Badrutts Palace Hotel St. Moritz

... were long & straight, but still felt like a session on the dodgems (that's the english name for a fairground ride with uncontrollable little electric cars that you are supposed not to bump into each other, but everybody does.)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ Bumper_car

... want to arrive at 11, and have to pitch up in the dark, so we decided to drive until about 7 - 8 p.m., and find somewhere to stay, then catch the group up at Val D'Isere the following day. As we didn't have a roadbook for the route, we just had to figure it out. This wasn't too difficult with the maps and GPS, so we set off to see how far we could get that evening.

... the various points of interest.
We soon climbed out of Chur towards Thusis and Andermatt. At Reichenau we took the line towards Llanz, climbing the Rhine gorge towards Disentis, home to the original settlers in their grand monastic building which overpowers the scenery, almost! Passing the Oberalppass and the headwaters of the Rhine we then headed towards Andermatt, dropping down into ...

... road traffic, especially if they park in the wrong place !!! It then climbs quite steeply up through the gorge and then beside the roadway and above the torrent. As it nears the resort it passes over the oldest concrete bridge in Switzerland, if not Europe. Entering the small town and terminating beside the lake out of which flows the previously described river.
In summer there are a few restaurants and shops available but the town seems fairly ...

... An early start on the Glacier Express, climbing up over the mountains and don into the Vallais and Brig lay ahead of us. We went to bed with the strains of the yodelling choir in the Hotel across the road obviously enjoying the hospitallity of that hostelry!

... seemed rather quaint after so many quite huge set-ups. The train set off out of Chur Station, then took a quick left off the main rail into the city's traffic, passing close to the City Gates and up beside a raging torrent that, with the train line and the road, filled the tight little valley up to the little resort called Arosa after first crossing one of the oldest concrete viaduct/bridges in the Swiss rail system c1910. We alighted ...

... Boxing Day Racing etc.. During late June it proved somewhat damp for us! It rained on us, but then it seems to rain in the early evening in the mountains!
The return route following the Engadine river as pleasant an experience as the rest of the day trip to Poschiavo.

... shop and tourist facility seemed shut. Of course it may have been the Italian siesta time being near lunch!
From the Railway Staion one can see the gradient of the whole system clearly obvious when looking north, back towards the Albula Pass and Lake Blanco, so named because of its glacier run off water colour.

Wouldn't mind another holiday here!

... villages. I took pictures from the bus and am hoping that they come out so that we can share them with you. We simply will not be able to describe the views. Heaven on earth! We disembarked in Tiefencastel to catch the train to St. Moritz. Again, I just can’t say enough about the scenery. The train ride to St. Moritz is indescribable. I know I’ve used the term before, but again it’s true! Riding the train in the mountains, going higher and higher, the mountains ...

... to help rescue them.

Well, it’s about 8:50 p.m. and I’ve been up for about 33 hours. Tomorrow we have a day off, we’ll stay in Davos and walk around. I’m starting to be concerned that Davos is maybe just a little too large for us to tackle, but we’ll see.




8/29/99 Sunday

DavosWe woke up to a sunny, chilly morning. Fog covered the top of the mountains. I woke up at 5:25 am, but fell back to sleep until 6:45 ...