These 3 destinations were chosen for their varieties of
History, nature and culture/exotic location, which would give us a complete satisfaction from the holiday.
Planning for Europe trip on your own is
not easy at all. The journey begins the day you decide your
destination and goes on until you record the holiday and publish in
various forms. For us it was a journey of 4-5 months.
The first 3 months went on in planning
for the holiday. Since we were going to be nomads for 2 and half
weeks, we had to carefully choose the places to suit our budget, consider the travel/transportation involved,
our stay, activities, food options, weather and safety.
Planning without involving any travel agents for a 2.5 week long holiday
was quite challenging.
We started exploring various sites on
the internet like expedia, wikitravel etc.
First thing was to decide on the
itinerary and best things to do in and around the place.
Then we had to look for hotels to stay
there. Swiss hotels' rates are exorbitant. Somewhere around 300-400
CHF per night for a decent hotel. When I spoke to my friend in Italy whom we were
planning to visit, he suggested apartments in
Switzerland to be more affordable and comfortable option.
Then began our search for the hotels
and apartments. Once we got a fair idea about the costs, etc., we
booked our main flight and the connecting flights. We got reasonable
deals with minimal transit times and cheaper options. It took us
about a week to find the most suitable options and book the tickets.
While booking these flights, one must specify the meal options then
and there (especially if you are a vegetarian). Later usually we
forget to update and so did we. So during our travel, a couple of flights could not
offer us a vegetarian meal (with no regrets as we were fully prepared
with lots of snack options for the 7 yr-old around).
We chose Emirates which offered best deal for open loop tkts and took the route
Singapore-Dubai-Milan-Istanbul-Dubai-Singapore.
Since taxis or rental cars in Europe are too expensive (and we are not used to left-hand drives, we did not consider driving as an option), we researched a lot on the public transport options and found a good deal on the Eurail family
pass with an option of the three European countries of Switzerland, Italy and
Germany. Good thing about Eurail pass is that we get discounts on various types of public transport, museums, rides, etc. even on the ones owned by private companies.We had to buy the pass for these 3 destination countries as
it was the only combination for covering that part of
Europe. The first class pass for 3 of us (husband-wife and 7 yr old) costed us
around 1800 SGD. There was not much difference between a first class and a second class family pass. So we preferred to buy first class. We used this pass to travel from Milan to Venice, Venice to Rome, Rome back to Milan, Milan to Interlaken and then back to Milan. We could also use the pass for travelling anywhere withing and around Interlaken, for travelling to various cities within Switzerland as well as we got discounts on scenic trains like Glacier Express, or even on the cogwheel trains to the various Swiss mountain destinations like Matterhorn/Zermatt, Harder Kulm, etc. as well as for the boat rides.
After all our travel was taken care of,
we started focusing on our stay there. We booked the hotels in
Venice - Villa Dori, Rome - Regina Giovanna, Istanbul - ISG Airport
Hotel (near airport for first leg), Capadoccia - Travellers' Cave Hotel, 8 residences, in Istanbul - Taksim Square. But while booking we did not book through just one
website. We compared pricing for the same hotels and booked through
the one that offered the lowest. We considered those hotels that were
family friendly, were in/near railway stations, or with most
important/popular sites nearby. For booking apartment in Switzerland,
the website called http://www.myswitzerland.com/ was very useful. Its
a government website and has all the information you need to travel
your Swiss itinerary. In fact, their service is also very good. We
called their service desk to help us to book a good apartment and
they actually helped us, emailed us apartments as per our needs, etc.
We managed to book a cosy 2-bedroom
apartment with kitchen in Neiderried, Switzerland and an amazingly beautiful view
right in front of the lake, approx. 2 min. walk from the station.
Niederried station is just 2 stations from Interlaken Ost(East)
station. We were quite keen for two important facilities of kitchen(for us being vegetarians and shops closing at 5/5:30 and for saving costs on dinners and breakfasts)
and wifi internet access (for being in touch with family) after accessibility to station.
Once stay and commutation was
committed, it was just about deciding on the various activities and
things to do in all these places. We took a rough idea from the
internet on best things to do in these places and on recommendation
from internet reviews, we booked the guided Vatican tour tickets
and Colosseum tours online as we had heard from friends and read from reviews that at times we don't get tickets or we need to queue for 2 hours or so. We also booked a hot-air balloon ride at Capadoccia for which
Capadoccia is famous in advance to ensure not to miss on these activities.
Slowly, our Europe tour was coming
nearer and nearer. We were all very excited to see the most wonderful
places of the world.
Our final itinerary for Italy, Swiss and Turkey :
Our final itinerary for Italy, Swiss and Turkey :
Day1 : Start from Singapore on
Emirates to reach Milan via Dubai.
Day2 : Reach Milan, Milan site seeing
Day3 : Extended Milan site seeing
Day4 : Travel to Venice by train, Venice site seeing
Day5 : Travel to Rome by train, Rome site seeing
Day6 : Extended Rome site seeing, Return to Milan by
train
Day7 : Milano to Interlaken
(Niedreid, Switzerland) by train.
