Here are some pictures of the cows I was trying to call from my bedroom window. There is an electric fence close to the window so they never get to close. The cows in Switzerland are very active right now because they are just getting get out for the first time this year to eat from the fields. Peter and Kerry were telling us that they get very excited when they go to the mountains. When the farmers send them up to the mountains they wear larger cow bells. The cows then know to get in line in order of oldest to youngest and head up the mountain. I guess they are smarter than I thought.

Oeschinensee was the first Alpine World Heritage site admitted by UNESCO. You can either hike up to the lake from Kandersteg or take a cable car. Since we were at breakfast so long we decided to take the cable car up with hopes we would still get some blue sky before the clouds covered the top of the Alps. The lake didn’t disappoint. The water was a maginificant green color.

The lake is pretty low with water right now since they had snow last week. Most of the hikes around the area were closed due to snow so we weren’t able to hike too much up there. There were two guys taking the cable car up with some skis. Peter told me that they would hike to the top of the Alps and then ski down. I think they said it would take around 7 hours to hike up there and the trails were closed so it was their own risk.

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I’m always amazed at how many photos I can take of mountains and wild flowers. The views on the way to the lake were beautiful and there was hardly any other people around. Due to the late snow last week, we were too early for some of the wild orchids. I think planning a trip to Switzerland really takes some luck. We have lucked out a lot with the weather considering it snowed here a week before we came.

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I don’t usually say much about the places we stay because they are usually just a place to sleep and maybe get breakfast but the place we stayed at in Kandersteg really deserves some time. Part of the reason why I wasn’t posting much the last couple of days is because we were just having such a good time with the family that runs the Bed & Breakfast. Peter & Kerry are some of the best hosts I have ever had. Kerry is from England and Peter is from Switzerland. They sailed around the world for 10 years before opening the bed & breakfast. They have a son who is now a teenager and together they all have wonderful stories and life experiences.

Their house is over 500 years old now. Of course when they bought the house ten years ago they needed to do some major work. Peter and Kerry did all the work themselves and they did a great job. The house has so much character and the rooms are integrated with the family. They have a total of 4 rooms to rent out. Our room was upstairs and it was called Arnica (an herb used to heal bruises and sore muscles). The name was fitting as the doorways were all very short and it took a day or two to learn that you need to duck anytime you go through a doorway or you will hit your head.

There was a couple there from North Carolina and we ate dinner with them, Peter, Kerry and their son every night. Kerry was a great cook and we would sit around the table for 3 hours for dinner. We all ate breakfast together as well and that would take around an hour and half. We had views from our room that looked out on a cow pasture on the back and a waterfall out of our skylight. Every morning the farmer would let the cows out at around 8:30 and put them in at 5:30. Peter was trying to teach me how to call the cows from my window so they would come over to me. I don’t think I got the singing part of the call down but it made him laugh.

I don’t usually write reviews on places but this one might be worth me writing a review. They are great hosts that love to be around people. They have friends around the world and they do a great job at integrating the guests into their lives. Here are some pictures of the views and house of The Hayloft.

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We stayed in Kandersteg for 3 nights.  Kandersteg is a small village located in the Bernese Alps almost 4,000 feet above sea level.  We were staying at a Bed & Breakfast that was located about 10 minutes (walking) outside of the center of Kandersteg.  The town is very small with only about 1,000 people.  It basically survives on tourism as you can ski all winter and hike/mountain climb all summer.

Everybody says Grüezi (hello) as they walk by. By the second day, I was noticing locals as they walked by from the pizza restaurant the night before. They would wave and say hi. It is easy to enjoy time in a village that doesn’t have a lot going on. You don’t have to listen to traffic or the buzz of city life. Kandersteg is the last town before a big mountain and there is no roadway through. The only way through the mountain is to put your car on a train and take a dark 20 minute ride through a tunnel. People don’t just drive through the town, and this is one reason why I fell in love with the town.

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Our drive from Lucerne to Kandersteg was through the Alps. I was very excited when there was actually one place you could pull over and take a picture. I wasn’t going to pass that up! Usually going over the mountain roads, I spend my time hoping that there aren’t any other cars coming down. Or ever worse, I hope there aren’t more tractors on the road. Below are some pictures of a town called Lungern that we saw as we were going up one of the passes.

I know you have a business in Australia, but you didn’t mention you had a gift shop in Lucerne.

The old wooden bridge was originally built in 1333 and was the longest covered bridge in Europe. A cigarette was the cause for it to burn down in the early 90’s. A majority of the 17th century paintings were also destroyed in the fire. It looked like only half of them were still hanging.

The city was buzzing with locals and tourists. We stayed only a short time as we needed to be at our next place around 4. Not to mention, we were a little worried at how expensive our parking would be since it charged by 3 minutes increments. In the end it wasn’t too expensive but I would rather not waste money on parking when I could be buying cheese or chocolate 🙂

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We had to pack our bags Monday morning and head to our next town. Since we had to leave the hotel by 10 in the morning and check in at 4, we decided to stop in Lucerne. We took an hour long boat ride which didn’t even get us very far in the lake. Hard to imagine that the lake is only the 4th largest in the country. We lucked out by not having many tourists on the boat. One of the reasons to travel in May 🙂 We have also been very lucky with the weather so far.

Once we finished the boat tour we visited the famous wood bridge. I didn’t realize that the original burnt down in the early 90’s but was rebuilt shortly after that.

The top of Ebenalp was definitely worth the two hour walk to get to the cable car.