The Glacier Express

The first day of our trip, we took the regional trains from Neuchatel to Zermatt. We caught the early train at 8:30 am and arrived in Zermatt shortly after 12:00. We had to change trains twice. One time we only had 5 minutes and we made it! The ride took us down thru Lausanne, along Lake Geneva and to Brig. From Brig to Zermatt it was a very beautiful, mountainous ride.

We dropped our bags at the hotel and took a walk up thru town. It was a great day to see the Matterhorn!

It was funny, I saw on the internet that it was suppose to be -3 Celsius. So we all took our warm clothes and jackets. It was so warm that we were getting hot.

Zermatt is a very nice, quaint town nestled in the mountains. There aren't any cars allowed. They have horse drawn carriages from several of the hotels and then electric carts as well.

The next morning we got up and caught the Glacier Express. The train wasn't long and all the cars had the panoramic windows.

Everyone was ready to embark on our 8 hour journey thru southern Switzerland to St. Moritz.

There is quite a bit of rock in this area and lots of land slides. They have used the stone for their roofs. I believe there is 2 layers.

We had to wear sunglasses the sun was so bright.

I think my favorite part is when we got up to where the snow was blanketing everything.

Mom and Dad enjoyed some wine. We were served a meal for lunch.

All the views were so pretty. The blue sky accentuated everything even more.

I believe we are starting our ascent to the Oberland Pass.

We were able to capture the picture of the skiers ready to take the plunge. There are ski areas everywhere.

Now we are approaching the St. Moritz region.

St. Moritz is a nice area but just didn't have the charm like Zermatt. This was the view from our hotel.

The hotel was located right in the middle of town. It was a very old hotel but nice. However, it was the most confusing hotel to get around. We had a delicious dinner at their Chinese restaurant.

The next morning we did a walk thru town and caught the train back to Neuchatel. We had another long journey ahead of us - 5 1/2 hours. We had to change trains twice and going thru Zurich. We made one big loop around Switzerland. I think we were all ready to ride a train for awhile.

We enjoyed our visit with Mom and Dad. We were sad to see them go. I think Maggie (our dog) is missing them the most. She was always being taken outside by my Dad.

Easter Weekend

Hello everyone! I am finally updating the blog. We had a wonderful visit with my parents and the weather was amazingly beautiful. They were able to see the Alps!
We took a walk along the lake. The temperature was nice but a bit chilly with the wind off the lake. I really like this picture of Jason in his hat. I hope you can see the Alps too in the background.

We had an Easter egg hunt in the garden. Devin and Lucas hid the eggs and Katelyn and the Taylor boys went hunting. We were still finding the plastic eggs a week later.

Lucas celebrated his 12th Birthday. As usual, no candles were allowed on the cake!

Our friend Susan sent jelly beans back with Jason. The different flavors entertained us for quite a while. They experimented with mixing different flavors. I think Stanton's favorite was the "Very Cherry" and "Dr. Pepper". Thank you Susan!

It was a nice and relaxing weekend!

Katelyn turns "9"

Hello everyone and Happy Spring! I can't believe how long it's been since I have posted something. We are all doing well and just seem to be busy doing the usual every day stuff. It really warmed up this past week and has been beautiful. However, today we are having a rainy day!

Last week Kate celebrated her birthday with the girls from her class. I think they all had a good time and it seemed that the 2 hours went by quite fast!

It's hard to believe she is "9". She has been wanting to get her hair cut at the salon that I get mine cut. So this past week we went and she had a good time. He didn't cut much off but she loved getting her head massaged and having her hair straightened.

I think it makes her look so much older! She's trying to wait as long as possible before washing it. She doesn't want to have her waves back.

We are all anxiously awaiting for next week. Jason gets back from the states and he'll be on the same plane as my parents from Atlanta to Zurich. I'll finally be posting some of our adventures while they are here. We are excited to take a train ride from Zermatt to St. Moritz called the Glacier Express. We're keeping our fingers crossed that the weather is nice and we have fantastic views!!!

School Trip to Grindelwald

Hi this is Devin. I want to tell you about our school trip to Grindelwald. We were gone for a week. We went skiing every day and at night we went sledding, ice skating, a movie in german, and karoke. It was great fun and Lucas and I also got a lot better at skiing. We'll never forget the experience.
This is the boy's room at the hotel. There were 6 boys sharing a room. This room had two floors. The bottom had the bathroom and shower with two beds. The second floor had another two beds and a bunk bed.
The hotel provided us all of our meals. After breakfast we packed a lunch of bread, meat, cheese, and a candy bar. For drinks, they gave us a choice of Ice Tea, Carbonated water, or Chocolate milk. We had fondue one night and it was good.

This picture is from the parking lot of the hotel.

One day we took a train through the mountain to the top of Jungfrau Mountain. It was warm and sunny at the top. The view was awesome.

I took these pictures at look out points on the way up. The train stopped for five minutes at every stop.

The snow and ice was huge and I felt like I was in the ice age.

I made it to the top of Europe. The sun was so bright I had to squint really hard just to stop myself from tearing.

This is me pretending to fall off the mountain.

We visited the ice palaces inside the mountain. People touched this spot so many times that it has left a print.

There were many sculptures around the caves.

This is a good picture of what the tunnels look like. This section wasn't open but had a neat polar bear sculpture.

They had a funny looking cow with a backdrop so Lucas and I decided to jump on for a funny picture.