Day7-Day12 : Visit different
places like Zermatt - Matterhorn, Beatus Caves, Trummelbach Falls,
Grindelwald, Mt Pilatus, Lucern (Lion Monument), Thun Castle,
Paragliding/helicopter ride, Mt Titlis, river cruise on Lake Thun,
Junfraujoch, Glacier Express, playing snow, etc.
Day13 : Travel from
Interlaken- Milan - Istanbul, Turkey, stay overnight at ISG Airport
hotel
Day14 : Travel from Istanbul
to Capadoccia, site seeing
Day15 : Do activities
like Hot Air Balloon ride and other tours, etc.
Day16 : Fly back to Istanbul. Visit popular tourist places
Day17 : Extended shopping and
leave for Singapore via Dubai
Day18 : Reach back to
Singapore
We bought new bags, clothes, winter-wear for all three of us and a lot of clothes and snacks.
We had gathered all the things that we
were supposed to pack in one room. We packed our bags just a
day before we were flying. The list of things that we packed can be
found at the bottom of this page. Since we were travelling to 3 different
countries, we decided to pack our bags in such a way that we don't
have to carry all the bags to all the places. We packed separate bags
for the 3 different countries. All 3 of us shared the bag that we
packed for the specific country.
For an 18-day long journey, we planned
to laundry our clothes twice during the trip. Once at the end of our
Italy trip at our friend's place and next time at the end of Swiss
trip in our rented apartment. This helped a lot to keep the luggage in
control and to manage hygiene.
Dubai International Airport
6th June 2013 : Finally after all this preparation, we
started from Singapore on 6th June at 9:30 pm. Although my husband is
a globe trotter, me and my daughter were travelling for the first
time to the West of India. Emirates took us from Singapore to Dubai
in 7 hours. We had a transit of about 4 hours in Dubai. Since we were
travelling backwards through time, our hunger timings had to be
adjusted. We went around the airport. After some time (at about
7:00am Singapore time), we had our breakfast of coffee/hot chocolate
and croissant. Hot chocolate from this part of the world was
different than what we usually get in Asia (to be more specific,
India and SG). It was something like pure molten chocolate heated
with slight water. It was so thick and chocolaty. In some time, we
boarded our flight to Milan. It was again a 10 hour flight which
landed Milan at 9:30 in the morning of 7th July. I couldn't sleep so well in the flight (probably wasn't used to such long hour flights and sleeping on chairs).
Milano Centrale
7th June 2013 : When we were above Milan in the flight, we could see very clear green square and rectangular fields. They were pastures of land. My first visit to Europe and I could notably see the difference in the geography as well as the landscape. Malpensa Airport is about 38 km from
Milano Centrale (where my friend came to receive us). Malpensa
has a shuttle bus service to Milano Centrale every 20 minutes. It
costs 10 Euros per pax for a single trip to MC. On the way, it was quite exciting to see rural areas in Italy. There were cute small cottages/row houses with slanted roofs very similar to Singaporean row houses (made for rains throughout the year), maybe for the snowfall during the winters and the rains. I was delighted to see my friend after 6 years. He was waiting for us in his Red BMW X5. He had a beautiful penthouse in the heart of Milan and lovely family. Although we were tired after the long journey, we decided not to sleep in order to get adjusted to the new time zone quickly. Our friend drove us around Milan. We started with a traditional Italian lunch with pizza made of fresh mozarella cheese, el dente pasta etc. It was a cute city with not-so-wide roads driven over by tiny cars (probably to get an easy parking). We went to the CBD area there. It had some historical buildings.
We went to Duomo, the famous cathedral that took 400 years to be built. Duomo's structure was like white icicles from the top. We also went to the Galleria Vittorio Emanuele, which is the oldest mall of the world. It was built in 1877. Duomo has Europe's only 7Star hotel. We also visited an old castle nearby, where we saw a heap of cannon balls as well as fountain. On the way we also saw the great maestro Leonardo do Vinci's statue. The entire flavour of the city was totally different, with all the fair and beautiful women and tall and handsome men walking around. Weather was dry and sunny. We had very tasty natural ice-cream there at GROM'S (freshly made from real pistachios and fruits which my friend claimed as world's best natural ice cream) and then came back home by about 5:45 pm. We had decided to religiously charge all our gadgets every night to not to miss photographing just due to battery drain. We had our dinner on the terrace of my friend's house and we didn't even realise that it was 8:45 in the evening as it was looking like 5:00 pm. The strangest experience I ever had was that days used to start early at around 5:00 am and end very late around 10:30pm. Finally we slept like Kumbhakarna and got up only at 7:00 am.
Duomo, Milano,
Galleria Vittorio Emanuele, Milano
8th June 2013 : Our Friend drove us to
Lugano, South of Switzerland.
On the way, we saw huge barricades alongside the highway for keeping the noise from ongoing vehicles as there were residences around. Since by road we reached high on the hill, Lugano town in in a valley. So we had to take the cogwheel train down town. We saw stalls of fresh fruits and vegetables, saw cute, flower studded buildings of Credit Suisse and other important buildings.
All were studded with flowers. After having lunch of pizza, pasta and desserts, we went for boating in the Lake Lugano which is surrounded by the Alps.
We saw swans, ducks, etc. There was a beautiful park loaded with flowers. Went for a short walk.
All of us had a good time. We returned home by 5 something. After getting fresh, we left for Adda, the famous spot where Leonardo-da-Vinci-designed boat is used even now. The speciality of the boat is that it doesn't use any form of fuel/electricity. It just uses the current of the stream to move from one end to the other and back. The boat can carry 3 cars and as many people as can fit in the boat from one bank of the stream to the other. We were extremely fortunate to get a glimpse of the Italian-Swiss culture as there was a wedding after which some 150th anniversary celebrations were going on where the boat platform acted as a stage.
We saw their bagpipers orchestra and the females dressed up in the traditional attire ready for a folk dance. We also managed to video record this as well as click some pictures with those people.We later had dinner at the restaurant at the top of a nearby hill. It was an experience of a sort.
9th June 2013 : Our friend dropped us at the station in the morning and we boarded the train to Venice. Since ours was the first class, we got some snacks and drinks on board unlike our expectation of getting a proper meal onboard (what we thought we will get at the time of booking Eurail pass). The journey was super smooth. The train was travelling at a speed of 290-300 kmph. It was our first experience on such a high speed on land. But it was so smooth and stil inside the train, that even a glass filled with water kept on the table in front was almost as still as on a halted train. We reached Venezia Mestre at 10:30 am. We did one TWO MISTAKES at the time of planning our trip. We did not book for hotel on the main Venice island. We did not book the shuttle to the hotel from Mestre station. We booked the hotel called Villa Dori online which stated that it is 10 minutes from Venezia Mestre station. It had offered to book for the shuttle to the hotel from station, but we thought while booking that we may not need it. But when we actually reached there, discovered that it is 5-7km from station. We looked for public transport, but since there was some re-contruction going on the station road, the route of that bus which could have taken us to our hotel had changed and its bus stop was kind of far from station in the new place and thus walking with our luggage to the bus stop would have been very difficult. So we decided to take a cab to the hotel and the 5 minutes ride costed us 30$. The hotel room was for 87€ per night.On reaching the hotel, first thing we did was to understand the public transport bus route and timings to and fro main Venice. And we booked the hotel's shuttle bus from the Venice main station back to hotel in the night. Finally after all this hussle/bussle, we reached main venice stationby 11:30/12:00 by taking the public tranpsort bus. I think we took bus 10 and then got down in between somewhere to change to another bus to Venice.
Venice
had a totally different look and feel. It was an island surrounded by
the Grand Canal from all sides and with water streets (canals)
everywhere, meaning if you need to go from this side of the street to
the other, you need to cross the canal. It is an old city and was
magical to know how that city was developed and how merchants used to
visit Venice for business and meet at the famous bridge which was a
meeting place for the European and Asian merchants to make business
deals. 
How
we wished we could have travelled without the tickets. In any case, we
were bound to miss our train, although we made a lot of effort to catch
it, but ofcourse, couldn't make it. When we got down to change to the
third bus, we got down at one stop later and then had no other option
but to start walking along the highway which was close to the station as
we could see the train tracks nearby. We went to the other side of the
highway, we walked for long (almost 2 km) and then came across the bus
stop which eventually also had a bus going to the Venezia Mestre
station. What a relief ... but was not so good to miss the train.
Luckily, we did not have to pay extra for making another reservation but
just that we could get only 2nd class availability on the next train,
which we didn't mind at all. We thanked God that we finally got the
tickets to Rome by the immediate next train. But leaving apart our
rushed stated of mind during all this, we got a good flavour of the
actual life in Italy, the city, the roads, the office crowd, the public
transport, the bridges, the highways, the area below the bridges, which
probably we wouldn't have got had we got tickets on the first bus no 10
of the day that we had boarded. :)10th June 2013 : Rome was again a 3 hr journey from Venice. But this time we didn't get any snacks/ drinks on board as we were traveling on the 2nd class. I felt there was not much difference between the first class seating as well as the second class seating (comfort wise) except that second class had many more people compared to our journey the previous day. Finally we reached Rome at around 1:30 pm. So we preferred to first have our lunch on the station. Rome station is quite crowded. Online reviews and my friend had warned us about frequent pick-pocketing being a common affair at Rome. So had come prepared with the safety pouches for all three of us and divided the cash and our passports that we had between me and my husband. We were extra attentive at the crowded station. We bought a tour guide book of Rome along with a map of Rome at one of the book stalls at the station. After having the yummy lunch of fresh parmesan veg sandwich and some drinks, we left the station. Our hotel was at 10 minutes walk from the station at the lane very next to the station road. First, we bought the tickets of half day hop-on-hop-off bus tour. Then we walked to the hotel. It was a double room at Hotel Regina-Giovanna in the heart of the city right next to the station. We stayed there for 2 days and 1 night for 99€. We reached hotel, freshened up, checked on the internet as well as the guide book and decided for the places to visit. But before that we decided to do the full hop-on-hop-off tour at least once to get a fair idea of the places that we would be interested to visit. This bus with audio-guide covered most of the popular city attractions.
We took the tour twice ... first time to get a gist of the attractions and second time to visit some of the places on the bus route. As we had booked a tour of the colloseum and the Roman Forum for the next day, along with the Vatican City tour, we decided to cover the remaining as many places as we could on that day. We clicked many pictures of the sites. 
