The Brienzer Rothornbahn

On Saturday, we decided to get out of Zurich for the first time since arriving, and do a day trip up to the mountains.  The transportation system is so efficient here that we were able to plan the whole trip that morning in about half an hour:

• Tram from our apartment to the train station
• Intercity Express train to Lucerne, then 7 minutes to change trains
• Intercity Train to the town of Schüpfheim, then 5 minutes to catch the Post Bus
• PostBus to the base of the Sörenberg cable car (The PostBus system goes to almost every little town and trail head in Switzerland, with a schedule synchronized to the local trains)
• Cable car to the Rothorn summit, where we had lunch in the mountain top restaurant, looking out over a spectacular view
• Steam powered cog-driven train down the other side of the mountain to Brienze

We returned the way we came, with a stop for dinner in Lucerne... We're going to have to return to Lucerne, we had only an hour there but want to see more.

If we had planned our trip a bit better in advance, we would have done this as a big loop through Interlaken and Bern, instead of an out-and-back.  We will try it that way next time, when we have some visitors from Canada!

The train at the top of the mountain, with lake Brienze in the background

The steam powered cog locomotive

A mountain goat (taken from the moving cable car with maximum zoom, it's a bit blurry)

The train steaming through the mountain meadows

Claire up at the top of the Rothorn!  The train station is behind her in the distance.

We took a lot of pictures -- these are just a few of the better ones!  If you are interested, there's lots more in our Picasa album here. Especially lots more train pictures, as Kaley, Kyler, and Leighton will be particularly interested in those.