Cow bells and paragliders

We woke to a beautiful morning with views across the vines covered in mist. Bridget went for a run (without getting lost!) and then met Mike at the end of his dog walk, before he went to the boulangerie to buy breakfast.

We then left to drive to Basel, via the supermarket, to pick up Charlotte from the airport. We worked out we could pick her up from the French side and drove into the pick-up car park. We managed to find Charlotte but we were then told off by a parking man who spoke at us in French, very fast. In the end we figured out he was worried about our width (rude!) and getting through the exit barrier at the car park. He supervised our exit and asked for our ticket at the barrier, which we then couldn’t find! Eventually, exhasperated, he just let us out! And then we found the ticket about five minutes later… We drove over the border into Germany and then into Switzerland. We stopped for lunch by the river and gave the dogs a quick walk, before continuing to Interlaken. We arrived at the campsite at about 5 o’clock and found a lovely spot right by the lake.

We went for an explore with the dogs along the river before supper and bed.

The campsite had given us lots of bits of paper informing us of things to do in Interlaken and how to get there on the boat/bus. So on Friday morning we decided to take the 10:30 am boat into town, but when we got to the pier the timetable said the first boat was at 11:30 am! So we walked! The route took us along the edge of the lake and then down a very beautiful blue river.

We walked through Interlaken town and watched all the paragliders, then found a fenicular that took us up to Harder Kulm.

When we got up there were stunning views over Interlaken and the Thunersee and Brienzersee lakes. After taking lots of photos from the platform we splashed out on a lunch of pizza and "The Coldest Beer in Interlaken!". By the time we finished lunch, the sun was shining and the clouds had cleared so we took a few more photos of the dramatic scenery.

As the fenicular was so expensive to get up to the top, we decided to walk down. This was an amazing walk through the forest on the edge of the mountain, with cowbells ringing in the distance, but after two hours we all (especially Mitzie) were excited to see the campsite.

So we spent the rest of the afternoon sitting in the sun reading our books by the lake. In the evening Mike made curry (of course!) and we watched the amazing sunset.