Day 3
- When: July 13, 2024
- Where: Zurich, Interlaken (briefly), Wengen
I actually had a decent nights sleep within normal local hours! Woke up around 8, with a headache, unfortunately. That’s not unusual. I wandered over to the train station and had a nice coffee and croissant before my train. My chosen journey today is Zurich -> Bern (stay on) -> Interlaken East (change trains) -> Lauterbrunnen (change trains) -> Wengen. It’s around 2 hours 40 mins total.
One of the busier trains for tourists is this first one from Zurich to Interlaken. Interlaken is a destination on its own, but it’s also a transfer point to major tourist places like Lauterbrunnen and Grindelwald. It was entertaining watching the rail line change the train from platform 31 to 32 for the Interlaken train like 3 mins before it was set to depart. I have to imagine at least a few people weren’t paying attention and got onto the train on Platform 31 anyway. This is the second busiest train I’ve encountered in 3 trips to Switzerland, the first being the one from Grindelwald to Interlaken, when Dad and I were making our unintended, unwelcome visit to Grindelwald after boarding the wrong train at Kleine Scheidegg. On the train from Zurich to Interlaken, I managed to find a single person seat on the second level of the train right next to a luggage drop. There’s a man in a bright red shirt who is the spitting image of Bob Odenkirk in a red shirt down the way from me.
Since we’d arrive in Interlaken around lunchtime, I hatched a bright scheme. My train tickets didn’t specify exact times, so I made a plan to get off in Interlaken, stash my stuff, grab a casual lunch, have a walk along Lake Brienz (one of the two Laken’s that the town is Inter), and then hop on a later train. The train to Lauterbrunnen runs every half hour so I’d have flexibility in continuing my journey.
My plan was immediately foiled by all the train station lockers being full. Since I wasn’t down for a leisurely lake stroll with two backpacks, I instead grabbed a pasta salad at the grocery and scarfed it down so I could catch the next train to Lauterbrunnen.
I loved these salads:
The Lauterbrunnen station needs to be, like, 30% bigger. It’s workable, but could be better. Thankfully they seem to coordinate the times between the arriving Interlaken train and the departing Wengen train, so you simply have to walk across the platform and there you are.
It was great being back in Wengen:
I made it to Hotel Alpenruhe right at 2:30 and thankfully my room was ready. The rest of the day consisted of grabbing snacks at the grocery, a beautiful (if cloudy) ~2 mile hike, a very satisfying steak dinner, and an after-dinner stroll around Wengen. Now here in front of the hotel writing on my laptop and swatting flies. Today is the first day I actually feel normal.
This ridiculous view from my hotel would actually get better tomorrow:
The hotel lobby was nice:
Dinner:
