Famille Du Pentium

Switzerland (Mostly Countryside): http://gallery.famille.org/main.php?g2_view=core.ShowItem&g2_itemId=778&g2_navId=xbede8b7e

Hyderabad, India: http://gallery.famille.org/main.php?g2_view=core.ShowItem&g2_itemId=779&g2_navId=xbede8b7e

This time I decided that I would go out to the Swiss countryside and see a little more of the world than just Zurich.  My trip report follows.

Separately, I have quite a review coming up tomorrow for the Hotel Intercontinental Zurich.   It was quite a stay, I must say.

So this time through Zurich, I took the "Heidiland Great Country Tour", offered by Gray Line Tours.  It cost about CHF75 (about US$60) and was well worth it.  A large, comfortable motor coach awaited us for our tour.  Initially, it didn’t seem like the driver realized how hot it was in the bus – it was about 80 (F) outside, and the top front of the bus (the prime viewing seats) were a lot warmer than that.  At first, the driver turned on the A/C until it got slightly lower than sweltering, and then promptly turned it off.  I’m all for conservation and realize that European culture is more efficient with it’s use of natural resources, however hot is hot and it was plain hot.  All the same, after mentioning the temperature problem to the driver at the first stop, he took care of it.

First we covered Zurich, which was pretty standard fare… the Universty district, the Lake Zurich waterfront, and various other local sites I’d seen already.  Not bad, but old news.  Then we hit the road toward Rapperswill.  Some of our fellow tourists were actually on the "Cityrama Tour", which includes a cruise on Lake Zurich from Rapperswill back to Zurich.  Otherwise, Rapperswill was a nice little town with a castle on a hill.  We climbed the hill on foot, and then made our way back down through the little shops.  Rapperswill is known as the City of Roses because of several large rose gardens located around town, however I never made it to those, the castle was enough for me.  Time to go to the bus and have a seat.

On the road again, we made our way  toward Vaduz, in Fürstentum Liechtenstein, which is actually a small country (or principality) adjacent to Switzerland.  It is a very very small country to be sure, with a smaller population than the village I live in (Skokie, Illinois).  It is also a Constitutional Monarchy, which means it has a royal family but it’s political leaders are democratically elected.  It’s official currency is the Swiss Franc (CHF) but unlike Switzerland, FL is a member of the EU so they also accept Euros.  Oh, and American Dollars, too, of course.  🙂  But I dipped into my plastic to buy gicts here.  It’s really quite a nice city, and in the center of town is a bunch of shops and restaraunts and hotels on a very small pedestrianized street that probably makes it a very cozy place to hang out in the evening after the day tourists leave.

More information about the Principality of Liechtenstein can be found HERE.   

Onward and Eastbound, we made our way toward   MAIENFELD, also known as Heidiland, the scenic area where the story Heidi was based.  I loved the scenery and fresh air, but the Heidi House wasn’t much (nor did it cost much).  It’s certainly not a whole day, just something to do for a few hours.  Which makes me wonder why there is a hotel adjacent to the house… I can’t imagine anyone spending more than a couple hours here.  Unless they like goats.

Finally we started making our way back toward Zurich, which took quite a while because of Sunday afternoon traffic on the main motorways.  We were scheduled to return to Zurich at about 6:00 PM, but actually got back around 7:30 PM, which was actually OK because we were all in a very comfortable coach viewing the Swiss countryside on our way back. 

Let’s talk about London.  One day after I booked my trip to London, Zurich, and Hyderabad, British authorities announced that they had foiled a plot to blow up airplanes bound for the U.S. from Britain.  Strict security measures were put into place after these announcements, some of which have since been repealled.   But not all.

Undeterred, I went boldly into the United Kingdom with my 12 hour layover in London fully planned to the minute.  Things went smoothly inbound; and my plans to try the Heathrow Express were only marginally upset by some track construction that delayed my train’s arrival at Paddington.  

Upon my return to Heathrow that evening, however, I learned about how good the British are at queuing.  I arrived at Terminal 4 (BA) on HE, came upstairs, and things looked pretty normal.  On my way to the check-in counter, something a bit odd happened; police blocked off the corridor across the terminal to allow what seemed like hundreds of passengers across the corridor to the security checkpoint line.  I didn’t think about it much yet.

I checked in at the Business Class desk, and was given a priority ticket to allow me to use the "invitation only" line.  I walked over to the priority line, and began to follow the line back some 100 yards to the end of the line.  This is crazy!  So I went back to the front of the line, where the "non-priority" queue was also located, and it actually seemed shorter.  I asked a BA security person if I should forgo the priority queue and just get in that line.  Her response: That’s not the non-priority line.  That’s just the group that they are allowing to wait inside.  The non-priority queue starts outside.  Around back.  Take a lunch with you.

