Switzerland – Vicki & Scot in Europe

KANDERSTEG, NEUCHATEL, MONTREUX, SWITZERLAND

We wake up to a totally misty, foggy day and surrounded by white, white and more white so we can’t see a thing. All the car parks near us are full as everybody starts their Monday but I wonder what business there is at this time of the year and who is around to frequent them but work goes on as usual.

We get another 2 baguettes and empty and fill the van and head for Kandersteg, back tracking the drive from Saturday but this is not a problem as the drive is worth it. However we decide to gamble on the highway a bit to bypass Bern & Thun to save time then hook on to the road between the mountains. It is scary as you are heading to what seems impassable mountains from a distance and then they seem to open up and let us through with the best grandeur you can imagine. Vicki only remembered she had the hotel business card that our friends Ruth & Mick gave us when they were here so we knew we had to come though we knew it was the wrong time of the year to go dog sled riding as they did but we are going to trek partway up the mountain tomorrow to a lake. As we arrived it seems we drove up to the camp on what must not be a road because a lady tut tuts us as we slowly make our way up a narrow pathway – probably only for walking and pushbikes, but once you are there you can’t turn around and have to continue until you get back on the road. We had a look around the town which like all the others is picture postcard lovely, had a drink in a hotel and as it was getting dark walked back to our camp as the last of the sun backlit the high snowy mountains in front of us. The contrast up high of the blue sky with the white mountain’s when it is dark where we are is magical and even though we are tempted, no photograph will capture it so it has to be embedded on our memory instead. Yummy green curry for tea and enough for tomorrow nite so I don’t have to cook means we can have a full adventure day tomorrow.

The day starts as a clear beautiful day and we head up a steep path towards the lake in the mountains. There are two paths and we take what we think is the easiest and less steep of the two but we are wrong and we end up walking up the very steep zigzag path (which we realise is the ski path down the mountain) which they say should only take one hour 15 mins but ends up taking us at least 2 hours. It is a harrowing climb but when we reach the lake it is so worth it. The lake is still and a beautiful green colour and reflects the snow covered mountains around it. It is a sight that you really just want to sit and look at in peace for ages, you never tire of it. We sit and eat our lunch but for some strange reason my blood pressure has gone sky high and I have a dreadful migraine. Can’t figure it out as I don’t have a problem with blood pressure. I take double medication to kill the pain and we sit in the beautiful surroundings and absorb the sereneness. We have a look around the lake a bit but it is a huge lake so don’t go too far. Other people arrive but not very many as it is very much the off season, plus the chair lift closed yesterday and a lot of people won’t do the climb up, only the climb down. We take the road back down rather than the steep path we came up (although the road is steep enough and Ruth it was steep enough going down in fine weather, I can’t imagine trying to walk down in the snow and ice).

It is dark by the time we get down and Scot organises dinner. An earlyish night as we are both tired and I still have a dreadful headache so more medication before going to sleep. I wake through the night with pain in my side which by morning has me doubled over and in tears. Scot helps me have a shower before we head off to the nearest hospital. I know something is very wrong as the pain is too severe to be just a bit of gastro or similar. It reminds me of when I had appendicitis only the pain doesn’t actually ease off.

An entire day spent in the hospital with blood tests, ultrasound and xray plus pain killers and drip etc. It is disconcerting to say the least to be in a hospital where only a few speak a little English and everyone around you is talking about you but you have no idea what is being said. They couldn’t get any veins in either hand or arm so after several attempts they use the most dangerous vein to use in my wrist as it is the only possible one. This un-nerves me a lot. They have no idea what is wrong but the doctor who has done his own ultrasound tells me I have a slightly enlarged bile duct and they suspect I have passed a gall stone. There are no others and once one has passed there is no other evidence, so it is only a guess. I am not as bad by the end of the day but by no means out of pain and feeling ok. They want me to stay in overnight but when Scot sees the costs we say no I will come back in, in the morning. This is a small regional hospital and the fees for the bed are Aud4,500 per night in a general ward, aud13,500 for a semi private room per night and aud21,000 for a private room for one night. Well it is one of the most expensive countries in Europe so it figures. The insurance company has said they can only approve the claim once I have completed treatment so there is no guarantee they will pay – bastards!