Fountain of Trevy Vittorio Emanual II Monument Roman Forum
11th June 2013 : The next day we left for Colosseum first thing in the morning at 8:30 am as it opens at 9:00am. Buying online tour tickets saved us a lot of time in really long queues at the ticket counters. We got our audio equipment and started touring the Colosseum. It was an interesting place with a not-so-pleasant history.
The Colosseum
It was originally built as an amphitheater by the Roman kings for viewing the gladiators fight with the beasts. Even the Romans had different societal classes which was represented by the distinctive seating arrangement at the front row for the elite while the top most rows at the back for lower class people lowest being the women of that class. After about an hour and a half, we completed the tour and left for Roman Forum which was very nearby. It had many interesting structures along with the shrine of Julius Caesar. Some of the structures were broken of course as they were a few hundreds of years old. We clicked many pictures again. We also managed to capture Palatine hills. We had carried many things to eat in order to save on lunch time. We straight away took taxi to Vatican city as our guided Vatican tour was about to start at 12:30.
Vatican City
St Peter's Basilica
Vatican City is the most artistic place I have ever seen. There is art on the floor, the pillars, the building itself, the wall and even the ceiling. The entire place is full of scultures, paintings, beautiful carpets, tiles, etc. We were really overwhelmed looking at too much of beauty everywhere. After the guided tour, we had to stand in a long queue for about 40-45 minutes to enter the Bassilica. But it was well worth it. Finally, we captured our moments and beauty in our cameras and were done by 4-ish. We rushed back to hotel to pack and catch our train at 5:00pm. But we missed the train. Good thing in buying a Eurorail pass is that you could still catch another train if you have missed one train. We got a train an hour later. By that time we grabbed some meal to eat and relaxed at the station food joint. We reached Milan in the night.
12th June 2013 : Next morning, we left Milano to
reach Interlaken (Niedreid, Switzerland) by train at 7:30 am. We reached there in about 3 hours. The journey was very beautiful. We saw lake Como and the Swiss alps from a distance. As we reached nearer, we got closer glimpses of the snow clad mountains. And were awestruck with the views. On reaching Interlaken, we tried to figure out the public transport system by picking up some brochures to various destinations. We had some hot chocolate, coffee and cookies. It was so quiet and peaceful with no crowd at all in and around the station. We had never been to such an "uncrowded place". It was as if we were in our dream world. Nature's beauty could be felt everywhere. We landed into our rented arpartment which was located on a beautiful lake below the beautiful green mountains bang on Neidereid station. It seemed as if we went into a sort of trans. We arranged our luggage there, ate something and left for making use of the rest of the day.
We Explored the area, went
to Harder Kulm by climbing rail. There is a hill terrace restaurant at the top. Ate some sandwiches and hot beverages there and clicked a lot of pictures of the beautiful view of the valley down there as well as the snow clad peaks opposite Harder Kulm.
After some time, we took the last train back down to the valley. We walked to the railway station to find the super market Coop. In Switz, the shops and supermarkets close down quite early in the evening between 5:00 pm to 7:00 pm. We bought some groceries at Coop like pasta, cheese, ketchup, milk, fresh fruits, bread, etc. for our breakfast and dinner and went back home at Niederied by train. We got comfortable with our new place, which being an apartment was a 2 bedroom - kitchen apartment, fully equipped with all the home appliances. We cooked pasta for dinner. We also managed to talk to family in India and USA with the wifi internet provided at the apartment. Again, the days were very long and the sky turned dark only after 10:30 pm.
The serene view from our apartment
Harder Kulm views
After some time, we took the last train back down to the valley. We walked to the railway station to find the super market Coop. In Switz, the shops and supermarkets close down quite early in the evening between 5:00 pm to 7:00 pm. We bought some groceries at Coop like pasta, cheese, ketchup, milk, fresh fruits, bread, etc. for our breakfast and dinner and went back home at Niederied by train. We got comfortable with our new place, which being an apartment was a 2 bedroom - kitchen apartment, fully equipped with all the home appliances. We cooked pasta for dinner. We also managed to talk to family in India and USA with the wifi internet provided at the apartment. Again, the days were very long and the sky turned dark only after 10:30 pm.
13th June 2013 : Next day, we left early morning at about 7:30 am to reach Zermatt, which was 2.5-3hrs of train ride away to experience the beautiful Matterhorn. Our daughter has been a travellor's joy kid by fully co-operating wherever and whenever we needed her help. Zermatt was a small, cosy town with a small population residing there. We reached there at about 10:30 / 11:00 am.when we are kind of hungry. We had a traditional vegetariani swiss lunch in a resaurant at the foot of the hill. Then we walked along the Vispa river to the cable car stations and took a ride to matterhorn.
