Lake Lucerne

James and I decided where we would go today by scrutinising the train timetables from Basel. We found that Lucerne is only an hour away by train, with no changes. Neither of us have ever been there so we took a train at 9 a.m. and by 10.30 a.m. we were boarding a boat on Lake Lucerne, having purchased the “golden circle tour”. This meant that we were on the top deck of the boat along with two American couples, while the rest of the passengers were confined to the lower deck. To add insult to injury, one of the American men was smoking a cigar and he kep flicking his ash over what he thought was the back of the boat - in fact he was flicking it onto the lower deck passengers below, a fact which only came to light when they complained and one of the ships’ crew came rushing up with an ashtray for him. He then leaned over the balcony and proclaimed to the ash covered passengers below, “So sorry, I didn’t know you were there!” which I thought was very funny.
Anyway, the golden circle tour included a ninety minute boat trip on the lake, which was just idyllic, followed by an amazingly steep funicular train ride right up to the top of Mount Pilatus. It is a very beautiful mountain, with great views of the Alps in the distance. The top was swathed in cloud when we arrived at the top, but luckily it was swirling around, so gorgeous views of the lake and the town kept tantalisingly appearing and disappearing far below. What we hadn’t realised was that at 7000 feet, the top of the mountain was considerably chillier than Lucerne, and we were both only wearing t-shirts as tops, because we have grown accustomed to the warm weather this weekend. However I spotted a shop inside the hotel and restaurant building at the summit, and we bought two “hoodies” which kept us warm. We walked around at the summit to various viewpoints before setting off downhill by the next part of the route, which was by cable car. Half way down you have to change cable cars, and there is a little leisure area which has a toboggan run. We couldn’t resist giving it a try and we had great fun whizzing down the hill and being towed back up. At the foot of the hill, a bus completed the “golden circle” by depositing us back at the train station. By now it was mid afternoon and down in Lucerne it was still very warm, so before our return train journey we went for a leisurely walk across some of its picturesque bridges and through the old town with its painted buildings and we had drinks by the Reuss river. And now we are back at our hotel in Basel, all packed and ready for our early start homewards tomorrow morning.