Scot decides Frutigen where we are staying is a great place for a run, after all he has been patiently sitting with me all day, so off he goes for a run around town. I like his runs as they always encompass a beer on the return leg, but this time he also thought of me feeling unwell and brings me home a delicious brownie which we share the next day. After a sleepless night for me we go back to the hospital and I have another blood test. There is still nothing showing up, I am fit and healthy so my blood says, so after consultation with the doctor we leave with medications (very expensive) and decide to head towards Neuchatel where there is a free camper stop. We initially figure one night and then perhaps we will head to Italy where we can get free treatment charged back to Aussie if I need anything further.

The camperstop is great, free electricity, free water and a toilet dump station plus many other campers for simple safety. We can have a wash in the van so no big deal. We pull up for the night and decide the next day we will head into Neuchatel and have a look. I don’t feel well enough to travel any further so we decide we will stay here free until I have recovered enough to move on. Also the rugby final is coming up in two days and if we move somewhere else we may not see it. The next day we find an Irish bar in town who are playing the game so we have fully decided to stay. Missing the final is not on our agenda. Unfortunately we missed the bronze game as it is on too late for us to see.

On the Saturday afternoon we head to a pool that is right beside the free camperstop as we both would love a swim, plus a shower and hair washed would be nice after 4 days. The pool isn’t full and they also have a diving board so Scot is in his element. We have a nice relaxing swim, dive for Scot and a shower, head back to the van to change and back into Neuchatel to watch the final. The Irish pub is packed and we share the bar with several other Kiwis and one token Aussie who seeming remains fairly quiet throughout the game except for maybe one of the point scores. We are stoked of course with the win, but it was nerve wracking a few times when we thought Aussie would take over.

On Sunday morning I pick up the tablet to check where we will head off to and find for some strange reason it won’t charge. I think the charging mechanism has been pushed inside and there is nothing I can do about it. SHIT!! I can’t believe it, this Samsung tablet is only 4 months old and the last one wouldn’t charge for some reason and had to stay in Aussie to be fixed. We decide we need to buy a new one (or repair other if easy) in the morning as there is no way we can do this travelling without the maps and camperstops it provides us. They are both invaluable and absolutely necessary. Damn another night we didn’t mean to be here, but at least it is free, so Monday morning and we head into the next town where there is a shop. They open at 1.30pm – who does that on a Monday. Yes here in Switzerland they open late, must be because they have huge Sunday sessions. We do purchase a new tablet, thankfully for such an expensive country the price is about what I would pay in NZ or Aussie for the same tablet.

Scot wants to see Montreux before we head out of Switzerland, ‘Smoke on the Water’ and all that. (For those who don’t know Deep Purple wrote that song in Montreux after the studio they were supposed to record at went up in flames and sent smoke across lake Geneva). So we leave Marin where we bought the tablet and head to Montreux. The old tablet still says 94% and I haven’t had time to set up the new one, so fingers crossed the old one will get us to the lake and beyond. As we reach Lausanne unfortunately the tablet dies. I am left with only instinct on where we need to go so head around the lake front towards Montreux. It has been a tough day so when we spot a camping sign we decide to check it out. The camp is a marina right on the lake front but it closed early October. I need to set up the other tablet so we sit there and as we do a lovely gentleman walks down and asks us what we are looking for. It ends up he lets us stay there for a good price, with free washing machine and dryer (we have 3 huge loads since no washing done for 2-3 weeks). So good, so we decide we will stay for two nights so I can set up the new tablet plus Scot wants me to make some mulled wine as we bought some ingredients in Neuchatel. Our outlook from the van is over the Swiss Alps and we are 10ft from the lake edge looking down towards Montreux at one end and Geneva at the other end, a magic location.

I cook up a storm and end up giving the owner one bottle of mulled wine as he gave us the sugar we needed plus we had free washing which would normally have cost up about aud50. I hope he enjoyed it, Jamie Oliver’s mulled wine recipe is devine. Tuesday morning and we decide to walk into Vevey as this is the next town. Montreux is 10km away and my bike gears aren’t working so is too far to bike from the camp. It is only 3 kms and as I am improving health wise each day (although still far from 100%) it is a pleasant quiet walk. We stop at McDonalds and sit having a coffee for over an hour while I use their wifi to download and update the new tablet. They are definitely our best friend here for wifi and coffee. We then walk around the town, up to the church (a quick prayer at each church doesn’t hurt just in case one day it works), then a walk back along the lake front to the van.

