Our busy week continued the next day as Renata’s Brother, Peter, picked us up at the Country house and we headed Southeast into the mountains of Switzerland! It involved a car ferry across Lake Zurich, which saved us 40 KM and got us back on the water! He was taking us to Mr. Titlis where the peak is right at 10,000 ft. and skiing was still going on for 2 more days before they shut down for the summer season.
We rode the cable car about half way up the mountain, switched to Tram for the final push to the summit. The views along the way were stunning and you had these beautiful, green, lush pastures in the lower elevations working their way up the mountain to the snow and a glacier!
At the summit, we managed to stay out of the way of the skiers getting their final runs in for the season and walked out to an observation walkway. This walkway was connected to outcrops at the summit and you looked down thru the metal grates to several thousand feet below. It was windy, the bridge was swinging a bit and I have to admit, it was a bit uncomfortable making walking across!
After tempting fate walking across the sky bridge, we headed back inside the summit and were treated to a walk INSIDE of a glacier!! WHAT!!! Yep, never been inside of a glacier before and we were treated to a surreal maze of a tunnel that took us about 200 feet into an actual glacier at Mt. Titlis! It was very cold inside and the ice was so clear and smooth that you had to walk very carefully to avoid a fall. The lighting inside the glacier were these neon lights that did not get warm to keep the tunnel nice a cold!
After our walk thru the glacier, we were hungry and decided on lunch at the summit. Yep, you guessed it, I had a brat again and it was deeeelicious! You’ve probably picked up a pattern here and it continued the entire time we were in Switzerland! The views were spectacular as we sat out over a steep drop that looked down several thousand feet onto rocks and snow!
After a wonderful lunch, we loaded up and headed North to Einsiedeln Abbey to a famous Monastery that Peter once worked at for 2 weeks – more on that shortly. On our drive to the Einsiedeln, we kept noticing these concrete structures scattered across the landscape. Peter shared that those were tank barriers from WW I & II that remain today! They are also the inspiration for the popular Toblerone chocolate candy. If you’ve had a Toblerone, you know what I’m talking about!
So Peter decided that he wanted to learn to to drive a horse drawn cart and the Einsiedeln Abbey has such carts. He reached out to the Bishop and asked if he could work for free in the stables and learn to drive a horse drawn cart. The Bishop agreed after some back and forth and so for 2 weeks he went to work in the stable and was taught how to drive a cart with 1 & 2 horses. For his “final” exam, he was asked to take a cart into town for supplies and bring it back in one piece. After his successful trip to town, he was provided an actual license showing that he was trained to drive a horse drawn cart, which is a requirement in Switzerland if you intend to drive a horse drawn cart!
Now let’s talk about some history. This monastery was built in 948 making it over 1000 years old! Imagine the history that this beautiful structure has seen and survived during this time. Today, it contains it’s on stable of horses, a vineyard and winery on site.
Inside, you’ll find the “Black Madonna” which is an interesting story and I will add a link for it below. As soon as you enter the Abbey, you see a shrine dedicated to the Virgin Mary. The Black Madonna is made of lime wood and came to the chapel in 1466. https://www.touringswitzerland.com/a-quick-guide-to-einsiedeln-abbey-and-the-black-madonna/
The link below takes you to their Monastery’s web site with more information and pictures – https://www.swiss-castles.com/einsiedeln-monastery
At the end of a long, busy day we decided to stop at a little Italian restaurant in the small village of Rickenbach for something simple for dinner. It was the first test of our Swiss language skills and thank goodness for Google Translate! We were able to figure out the menu and place our order. The pizza was magnificent and we had a delightful waiter who spoke some English. We had to show him our Google Translate results on a couple of items but it all worked great.
At the end of dinner as we’re paying our bill, he asked if we were American’s. We answered yes, and he just lit up and become so excited! He started thanking us over and over and when we asked why, he shared that he was from Kosovo and that he was a refugee who escaped 20+ years ago during the war. He said he was so grateful for America coming to save his country and family during that time. It was very humbling to hear his story and see first hand how he had been impacted by the war. It gave us a first hand experience with someone who had been positively impacted by America’s intervention in a terrible situation over 20 years ago…
Next up – Day 3 and some amazing water falls!