The journey both in the train extended to the mountain by the cable car was tranquil. Where, at the foot of the mountain, we saw the swiss cows grazing making some noise with the cow bells hanging around their neck at the green pastures,slowly the landform stransformed into a more rocky and then a completely snow-clad top. Where there were summers at the foot of the mountain, the top of the mountain was looking like winters. But the sun was really intense at that height. We enjoyed the snow and the serene, breathtaking views, clicked some of the lovely moments After 2-3 hours of having fun, we decided to come back. But it was really difficult to pull out our daughter from the snow, who saw the snow and ice glaciers for the first time ever in her life. Finally, we reached back to the foot of the mountain by gondola by about 4:00pm. We just sat on a bench and relaxed in a park nearby. We left at about 5:30-ish from the park as most of the shops would be closing soon and we wanted to buy some souveniers befor we left Zermatt. We bought a T-shirt for my hubby. We ate some ice-creams and boarded the train back to Brig/Visp - to - Interlaken. What a day it was. We all were super satisfied and super thrilled as for me and my daughter, it the first time to see/feel the snow :) We reached Interlaken quite late as our train got delayed a bit and we missed the connection. It appeared from rest of the crowd's reactions that we had missed the last train. We checked with one of the rail staff for trains later in the evening/night, but prpobably he wasn't aware too, though the train schedule that we were carrying said that there was a train every hour until 11:40 in the night. It started raining super heavily and everyone on the platform looked to be stranded and finding out other options to get back to their homes. The situation was not very comfortable as it was a foreign country, where we don't know anything, not even the language and all the shops had closed down and of course, we didn't have our dinner till that time. With time, we were slowly getting worried. We knew that taxis were very very expensive in Switz. And we also knew that none of the public transport busses went to Neidereid. It was very dark, about 10/10:30 and we decided to take a cab. But empty taxis were not coming to the station and whichever taxi came, one of the big youth group that was also on the bus station near the railway station, used to just run and capture it. While my husband was trying to call for a cab, I just saw an empty car arriving and ran to capture it for us and fortunately, I was successful in doing so. I had asked my daughter to go and be with her father till I get that cab. We finally boarded the taxi to our relief. The meter ran really fast and we spent 50 CHF for that 6-7 km ride to our apartment at Neidereid. But alas, we were back to our apartment, temporarily our home sweet home in Switz. What an experience. Ironically though, we met another passenger from the previous night Interlaken platform who waited for the next train and he told us that there was a train at 10:40 followed by another one at 11:40. But, we being a family with a child, our decision was quite fruiful as we could feed our daughter and ourselves on time to be ready for the next day.
The journey both in the train extended to the mountain by the cable car was tranquil. Where, at the foot of the mountain, we saw the swiss cows grazing making some noise with the cow bells hanging around their neck at the green pastures,slowly the landform stransformed into a more rocky and then a completely snow-clad top. Where there were summers at the foot of the mountain, the top of the mountain was looking like winters. But the sun was really intense at that height. We enjoyed the snow and the serene, breathtaking views, clicked some of the lovely moments After 2-3 hours of having fun, we decided to come back. But it was really difficult to pull out our daughter from the snow, who saw the snow and ice glaciers for the first time ever in her life. Finally, we reached back to the foot of the mountain by gondola by about 4:00pm. We just sat on a bench and relaxed in a park nearby. We left at about 5:30-ish from the park as most of the shops would be closing soon and we wanted to buy some souveniers befor we left Zermatt. We bought a T-shirt for my hubby. We ate some ice-creams and boarded the train back to Brig/Visp - to - Interlaken. What a day it was. We all were super satisfied and super thrilled as for me and my daughter, it the first time to see/feel the snow :) We reached Interlaken quite late as our train got delayed a bit and we missed the connection. It appeared from rest of the crowd's reactions that we had missed the last train. We checked with one of the rail staff for trains later in the evening/night, but prpobably he wasn't aware too, though the train schedule that we were carrying said that there was a train every hour until 11:40 in the night. It started raining super heavily and everyone on the platform looked to be stranded and finding out other options to get back to their homes. The situation was not very comfortable as it was a foreign country, where we don't know anything, not even the language and all the shops had closed down and of course, we didn't have our dinner till that time. With time, we were slowly getting worried. We knew that taxis were very very expensive in Switz. And we also knew that none of the public transport busses went to Neidereid. It was very dark, about 10/10:30 and we decided to take a cab. But empty taxis were not coming to the station and whichever taxi came, one of the big youth group that was also on the bus station near the railway station, used to just run and capture it. While my husband was trying to call for a cab, I just saw an empty car arriving and ran to capture it for us and fortunately, I was successful in doing so. I had asked my daughter to go and be with her father till I get that cab. We finally boarded the taxi to our relief. The meter ran really fast and we spent 50 CHF for that 6-7 km ride to our apartment at Neidereid. But alas, we were back to our apartment, temporarily our home sweet home in Switz. What an experience. Ironically though, we met another passenger from the previous night Interlaken platform who waited for the next train and he told us that there was a train at 10:40 followed by another one at 11:40. But, we being a family with a child, our decision was quite fruiful as we could feed our daughter and ourselves on time to be ready for the next day.
14th June 2013 : After enjoying two fun packed days at Switz, today's plan was to visit Trummelbach Falls,
Grindelwald. We left by train for Grindelwald from Interlaken Ost. Again, Grindelwald is a small town from where we took a bus to Trummelbach falls. The journey was so beautiful with grasslands and yellow flowers spread across large fields. Finally we reached our destination. Trummelbach falls is the waterfall made by melting water from glaciers inside the trummelbach rocky mountain. These waters have been falling with such force every summer for ages that the force has carved out caves inside the mountain and they have made their way down to the ground into a river. Nature is so artistic... it has created all these wonders just on its own based on simple physical principles of force and gravity. On our way back, we shopped some caps and swiss bells as souvenirs for family and friends.