We head out next morning and stop in Montreux which is a lovely town and I could see myself coming back here to spend a week looking around. We need to use up all our Swiss francs as we leave here in about half an hours drive. We find a nice looking café and I think I have enough francs to cover the coffee, apple tart and baguette, but at the end I am 15c short. Buggar, so we end up having to have another coffee and we pay for that with euro (some people here do take it) and use the change for the shortfall of francs. Not using the euro is frustrating when you need to use up all your foreign currency when you leave a country not using euro. Anyway out of Switzerland we head and we have decided we need a stop in France at one of our favourite locations we stayed 6 years ago. Aix les Bains, a lovely little town on another lake front in France. We stop at a campsite as it is only 5 euro more than the camperstop here and we get a shower and toilet plus security. We have been getting worried about some water that seems to be leaking out of the one side of our van and we don’t know where it is from. We have had dry beautiful weather for the past 3-4 weeks so it can’t be rain water and there is too much to be overnight dew. We go to the Skiff Pub here where we stayed last time and have a drink. The people speak slightly more English than last time but I still try out my French here.

Looking down at Kandersteg where we have walked from

BAVARIA, LIECHTENSTEIN, SWITZERLAND

In the morning where we are staying is a camper repair place too and they give us the address of a fellow who repairs fridges who is 30mins away and we need our gas part fixed. We head off into the countryside to look for this fellow. We are out in the middle of nowhere and we come across a little German village – so small it only has one shop, a bakery. We find the guys house and he is away for half an hour so we head back to the bakery for a coffee and a biscuit. The guy comes back and has fixed our fridge in half an hour with a new gas burner and jet. It was just old and corroded like most other things have been in the van – lack of maintenance. It works amazingly now and we can see it wouldn’t have been as efficient as it should have been in the past. We are all set and back on the road. This area of Germany is part of Bavaria and has beautiful green rolling hills with cows everywhere. We can’t figure out how people can live so close to the cow barns as the stench you get when you just drive past is so dreadful and really strong and a lot of houses are built over the barns.

We head back part of the way we have come and are back on our path to Switzerland, but we decide before we head over the border we have one last night in Austria so we can work out where we can stop for the night on Saturday night so we can watch the All Blacks play South Africa. We are also tired as it has been a long day and I want to get a sim when we cross the border as Switzerland has an average camping ground price of somewhere like 40-50 euro a night (almost aud100) so we do not want to stop at any campsites if we can help it and will do our best to do cheap or free camperstops. This campsite is right on the border so we get to see the Swiss alps which look amazing like the many mountains in Austria.

In the morning we pack up and head down across the border firstly into Liechtenstein. This country is the 6^th smallest country in the world and is only 6kms wide by 25kms long. We drive down the only main road through the country and there are some cute villages. We decide we want to at least stop in Vaduz for a coffee so we can say we have been there. They use the swiss franc for currency so we need to get some before we buy a coffee. We find a carpark that the van will fit into and walk up into the small village centre that Vaduz has which is really no more than a couple of dozen shops and cafes. The prices here are dreadful – being about aud8-9 for a coffee and not even a great one at that, but we decide that is what we must pay to have something here in this country so be it. We head away and over into Switzerland. Switzerland is our 20^th country and we have been in 3 in the one day today.

There is a gorgeous little village we travel through just over the border which is ancient with really narrow streets. It would be such a cool place to stay but we need to keep going. The next town Bad Ragaz we go into is amazing and obviously a very popular tourist destination and they have art works all around the town. We want to stop here, but we know that we must get over to Fribourg by tomorrow so there is no stopping unfortunately. We stop at Mels where I know there is a phone place we can get a data sim for the tablet. They have the same bizarre security over their sims as Slovakia and I have to provide passport and sign etc to get one. They are very expensive but I know we will save a lot by being able to find the camper stops here. We get a very small amount of data 600mb for aud40 – quite insane really – but as I said it will save us a fortune. We get back on the road and head towards Lucerne.

