The Alps and Zurich - Switzerland
The Alps and Zurich
Friday 20th March 2009
Spent the daytime enjoying some fabulous Alpine scenery in the Flumserberg ski resort, then the evening sampling Zurich's weird and wonderful nightlife, including a circuit bending party (!).
Switzerland
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| 09:48:41 The view from outside the hotel, with a little Alpine chalet below. | 09:48:45 The view in the other direction. | 09:49:40 The Hotel Waldegg where we had stayed the previous night. |
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| 09:50:23 Can see a bit of a lake in this direction. | 09:51:39 On the road on the way to the other hotel. | 09:58:45 The other hotel, where most of the group stayed, which acted as basecamp for the day. |
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| 10:04:39 On the way up the road to the ski lifts etc. | 10:06:40 A view back down into the village of Tannenboden, | 10:15:29 A colleague and I, both of us having opted out of the actual skiing, thought it might be nice to take this gondola up to the top of the mountain. |
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| 10:18:57 ...I think this is taken as we began our ascent. | 10:19:31 Looking up the gondola run. | 10:20:55 A bit hard to appreciate these views in still pictures! |
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| 10:21:04 The gondola run was parallel to one of the chair lifts for some of the way. | 10:23:56 It looks a bit misty here, this is in fact just the heavily scratched window through which I was taking this. | 10:24:55 Nice view of the lake here. |
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| 10:25:27 ...and again. | 10:27:45 Another gondola passing by. | 10:40:09 Right, we're at the top now, and I hope you'll agree the views are pretty impressive! |
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| 10:40:14 Having never really been to the Alps before (with the exception of Monte Generoso in the Lepontine Alps, which was in summer so quite a different effect) this was just stunning to me. | 10:40:32 Here's the one picture of me in the whole day, just to prove I was actually there! | 10:41:29 Some flags. |
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| 10:41:41 I obviously got a bit snap happy from here on... | 10:41:51 Rather than thinking it to be a blot on the landscape, I actually quite liked the machinery of the ski lifts. | 10:42:20 If Chie had been here she would have been saying "oishiso" (looks tasty!). |
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| 10:43:17 It was unsurprisingly a bit cold, so we eventually thought it prudent to retreat inside the restaurant / lodge / whatever you call it, and watch the world go by from there. | 10:43:27 I'm sure they're having fun out there, but I was quite happy to be on the inside looking out. | 10:43:32 Marvellous. |
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| 11:05:33 Elevenses - beer and frites. Very nice too. | 11:18:01 We spotted this guy skiing in a sort of frog suit... | 11:18:09 ...here's a closeup. |
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| 12:10:17 Not much was changing outside really, but the views were so nice I felt compelled to take the same shots again every so often, | 12:11:01 Cold beer and Alpine scenery, a surprisingly good combination. | 13:12:58 During the course of the day quite a lot of people joined us at various times - we had unknowingly formed a sort of second base camp here. |
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| 14:02:53 Just checking the views are still there - I felt it necessary at this point to have a quick run around outside. | 14:02:59 ...yes it all appears to be present and correct... | 14:03:25 Interesting how no snow settled on this wood carving of a bear. |
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| 14:03:51 The restaurant from the outside - useful as it has the name on it - Maschgenkamm, at 2020M. | 14:03:57 One more picture before dashing back inside - I'd gone out without my jacket and it was decidedly nippy! | 14:42:01 One of my colleagues ordered at cheese platter, which I thought was worthy of a picture. |
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| 15:33:59 Eventually the time came to leave what was probably one of my top 10 favourite drinking spots of all time, and get the gondola back down to the village. | 15:35:23 ...so here are some more shots from the gondola. | 15:39:47 ...not much more to add really! |
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| 15:41:05 A colleague suggested it would have been very fun if these snowmobiles were available for hire. | 15:42:47 ...back through the trees... | 15:48:44 ...and here comes the gondola station at the bottom... |
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| 15:48:54 ...almost there now. | 16:23:02 A little later on, the view from the Tannenboden hotel, where we all gathered and waited for the bus to take us back to Zurich, | 16:23:22 Poor chap. |
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| 17:04:02 On the coach now I think, I liked the icicles hanging off the roof here. | 17:09:11 What looks like a fire station. | 17:10:54 ...a colleague taking pictures out the front of the bus. |
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| 17:15:38 More cabins and chalets on the way down the mountan, | 17:17:09 ...you get the idea. | 17:26:22 Probably an effect of the beer - I'd got into that state where you'll happily take random pictures of just about anything. |
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| 17:27:03 ....including, apparently, a lamp post?!? On close inspection there's a little church barely visible in the centre of the shot there. | 17:30:38 Going into a tunnel... | 17:34:34 Even the main roads were quite scenic around here. |
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| 17:49:59 The sun is starting to set here. | 17:50:17 .... | 17:58:32 ...yes very definitely in the realms of random photography here. |
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| 17:58:38 A colleague having a sleep. | 17:59:01 ...more of the same random pictures. | 18:24:57 Right, in Zurich now, I quite liked the effect of this bridge with the two spires behind it. |
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| 21:12:04 Somewhat later on, having been to Zurich airport and back, and then checked into our respective hotels, this is back in Zurich station. | 22:07:39 Dinner! Some very nice gnocchi (I think they were really spatzli) in a creamy sauce. | 22:50:08 A complete failure to take a picture out over a lake next to where we had dinner. |
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| 22:59:20 My fellow drinking companions for the evening in Zurich - two colleagues and a Swiss guy who was a friend-of-a-friend of one of my colleagues, and had kindly agreed to show us around. | 23:07:15 ...so here we are at a "circuit bending party", which I only dimly understand the idea of, but it does seem to involve live soldering action. | 23:09:42 ...and there was also a guy running entertainment picha kucha style from his Mac. |
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| 23:11:03 ...and they had Free Beer! I had heard about this stuff, but never actually seen a real botlte of it before. I believe it is free in an open source sense (we did actually have to pay for it). | 23:38:58 The picha kucha style entertainment that accompanied the circuit bending. A delightfully weird way to round off a very out-of-the-ordinary sort of day. |
