Day Twelve...

Many of our friends have said that our pictures have been boring, so today we have interesting, very interesting stuff.

For the first shot, you may ask, what's so interesting about a train car carrying a a pile of wood? Answer later in today's narrative.

Cows? Well, they're not that interesting to most of us, but Kate loves them, as well as sheep, goats, chickens, racoons, etc. These were seen on our day trip, on the way to Gruyeres. Yes, that's the place that's famous for the like-named cheese.

Here's the main street in Gruyeres, a very small village up on a plateau. To get there, you have to walk almost a mile, and several hundred feet uphill onto the plateau. On the plateau, you find this street, a church, and a castle at the top. John somehow erased the exterior pictures of the castle, including a good one of Gina and Susie, but you've already seen enough castles on this trip, right?

Inside the castle (5 francs admission fee) we found an art show. Very interesting.

After the castle tour, we had a very nice, authentic Gruyeres lunch. John had the raclette, which is sort of a self-prepared meal of potatoes, sweet pickles, and pickled onions covered with cheese that you melt yourself using the pictured gadget. The cheese tray swings under the main apparatus which includes a heating coil that melts the cheese from above.

And how did Gina and Susie amuse themselves at lunch? By making a doll family out of water bottles, onions, spices, and napkins! Oh, those girls, they're so creative! (By the way, the family includes mother, father, and baby -- the pickle sticking out of the left-hand doll!)

Here's the view of the Gruyere plateau on our return.

So, what was so interesting about the train car? Well, that car was a normal-gauge train, for track of the standard width. The train to Guyeres and around that region are narrow gauge, and use a narrower track. The pictured train car was riding on little adapter carriages so it could ride on the narrow gauge rails. Mike discovered this and decided that a few people, at least Nick Tredennick and Andrew Tomlinson, would find this interesting!

In the evening, we took a boat ride from Lausanne to Montreux and saw lots of nice scenery, sailboats, and windsurfers, all surrounded by the incredible peaks of the Swiss and French Alps.

We stayed in Montreux long enough to get pizza and ice cream, and then took a train back to Lausanne. (The "kids" ice cream was served in a souvenir toy.)

So, all-in-all, the recommendations of our new friend Eduardo Sanchez were very good indeed! Thanks, Eduardo!

P.S. Answer to the question at the end of Day 10: They installed all of the summer flowers on the hotel balconies! Peter Korp was the first to notice.