Our next stop was Wengen, a car-free village nestled amid the Bernese Alps in the Lauterbrunnen Valley.

I found a scenic rail journey, the Golden Pass Express which would take us from Montreux to Interlaken Ost. Perfect! ‘Express’ was a misnomer. This was a very slow train, but we chose comfort and thoroughly enjoyed our journey along Lac Leman, through the mountains and beside Thunersee.

On arriving at Interlaken Ost, we inadvertently made a very good decision and booked and paid for our onward journeys to Innsbruck where we were to pick up a car. The woman at ÖBB, Austrian Rail, was wonderful. We didn’t realise that the journey to Innsbruck would take seven hours and require several changes. She organised everything and reduced the changes to one, Zurich. 

Wengen was very beautiful. We had chosen to have just one night and were a little disappointed when we arrived as it was cold and overcast. The hotel however had a marvellous pool, spa and sauna complex, and we made the most of it. We were delighted when we came out for dinner to be greeted by the most beautiful afternoon with the sun lighting up the snow-capped mountains and the Lauterbrunnen valley. It was sensational.

Our last night in Switzerland so we decided to share a cheese fondu and a rosti- so typically Swiss. Our host, on the other hand was Portuguese, a network engineer, just to demonstrate how divers the hospitality workers are, was fabulous and happily engaged us with conversation. 

Interlaken sits between Thunersee and Brienzersee and the journey from there to Zurich and on to Innsbruck was stunning, skirting numerous lakes and spectacular countryside. The people we have met continue to surprise and delight us. Zurich has thirteen platforms, twenty-six tracks and serves almost half a million travellers on three thousand trains each day. When we arrived, we must have looked a little dazed, and an older woman, probably the same age as us, guided us to the lifts and informed us as to how we would get to the platform we needed and also where we could get a bite to eat. We fluffed around for a bit and decided on a bite at the mezzanine floor. She was there waiting for us, making sure we were OK. 

We arrived Innsbruck late in the evening, grabbed a taxi, settled into the room, and headed for the bar. It had been a long day.