbrücke), featuring 17th-century scenes of Lucerne's
history/saints (many restored after a fire) and the Chaff Bridge
(Spreuerbrücke), known for its "Dance of Death" (Danse Macabre)
series from the 17th century, both crossing the Reuss River.
see the bones below!!
We still aren't great at selfies, but we have improved. Using the timer is a game changer!
The photo below is one of my favorites!
More art . . .
So many beautiful flowers!
Yes -- those are the Alps peeking out!
One of our favorite experiences on the whole trip was eating lunch in a real Swiss restaurant. We ate on a table that was hundreds of years old!!
The restaurant was established in 1602.
The restaurant was packed and Dustin and Jeff, a couple from the boat, were already waiting on a table. They graciously agreed to let us sit with them and we had so much fun. Mark and Dustin loved the beer.
Mark ordered Rösti with a special aged ham on top. Rösti is similar to hash browns but is a giant patty (on the bottom). He said it was his best meal of the trip.
I ordered chicken with gooey cheese inside this fried deliciousness. It was chicken cordon bleu and it was really tasty. Others in the restaurant were eating fondue - which we considered - but our choices were excellent.
We had a couple of hours to roam around town. It was Sunday so many of the shops were closed.
The Alps were breathtaking.
Here we are with our new friends from Canada. We had so much fun with them. It had warmed up enough, we removed our outer layers!
Isn't that view spectacular?
This is another favorite photo (below).
I bought about 10 pounds of chocolate to take back as gifts. Before long, we boarded our bus to head back to our last night on the ship.
It was a fun and sad night. Dinner was beautiful.
We ate with the folks we had spent the most time with on the trip. We laughed a lot!
We headed back to our room to pack. It is never as much fun to pack to come home, is it? We were picked up by a limo driver (another mercedes van) and transported to Basel airport. It was a difficult one to navigate for some reason. It was cold and rainy. We boarded our connecting flight to Frankfurt, Germany - a Dolomiti flight. It was a tiny plane and the flight was incredibly turbulent. Thank God the flight was only about 40-45 minutes. The kids across from us got violently ill. I was wearing a mask already and I had my fingers in my ears and my eyes closed!! We landed and had to take a bus to another terminal and we waited and waited and then realized we were waiting on that mama and little girl. I felt bad for them. We were cutting it so close in time for our flight. We did a fast walk through the big airport - maybe a sprint - and the passengers were lining up to board. We walked up and got in line. Actually, the gate had changed and a sweet person saw us and told us! I think I had a panicked look on my face!! We boarded our flight to Chicago and a bajillion hours later landed. I think we may have eaten something and grabbed our late flight home. I had stayed awake all day and fell asleep twice on the short flight home. We landed in Birmingham around 9:30 and drove straight home and brushed our teeth and fell into bed! I woke up the next morning and went to work! Crazy, right?
It was a wonderful trip and we love making these memories together!!
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