15th June 2013 : Half of our stay of Swiss was over. Today's plan was to visit Pilatus Kulm and Lucern. As everyday, we left early in the morning as it takes a while to reach there from our station. We took a train to Brienz and from there went further to Lucern from where we took a train to Kriends Lind Pilatus. From there we took a cogwheel train to our destination. Many school students (teenagers) were also with us in the cogwheel. It was good fun to watch and laugh with European youngsters. On the way we could see pieces of snow glaciers which had eventually molten into these small pieces due to summer heat. (Lion Monument) On the top there was a big restaurant with some preserved snow.
Some people played the traditional instrument called Alphorn at the top of Pilatus Kulm. It was devine listening to them play.
There were stuffed raindeers and goats. We had some chocolate mousse and coffee. The scene was beautiful with cloud stdded skies, snow decorated rocky mountains and lots og fog around. There was also a cave and the mountain peak to climb, We clicked lots of pictures, climbed the places and moved forward. There was a stop mid way down which was a mis way family recreational village.
There we took the scenic mega slide down the hill through the fields, watched families having some tree climbing fun, had sandwiches for lunch at the small cafe at the mid way station and then went back to Lucern.
It was evening by then. We clicked some pictures at the lake near the station, walked around and shopped some souvenir chocolates for our friends back home. We went to the Lion Monument, which is a historical monument in memory of the Swiss soldiers who died fighting a war. It closes by 6:00 pm. Then we went around the streets, grabbed something to eat and then walked back to station. And then further went back home by train.
Some people played the traditional instrument called Alphorn at the top of Pilatus Kulm. It was devine listening to them play.
There were stuffed raindeers and goats. We had some chocolate mousse and coffee. The scene was beautiful with cloud stdded skies, snow decorated rocky mountains and lots og fog around. There was also a cave and the mountain peak to climb, We clicked lots of pictures, climbed the places and moved forward. There was a stop mid way down which was a mis way family recreational village.
There we took the scenic mega slide down the hill through the fields, watched families having some tree climbing fun, had sandwiches for lunch at the small cafe at the mid way station and then went back to Lucern.
It was evening by then. We clicked some pictures at the lake near the station, walked around and shopped some souvenir chocolates for our friends back home. We went to the Lion Monument, which is a historical monument in memory of the Swiss soldiers who died fighting a war. It closes by 6:00 pm. Then we went around the streets, grabbed something to eat and then walked back to station. And then further went back home by train.
16th June 2013 : This day was planned for Thun Castle. We had heard about castles in just fairy tales but never saw one in real. So we had planned it for this date to see the reality bites. We left sometime in the late morning after kind of brunch. We reached the Thun station, again grabbed some pizza bread for some snacks and then walked around the town in search of the castle. Beautiful river flows from most of these villages and towns in Switz. Finally reached the castle which was besides a church. Both the church and the castle were very very simple and so unlike our fairytale imagination. But none the less, we walked through the town and got good glimpses of the swiss town. We had planned for
Paragliding in the afternoon. Last time had taken phone number from a paragliding company person on Interlaken. We had called him the previous day to confirm our ride plans for this date. They picked us up from the Thun station for our paragliding experience. We, especially my daughter was super duper excited for the ride. Finally we reached the hill top which was covered with small yellow flowers adding to the scenic snow beauty of the Alps. We were a group of paragliders who were going to be guided by the professional crew. We were each assihned an instructor. My instructor looked like Hrithik Roshan :D. But he was 45 yrs old, which we couldnt even guess, he looked so young and fit. The biggest mental challenge was to jump off the cliff. Our instructors had instructed us to keep running without thinking anything and without looking down unless instructed by the instructor to stop. And the bravest one, our daughter was the first one to jump off. I followed and my husband was the last one. But just before my husband was about to jump, the instructor asked him to stop as the wind got very low. Then next time he was a bit scared but managed to jump and there we were, floating in the air, feeling the breeze, the mountains, the top view, the beauty of nature. The ride was over in about 15-20 minutes, but the experience was imprinted in our minds forever. The instructors clicked some pictures as well as videos of our landing. It was truly an awesome experience. It was evening and then we left for home. What a fun-packed day!!
17th June 2013 : After a lot of discussion, we finally decided for to include Mt Titlis as well in our Swiss itinerary. Since this is also a snow spot, we thought it would be similar to Zermatt. And for that reason only, we kept it for the last day of our tour since we wanted to carry snow-filled Swiss memories with us back home. Mt Titlis is very famous amongst Indian tourists as Dilwale Dulhania
Le Jaayenge movie was shot here. When we were in the cable car gondolas
there, we could see all information boards including information in
hindi as well. In fact, when we reached the mountain top, we also found
Kajol and Shahrukh's cardboard dummies for photo clicks. We played a lot
in the snow here for two reasons. Firstly, we love snow and this was
going to be our last day in Swiss, and secondly, summer was slowly
turning hotter and hotter, all this snow was soon going to melt. So we
wanted to enjoy it before we leave. We also took the bench ride. It was a great experience to feel hanging so high above the snow clad mountains on the open bench. We are finally so small in front of the nature. Such rides help us realise our miniature.
