On day 5 of our tour we departed Paris for Geneva very early and we were in the bus the majority of the day, driving through the burgundy hills and wine region of France.
The UN is a fairly impressive building, the Red Cross wasn’t much to look at. Sad it’s not the other way around. After that we drove to our hotel… it was about 6PM. We had planned to go out but our dinner was in an hour so we just chilled in the room instead. The hotel was one of the nicest on the tour, brand new and super modern (figures… the Swiss have such a great design sense).
We then had included dinner in the hotel and ate with our Aussie friends Rob and Chanel and our Singaporean friend Nikki, who is quite funny and adorable and we learned was only like 17. She seemed a lot older. The meal was really good… salad with a lot of nice carrots and pork something with nice vegetables.
I don’t know why but some of my best memories from the tour are just some of the funny conversations we had with the people we met. Now up until this point on our trip I was convinced our driver, Francesco, didn’t speak English because I hadn’t seen him talking to anyone on the tour except the few that spoke Italian, so I just assumed he didn’t. At dinner Jelle and Francesco were sitting the next table over from us and since he was facing the sun, Francesco seemed to be having the same problem as me with the sun being in his eyes. The super modern stringy curtains covering the windows just weren’t cutting it. So I joked that we should pull our tables away from the windows and just push them together into one massive table. Francesco laughed and thought this was a good idea I guess because he stood up and started to push his table. I got up to push ours as well but nobody else was paying attention at this point and lost interest in the sun blinding me. Francesco and I just started laughing at one another and finally Jelle started laughing at us and said “what are you guys doing?!”
We needed to ask Jelle what the best way to get to Montreux was so we hung around the bus after everyone else had walked away. Jelle told us the best way would be train, but I had my heart set on a cruise across the lake. Turns out the cruise ship wasn’t running at all at that time so we had to take the train. Somehow we managed to figure it out again despite everything being in French. We got on the train to Montreux and it was right on the shore of the lake the majority of the ride… which was an hour. We got off the train clueless as to where to find the Rochers de Naye train, which is where we were headed – to the peak of one of the highest mountains on the lake. To my amazement and relief the second we got off the train there was a huge ad for the Rochers de Naye train right across the track on the other platform. So we bought the ticket and quickly hoped on that train, a cog wheel train that was at a steep incline for most the journey up. It also made 10 other stops along the way to the peak, each one ridiculously scenic and breathtaking.
After another 50 minutes we were finally to the top.
Another really cool thing about this mountain is they have these mongolian yurts you can stay in…
On our descent in the train I finally caught a glimpse of Chateau de Chillion, a castle I wanted to visit but we didn’t have time for. I just love how many beautiful sights there are in Europe… you can already be at the most breathtaking place you’ve ever been, and then as if that isn’t enough, you spot a centuries old castle on a lake shore!
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Spectacular first picture. Is it ok if I reuse it with a credit back to your site on a feature I’m writing about mountain bike climbing and the effects of altitude?
Thanks! Yes that would be fine 🙂