Switzerland Day 1

Switzerland is more beautiful than Reed or I could have imagined. The colors are so vibrant and you are constantly surrounded by green rolling hills amidst breathtaking mountain tops. Plus it is perfectly manicured and very clean everywhere you go. I highly recommend visiting Switzerland to everyone. Most places in Europe will appeal to certain types of people but I really think everyone would enjoy Switzerland.

On Tuesday we left Paris by train and headed to Geneva Switzerland 3 hours away. After a beautiful train ride we arrived in Geneva and picked up our rental car to drive to our apartment in Grindelwald (also about a 3-hour drive). We decided to stop at this area called Montreux to see a chateau along the way. We are SO happy we did. Montreux was one of the most charming and beautiful European cities I have seen. The chateau was nice (Chateau de Chillon) but the best part of that stop was definitely the city. I really regret that we didn't have much time in Montreux so I would most certainly recommend that anyone else going to Switzerland stay a night or two in Montreux. As for us, I guess we'll just need to plan another trip to Switzerland so we can explore Montreux a bit more ;-). We couldn't really find parking in the city so all my pictures of Montreux from within the city are unfortunately from the car window and it was hard to get any good ones :-(. But here are some of our photos from Montreux (the inner-city pictures don't really do it justice but I think they give you a taste)...

Driving into Montreux:

Reed enjoying a little shade on our walk to the Chateau de Chillon:

Me doing what I'm always doing on vacations:

Chateau de Chillon (and stupid construction...grrr):

More pictures of Montreux on our drive out:

Some of the many beautiful vineyards right outside Montreux:

After Montreux we continued on to Grindelwald. The drive was absolutely breathtaking. I often think of traveling time in between destinations as "lost time" on vacations but our drive through Switzerland to Grindelwald was so much fun. Most people recommend taking trains through Switzerland because the train system is so well-developed but I'm really happy we got a rental car because we got to go through so many charming little towns and we got to see the scenery at our own pace. It was awesome. By the time we arrived in Grindelwald, we felt like we had seen a ton of Switzerland and were very happy with how the day had gone. We then got ourselves set up in our apartment (attached to the home of a local...really a cute place) and then just went to dinner and retired for bed.

On our way to dinner:

At dinner I ordered some delicious fondue and Reed got a chicken dish that is popular in this region. Both dishes were fantastic (but expensive...Switzerland is extremely expensive)!

Here is a picture of the Chalet we are staying in (but it was taken the next day):

Oh, one last thing...Our rental car is a little embarrassing. It says "New Ford Fiesta" on both sides of the car in huge letters! So we are driving around one of those stupid advertisement cars. I'm not very happy about it but I think Reed kind of likes it.