A Train Adventure through Slovenia and Switzerland

This week we continued our adventure with Mr. Wander’s parents through Slovenia and Switzerland until it was time to say farewell to them as well. This is the first time I’ve ever visited a country for less than 24 hours so that was a new experience, but we definitely got our fill of trains, delays, and reroutes by the end of this week.

Brief Stop in Slovenia

We could have taken a night train directly from Zagreb, but instead of spending the day where we had already explored, we decided to hop over to Ljubliana, Slovenia to explore a new city.

It was just a two hour train in the morning and we stashed our bags in the train station to explore unhindered. We had a quick early lunch in the station before making our way to the river in the city center.

The first thing we did is find one of the boat tours to cruise up and down the river for about an hour. They were giving some overview in both Slovenian and English, but the boat engine was pretty loud and we missed most of it. It was quite peaceful on the river though!

After the boat excursion Mr. Wander and his dad took a walk around the city and saw many cool places. In the alley way in the third picture below the little pebbles in the middle are actually carved faces, the entry to this alley is the key sculpture farther down as that was where all the locksmiths were located. There are several dragon sculptures, paintings, and mosaics around the city as that is thought of as a protector of the city.

Meanwhile, my mother-in-law and I sat in the shade by the river, people watching, reading, chatting and working on posts. Once our other halves returned, we all headed towards an Irish bar that had some AC for some refreshing beverages. So far both in Rome and here, Irish bars are the easiest places to find air conditioning!

As it was getting on towards evening, we walked towards the train station to get some dinner. Not long after we sat down inside and ordered that the sky opened and it was a downpour! Perfect timing! We had a mix of Pad Thais and Pasta, and once it stopped raining we made our way back to the train station. I stopped on the way to pick up some extra water and snacks at a nearby grocery store, and was amazed at the prices. I had gotten used to the costs in Croatia, who had just switched to the Euro in 2023 but the cost of some things were higher than parts of Italy. It is highest on the coastal cities with all the Tourists, but comparatively, Slovenia is extremely affordable! We had to wait awhile for the train as it was a bit delayed but finally we made it aboard.

Swiss Trains to the Mountains

Our train compartment was quite cozy, I should have taken a picture but with three beds down on both sides there isn’t much room to walk, and no where to sit up. It was already after 10pm though so we all stashed bags in the top bunks, set up the seat belts so they wouldn’t fall, and did the same for Mr. Wander’s and my beds on the middle level, and we all settled down for some sleep. We arrived on the Swiss border where the police came through at around 8am. They came in, asked if we were all family, we said yes, then they left. A few hours later and we arrived in Zurich where we got some tasty snacks and caffeine while we waited for the next train.

We got on the train to Lucerne for about an hour and after getting off, we couldn’t find the train on the boards Finally we figured out it was supposed to be on track 13 and only then were we told that the train was cancelled due to a weather event a few days prior washing out parts of the track. So we had to board another train very quickly to get to Bern, then approach Interlaken from the West instead of the East. We were all ready to just get to the hotel in Grindelwald so we bought our tickets and found out part of our route was changed to bus service due to the same storm. This meant that we didn’t get dropped off at the station next to the hotel and instead had to walk a bit. We were all pretty tired by the time we got to the room and got some food just at the hotel, ready for a good sleep in a stationary bed.

Next day we woke up early to take the Eiger Express Gondola up the mountain, but they had a delay due to technical issue, so it was nearly an hour before we got on. We managed to be in the 2nd car going up the mountain and were probably first on the train to the highest railway station in Europe, at 3454m or 11,332ft above sea level.

We started our way around the loop and wandered outside a bit where the snow park is, complete with Zipline. The sun was so warm that shorts were perfect outside, but chilly if you were in the caves. I was bummed one of the observatory elevators didn’t seem to be working. They had a cute animated snow globe and some other friends for the picture taking.

Next we went down a flight of stairs and found ourselves in their ice palace built into the cave, complete with penguins and a grand piano carved into the ice! There was a little furry guy that got caught with his favorite snack. I found him in an ice bar in New Zealand several years ago, he has a knack for getting stuck in ice. You really had to be careful though, the floor was quite a slick ice, and I’m glad they had a handrail through most of it.

With the help of an elevator, we got to one more spot where we could go outside and it had a spectacular view! They also had 2 flags you could take a picture with but I think a few tours had gone there first and there were long lines. The view is cooler than the flag anyway.

By the time we made it back to the main area it had gotten very busy! We of course had to stop by the Lindt chocolate shop to pick up several truffles. They had so many delicious flavors, several with alcohol. My favorite was the blood orange, citrus and chocolate go so well together; and the marzipan was delicious as well with a little hint of alcohol. We bought a few postcards and managed to send them out from the top and then we went back to the train to work our way back down.

We relaxed that afternoon after some tasty pizza and just ate onsite again to avoid too much walking up the big hills.

Geneva

We were very thankful that by the next morning the train was back up and running so we only had a 5 minute to walk to the train station. We took the train to Interlaken, then had two more trains to take us West to Geneva. Our hotel was only a block from the train station and they let us check in early so we were able to drop our bags. We walked down toward the lake where once again Mr. Wander and his dad took a walk to check out the sites and my mother-in-law and I had some good conversations over a few tasty smoothies in the shade by the lake.

We walked back up to our hotel and rested for awhile before our reservations at a fondue and raclette restaurant. This has been on Mr. Wander’s list for awhile! Raclette is a dish where a big block of cheese is melted and the melted part is scraped off. Mr. Wander and I had this so they gave us each 3 plates over the course of the meal with melted cheese, that way it never gets too cold. They gave us pickles, onions, and potatoes for dipping in the cheese. The potatoes were SO good, I know they’re pretty simple but having them with this cheese was the perfect combination. I also got the option of a meat plate with several salamis or thinly sliced cured meats, but the potatoes were my favorite. His parents got the fondue, they had about 10 flavors but they picked the one the server recommended which was garlic with something else, and they just give you bread with that one, but we shared our goodies with them as well.

The next morning we went with them to the airport via the train, and managed to stash our suitcases in the train station lockers by the airport. Once they got checked in, we said our goodbyes. It’s always hard to say goodbye, but at least it’s less than 6 months this time!

Alone again

After we left, we managed to find a way to walk out of the airport, which is not possible at some airports, and get to a tram stop to catch one to get to CERN. This has been on my list for awhile to visit, and the cool thing is it’s completely free. CERN stands for “Conseil Européen pour la Recherche Nucléaire” Which is french for the European Counsel for Nuclear Research. It is one of the first cooperative European projects and is currently made up of 22 member states. It was first founded in 1954 as way to start rebuilding advancement of science in Europe after so many brilliant scientists had escaped the continent during World War II, such as Albert Einstein.

When you get there and log onto the free guest Wi-Fi, you can access the registration for the tours and sign up for one within 2 hours that hopefully has space. We managed to get a spot for the 12:30 tour so we had some time to explore. First we found the 15 minute video that loops in the theater that gave a good overview of the center and its history. Throughout the rest of the exhibits they had a ton of spots for interactive learning about the science of sub atomic particles, vacuum technology, how they accelerate particles and keep them on track, and several other physics principles. I felt like a kid playing with all the different parts and learning more about the accelerators.

CERN has more recent reknown because they were the ones that discovered the Higgs Boson back in 2014, which won the Nobel Prize that year. There are many experiments ongoing that have been proposed by physicists all over the world at partner universities, not just in the member states. On site there are also many Physicists, engineers, and other scientists from all over the world, working together. I came to see the accelerators and learn some things about what they do, but I didn’t realize what would most impress upon me was the idea of all these people from different nationalities, of different religions, speaking different languages, all working together. Really gives you a hope for the future!

On our tour, our guide started our tour with saying we could ask questions in English, Dutch, German, French, and if you speak slowly, Spanish. That is amazing that he can understand so many languages! We got to see the first accelerator called the Synchrocyclotron. It was cool to hear how it had been developed and produced in so many countries and brought to the site. It was in service from 1957 until 1990 when the experiments were transferred to the newer Proton Synchrotron Booster. They had a really neat set of projectors show how the device worked internally, right on top of the machine itself.

It is cool to think the Large Hadron Collider is running underground if you are flying in or out of the airport, you’ve probably traveled right over top! It is a loop with a circumference of 27 kilometers where particles can be sped around the loop in both directions until they reach the proper speed where they are sent to collide in one of four spots along the path where there are layers of detectors and cameras in every direction that can take measurements and pictures of what is happening.

We also got to view the control room of ATLAS, one of the four detectors along the LHC. Nothing exciting was happening since all the indicators looked green and as the saying goes, if it isn’t broke, don’t fix it! Outside they did have a counter of the collisions that had been detected and those that had produced a Higgs Boson! We ventured back to get our bags, check into the hotel, and have a relaxing evening.

We had originally planned to do a bike adventure along lake Geneva to Montreux, but of course the day we planned to leave there were some pretty scary looking thunderstorms. We decided to not risk it and just took the train since we already had a hotel booked and couldn’t change the plans. We did get a good hour long walk in with our packs though, since we couldn’t check in right away so that’s good training for another adventure.

This was probably my favorite thing we found on our walk, what a great sign, might need to put one up like this whenever we build a house some day.

We got a snack at a cute patisserie, it was a delicious sandwich and dessert.

Then we checked into our hotel, check out this massive bathroom and bedroom! We could even glimpse the lake from our balcony.

It was a really cool hotel, one that Mr. Wander found on a site that talks about where to stay when you bike around the lake. Then we ventured out again to find dinner and wine from the grocery store. We spent the afternoon writing and relaxing and enjoyed our simple dinner.

After getting breakfast in our hotel the next morning, we decided to book a boat trip back for a change in scenery and it looked like a much nicer day. It was really nice to be on the water looking at the beautiful mountains, especially on the eastern end of the lake. We had one change at Lausanne and after 5 hours we made it back to Geneva. We checked into our hotel and spent the next couple of days relaxing, planning and writing, until it was time to leave the EU for awhile.

Next Time

Since we had decided to sign up for the bike event in Wales, we had to rearrange a few plans and make sure we watched the number of days we had in the Schengen region of Europe. We decided to spend two weeks in Cardiff, catching up and planning ahead and also give ourselves time to do some longer hikes and bikes to get ready for the two physical challenges we have back to back! The first is the bike adventure across Wales, from Caernarfon in the North, to Cardiff in the South, 200 miles in 4 days. It is a charity ride and there is still time to donate! More information is located in our post here. We’ll talk about our other challenge in the next one, keep ya’ll in suspense! Until next time, Slovo, Tschüss, and Au Revoir! (That is goodbye in Slovenian, German, and French if you were unsure, Switzerland actually has 4 official languages, we were mostly in the German and French regions.)