| Completing
the Golden Circle |
| near
Lucerne, Switzerland (May, 2004) |
| |
| My
best old Army pal, Zach, and his lovely wife, Cathy, arrived in Thalwil
for five days, and the four of us spent most |
| of
our time together on the road, visiting local landmarks. On one of
those days, we traveled to the Lucerne area for |
| an
attempt at the fabled "Golden Circle" available to tourists of
the adventurous sort. The trek involved riding what is |
| reputed
to be the "world's steepest cog-wheel train." We began
the trip by driving Zach's rental car from Thalwil to a |
| start
point near the village of Alpnach, nestled on a finger of Lake
Lucerne. Tickets in hand, we boarded a specially |
| constructed
passenger car equipped with sharply angled seating (to keep one sitting
level) for a one half-hour ride to |
| the
top of Mount Pilatus (www.pilatus.ch)
where spectacular panoramic views stretched to all points of
the compass. |
| After
photographing scenic vistas from every conceivable vantage point, we
joined about forty other people on a large |
| gondola
that transported us down the back side of the mountain to a middle
station where we exited and transferred |
| to
four-person cable cars for the remainder
of the ride to the bottom. Once
on flat land again, we strolled
for fifteen |
| easy
minutes down an asphalt path to a municipal bus stop and caught a short
ride to the Lucerne main train station. |
| Opposite
the train station are the passenger ferry docks where we purchased
tickets for a one-hour-and-thirty minute |
| boat
ride across Lake Lucerne back to the start point where we had left
the car. The entire Golden Circle took us |
| less
than three hours,
providing a perfect combination of exercise, fresh air, and exciting new
shared experiences. |
| |