As it turned out, I needed all of the two hours I allotted myself to get through security (Priority queue) and get to my gate.  In the end, I didn’t have really much trouble getting through (I had already planned way ahead and checked everything that could be remotely suspicious) but security was definately being much more careful, checking more bags and wand-scanning more people.  

I’ve uploaded the final pictures from our 2006 Summer family vacation, these are from Coyahoga Valley National Park near Cleveland, OH. 

http://gallery.famille.org/main.php?g2_view=core.ShowItem&g2_itemId=735&g2_fromNavId=x70443d12 

A new assortment as we start to pull pics off of cameras and so forth… plus we went to A Day Out with Thomas yesterday, GREAT pics from that event…

Indian Echo Caverns, PA: http://gallery.famille.org/main.php?g2_view=core.ShowItem&g2_itemId=582

A Day Out with Thomas:  http://gallery.famille.org/main.php?g2_view=core.ShowItem&g2_itemId=581

I’ve posted more family photos to the Gallery.  I’ve reorganized them, added more from this summer, and also posted the long-overdue pictures from our spring NYC trip. 

http://gallery.famille.org

Enjoy! 

This was one of our activities on Saturday, when we had some free time.  After we spent the requisite one hour at Hershey’s Chocolate World, we made our way to Hummelstown to check out the Indian Echo Caverns.  These are fairly complex caverns about 190 feet below ground.  There is a gift shop, and several other money-making activities that we generally ignored.  It cost us $11 per adult and $6 per child to take the tour.

The tours are lettered, and after you buy your tickets they call out your letter and several dozen people join the group at an appointed location outside the gift shop.  WARNING: There is no apparent accomodations for people with disabilities.  There are ~70 stairs down to the caverns, and ~70 stairs up, with no elevators or ramps.  Also the cavern tour would be very very difficult to navigate with a wheelchair.  You should be prepared to decend and ascend by foot, and tour the caverns themselves on fairly slippery, narrow paths.

That said, it’s a hell of a lot of fun, and a cool 52 degrees farenheit year-round.  The only criticism I have is that the various tours starting at different times cross each other often and you have to stop and allow for other groups to get by.  But that wasn’t a huge issue.  The tour includes a large area and several paths going in to smaller areas.  The tour guide was not a geologist, but was very knowlegeable about geology nontheless.  Everything was well lit and easy to navigate visually.

If you’re in the Harrisburg / Hershey area and need a break from Hershey Park (although not a break from the workout I’m afraid) you should visit this attraction. 

This is the last hotel we stayed at during our vacation.  Overall, it was a good hotel – same room configuration as the Bucks County, PA hotel – but a few differences show the good from the bad.

The wallpaper was peeling.  There were missing tiles in the bathroom, both that could clearly be seen by sitting on the commode.  One near the floor, and one around where the shower curtain rod screwed into the wall, leaving the screws for the shower curtain rod exposed.  When we checked in, the lights and clock on 1/2 of the room didn’t work, and it took 2 calls and several hours to get maintenance up to have a look.  It turns out a rather overloaded extension cord was pinched under the headboard and had to be extracated and reattached to the outlet.  Also the remote didn’t work, and required batteries.  

These were all realatively minor issues, but issues that should have been picked up by housekeeping all the same.  A little attention to detail would make this hotel a better place for it’s guests. 

This is a couple of quick blogs to finish off our trip report.

The Holiday Inn Select at Bucks County PA is excellent.  We had a standard King / Queen foldout room (not suite) and there was plenty of room for us and our kids.  The rooms were clean, well maintained, and didn’t show the signs of mis-repair that most hotels do (like peeling wallpaper, bare carpets, and missing tiles).  The only downside we found was that the shower/baths don’t have safety grips on the floor of the tubs, and no rubber mats are provided, so it’s very slippery. 

The pool looked good but we spent so much time in the water at nearby Sesame Place that we never had time to try it out.

The most appealling feature is the restaurant staff.  They advertise that they carry 110 beers, and they’re right.  The selection is well spread across local and foreign, bottle and tap, and even a few cans for good measure.  But best of all the staff is very knowlegeable about their beers and can tell you about the brewery it came from, how it was made, and even suggest (and give samples of) other similar beers that you might like.

Overall an excellent experience, and we’ll go back again. 

Go to the Famille gallery page to see some trip pics so far… not organized yet, and not all uploaded, but it’ll give you a taste… http://gallery.famille.org/main.php?g2_view=core.ShowItem&g2_itemId=351&g2_fromNavId=x48a715c1