Then we started back to reach Engelberg station to get a glimpse of Mt
Engelberg. Although it was very very foggy, we just managed to get a few
short glimpses of the mount in between the fog and the mist. But the
weather was all so refreshing, so full of cool fresh air and oxygen. We
were trying our best to get the feel of the place soaked in our
memories. We again shopped some t-shirts and sweat shirts here and then we went to Berne station.... just to make our trip
complete. We didn't want to not visit the capital of the country after
all the way coming here for tourism. We ate some swiss ice-creams on the
station and walked around to see the city people, traffic, streets,
etc. We were there for about an hour or so then boarded the train to go
back to Neidereid. Finally our swiss itinerary was complete. The
refreshing experience of strong and sturdy rocky mountains, green
grasslands covered with flowers, lakes, waterfalls, long days until
10:00 pm and shorter nights until 4:30 am, tight sleeps, happiness and
peace in mind, the quiet of nature was truly unforgettable. We wish and
hope that we are able to visit this place again and again and again.
18th June 2013 : Finally, we took leave from Swiss alps and started from Interlaken to reach Milan in the morning itself. From there we took flight to Istanbul in the evening where on reaching we stayed in the airport hotel. We could see the Europe's border as half of Istanbul is in Europe. The airport hotel was quite posh, where we stayed only for the night as we had to leave early morning next day for Cappadocia. We were going to be there for two days-two nights.
19th June 2013 : Next day early morning we left Istanbul for Kayseri city in the Cappadocia region. The Kayseri airport was a cute tiny airport.
We had arranged the airport transfers from hotel. It was a long distance. It took us about 1.5-2 hours to reach the hotel. It was a beautiful boutique resort style hotel, called Traveller Cave Hotel. As the name suggests, the rooms, in fact, the entire hotel was carved out of the rock structures there.
Cappadocia is famous for the minaret like rock structures made from the weathering of volcanic sedimentary rocks deposited thousands of years ago. Our daughter superliked the place and immediately made herself comfortable. We are fond of turkish food and that was one of the reasons behind selecting Turkey as one of our Europe tour destinations. We finally had authentic turkish lunch comprising lentil soup with turkish bread and hummus. At the hotel itself we booked for site seeing tours for the two days of our stay. First day was site visits to rose valley and white valley in the rocky hills. We went walking with the tour guide first to the white valley. After which, he took us to a refreshment tent, from where we went to the rose valley.
On the way we saw apple and grape orchards and a lot of peach trees. The place was generally pretty cool and dry. Even there the days were longer than the nights. We saw a beautiful sunset from the rose valley. This entire area of rock formations used to be a house of underground civilisations thousands of years ago. After our site seeing was over the guide dropped us back to the Goreme village where in the late evening we did some window shopping and then went for exotic Turkish dinner around warm campfire in an open air restaurant in the cool evening. The whole atmosphere was so pleasant and relaxing. Good end of the day.
We had arranged the airport transfers from hotel. It was a long distance. It took us about 1.5-2 hours to reach the hotel. It was a beautiful boutique resort style hotel, called Traveller Cave Hotel. As the name suggests, the rooms, in fact, the entire hotel was carved out of the rock structures there.
Cappadocia is famous for the minaret like rock structures made from the weathering of volcanic sedimentary rocks deposited thousands of years ago. Our daughter superliked the place and immediately made herself comfortable. We are fond of turkish food and that was one of the reasons behind selecting Turkey as one of our Europe tour destinations. We finally had authentic turkish lunch comprising lentil soup with turkish bread and hummus. At the hotel itself we booked for site seeing tours for the two days of our stay. First day was site visits to rose valley and white valley in the rocky hills. We went walking with the tour guide first to the white valley. After which, he took us to a refreshment tent, from where we went to the rose valley.
On the way we saw apple and grape orchards and a lot of peach trees. The place was generally pretty cool and dry. Even there the days were longer than the nights. We saw a beautiful sunset from the rose valley. This entire area of rock formations used to be a house of underground civilisations thousands of years ago. After our site seeing was over the guide dropped us back to the Goreme village where in the late evening we did some window shopping and then went for exotic Turkish dinner around warm campfire in an open air restaurant in the cool evening. The whole atmosphere was so pleasant and relaxing. Good end of the day.
20th June 2013 : We had booked for the Hot Air Balloon ride the previous day from our hotel itself and Red Bus Tour. We woke up early morning at 4:30am to leave for the hot air balloon ride at 5:00 am from hotel. The balloon sail company had arranged for our transfer to the balloon boarding terminal. We boarded our balloon of 8 passengers and a pilot at about 5:00 am soon after which we saw the sun rise.
It was a beautiful site. Our pilot maneuvered the balloon high up and very low down one foot from the ground at times from where we even plucked fresh apricots from trees and ate onboard the balloon. The ride was almost an hour long. At the end of the ride, we celebrated with a toast of vine and we were given a certificate each signed by the pilot for sailing in the hot air balloon. After that we came back to the hotel for breakfast and freshening up. We left for our bus tour at 10:30. It took us to the Goreme open air museum, underground city, Buckle Church, Greek Settlement, Vinery, pottery centre and tour to different areas of rock formations (Pigeon valley, etc.). At lunch time the tour also took us to a 4 star hotel where they offered a royal buffet of a vast spread of dishes and desserts.
At the end of the tour which was at about 4:30 pm, they took us to a snacks station after which we dispersed. We again went to another restaurant in the market for a yummilicious dinner. The restaurant belonged to the chef who travelled all the way from New York. A fantastic day indeed.
It was a beautiful site. Our pilot maneuvered the balloon high up and very low down one foot from the ground at times from where we even plucked fresh apricots from trees and ate onboard the balloon. The ride was almost an hour long. At the end of the ride, we celebrated with a toast of vine and we were given a certificate each signed by the pilot for sailing in the hot air balloon. After that we came back to the hotel for breakfast and freshening up. We left for our bus tour at 10:30. It took us to the Goreme open air museum, underground city, Buckle Church, Greek Settlement, Vinery, pottery centre and tour to different areas of rock formations (Pigeon valley, etc.). At lunch time the tour also took us to a 4 star hotel where they offered a royal buffet of a vast spread of dishes and desserts.
At the end of the tour which was at about 4:30 pm, they took us to a snacks station after which we dispersed. We again went to another restaurant in the market for a yummilicious dinner. The restaurant belonged to the chef who travelled all the way from New York. A fantastic day indeed.
21st June 2013 : Hotel again arranged for airport transfer at 5:00 am as we were supposed to catch our flight at 7:30 am by Anadolu Jet to Istanbul. But unfortunately there were some riots at the Taksim square during those days and so the flight was delayed. Hour after hour passed but the flight that was supposed to carry us didn't arrive till evening. Luckily my husband is a frequent business traveller so knows the knacks to handle such situations very well. He was after the airline staff since morning to give him a report confirming the delay of the flight so that atleast we can claim insurance for delayed flight. For the same reasonof riots, the night before we also changed our hotel in Istanbul at Taksim Square that we had booked before leaving Singapore. Finally we boarded our flight at 5:40
pm after missing a couple of other flights that went full due to change in flight timings but still ahead of some other passengers. Due to all this, we lost the entire day of touring Istanbul. On reaching, we checked into the time pass hotel. Atleast it was near the tourism locations. On the way to hotel from airport we saw the black sea which was actually quite deep blue in colour, at least it appeared to be from the taxi. We then visited the Blue Mosque.
Men are supposed to cover their heads before entering the mosque and women are supposed to cover their heads and head and arms and legs, etc. So we covered ourselves as per the norms with handkerchief and shawl respectively. Then we ate our dinner after window shopping of carpets and beautiful lamps in the Grand bazaar, which was at the doorstep of our hotel.
Men are supposed to cover their heads before entering the mosque and women are supposed to cover their heads and head and arms and legs, etc. So we covered ourselves as per the norms with handkerchief and shawl respectively. Then we ate our dinner after window shopping of carpets and beautiful lamps in the Grand bazaar, which was at the doorstep of our hotel.
22nd June 2013 : Next day we left early in the morning to make up for the loss of day to try to visit at least the most famous tourist spots. We visited the Hagia
Sofia mosque, went to Grand Bazaar for some shopping, shopped a
miniature vine jar, turkish candle lamps, Cushion covers, and turkish
sweets for friends.
Early morning, we had bought 1 kg fresh cherries from a street hawker and relished the mouthwatering cherries to the content of our hearts. In the afternoon had lunch at one of the Turkish joints. But didn't like it as much as the Cappadocia restaurants. Nonetheless, we were satisfied to the fullest with the tour capturing a variety of nature, scenery, beauty, culture, history, exotic memories with us. The same late afternoon we boarded the flight to Dubai for returning back to Singapore on 23rd morning 11:00 am.
Early morning, we had bought 1 kg fresh cherries from a street hawker and relished the mouthwatering cherries to the content of our hearts. In the afternoon had lunch at one of the Turkish joints. But didn't like it as much as the Cappadocia restaurants. Nonetheless, we were satisfied to the fullest with the tour capturing a variety of nature, scenery, beauty, culture, history, exotic memories with us. The same late afternoon we boarded the flight to Dubai for returning back to Singapore on 23rd morning 11:00 am.
Our dream holiday was over, giving us many learning experiences, leaving our hearts and mind more open and flexible to venture an all new vacation next time.
List of things to pack
Winter wear, wollens
Summer wear
3 Night dresses each
6-7 pairs of undergarments
Hand-kerchiefs
Tissue papers
Socks
Caps
Sunglasses
Hand Sanitiser
Toilet tissue roll (I carried in my
handbag.. for just in case the toilets are not clean)
Travel scrapbook
Passports
Travel itinerary
Flight tickets
Hotel bookings
Tour bookings
Camera and charger
Laptop and charger
Mobiles and chargers
Mobiles and chargers
International multi-plug socket
Secret safe pouch to be pinned at the
inside of trousers / jeans (to prevent any pick-pocketing incidents)
Slippers
Stretch strings for drying clothes
Back-packs for 3 of us
Milo/coffee sachets
Big variety of snacks
Heat to eat packets of food
Cash in the form of Euros and USD
Books to read on the way
Bath and hygiene accessories
Cosmetics, make-up
Hand and body lotion and lip balm
(especially for the cold and dry weather of Europe)
Gifts for our friends whom we were
visiting
No comments:
Post a Comment