I find a campground that is closed and they are often great for stopping outside as they are usually in safe locations. We stop here at Zug and it is closed for the winter. We bypass the camping area where there are a few campers and park in the car park backed up against the bush near another van camper (a Possl which we like as they are unobtrusive) and cosy in for the night. The trains run past every 10 minutes or so but are very quiet and not a worry. What a great transport system they have where they can practically run 24 hours. We are up early in the morning as we are mindful that we are not in the camping area but even the council guy who comes to clean the public toilet doesn’t even give us a look. A few older guys turn up early for their Saturday fishing on the large lake, no more than 50 metres away. We were on our way quite early as there were no chores to do and we want to get to a place called Fribourg which has an Irish bar with a car park to watch the All Blacks v Springboks semi-final. I have found it on the net and it is difficult to accurately gauge if it all will be ok. As we have a good amount of time to get there we travel the ‘yellow’ roads not the highway which are quicker but you don’t get to see the sights. We are through Interlaken as well as other towns on the lakes and it is a beautiful drive. We had stopped at a service station to get a vignette which is required mainly for the highways but find out we can only get a year one for 40chf($60.00aud) which is a huge cost but reflects Switzerland compared to other countries were we have got these for 10 days for $10.00aud. As these are mainly for highways we decide to risk the small amount of highway driving we will do ($180aud fine if caught) and will stick to the lesser roads. This turns out a great idea as we get to see the real country and not traffic.

The drive around the lakes was great and more than once on this adventure I yearn to be on a motorbike even a bloody Vespa would be ok! We drive into Fribourg which is a lot bigger than I imagined with an old battlement and castle surrounding the old town and river which looks inviting to explore but we are really here only for the rugby so with the magic of technology we find our way to Paddy’s Irish Bar and find a park in the coach car park behind a French gentleman’s camper who is going to the cinema. In our usual hand signals and both our limited language find out what to do with tickets and a note on the dashboard explaining to any powers that be that we are not camping overnight but just watching the footy. The pub doesn’t open till 4 and we are a bit early so kick back and find a place to stay after the game as the car park seems a bit dodgy in the middle of the city and lots of youth cruising around. We are made welcome by the pub owner and settle in to watch a nail biting win to the AB’s with 3 Swiss people with All Black jerseys on a few others with a couple of SA supporters. I am driving so one Guinness lasts me the game (that’s a first right there) but it is not cheap anyway so not hard to abstain. After the game we thank the pub owner as this makes it easier for future kiwis when you are thankful for their hospitality and thank the locals for their kiwi support.

It is dark when we travel the 30 minutes to Romont which looks really quaint as we drive in with lights highlighting the castle, turrets and battlements towering over the town on a high hill. We have found on Camperstop.com that there is 2 parks for campers only with power, water and toilet drop for free (just pay $3.00aud tourist tax). However we have to climb the hill to get to it as it is right at the top 1^st & 2^nd gear right below the castle walls with views over the countryside. Unfortunatly both parks are taken so, after not finding the other 3 non electric parks down the road we park near the others and rely on our battery which fortunately is new. We can’t quite get the van level and spend the night a bit downhill so the blood goes to your head which isn’t the best.

We get a sleep in in the morning as there is no need to rush as we are going to stay the day as Vicki is not that well and we don’t feel like driving and it is free camping. One of the vans move so we quickly jump in and take there spot hook up the electrics and scout the town getting some fresh French baguettes from the bakery and walk the length of the town finding somewhere to watch the wallabies V Argentina semi final. After a few enquiries we end up at the Terminus Hotel near the train station, Vicki has a cappuccino and I have a beer as we try and we play language games to see if we can watch the footy. The owner who doesn’t speak English gets a lady on the phone who speaks our language and who we find out later works there. We think it will be on Euro sport so tell them we will be back at 5pm. We wander back to the van ( there is a steep hill going up that reminds us of the steepest hill in the world which is Baldwin St in Dunedin and have a baguette for lunch I have a couple of beers in the sun then we wander the castle walls for an hour and back to the pub. However there is confusion as there is tennis on live so find another channel where they are discussing the rugby then find out that Europe and GB have just changed all their clocks so we are an hour early( better than an hour late!). So we watch the valiant Argies lose to the aussies and look forward to next week’s first ever Pacific final.