Holiday in Switzerland · 8:29pm Aug 2nd, 2023
With part 2 of Night on Bald Mountain almost ready, it's about time I tell you all about my trip to Switzerland. I had a great time. We slept in a chalet not far away from a ski resort. The view is beautiful. Sometimes you could see a whole bunch of clouds covering the mountains and sometimes not. You could also hear the bells of the cows nearby.
July 20: We paid a visit to the Oeschinensee in Kandersteg. We took a cable lift and took a walk of almost 3 hours.
July 21: We took a quiet nature walk in the woods not so far from the chalet.
July 22: We took a visit to the beautiful city of Montreux where we went inside Chillon Castle and gained free passage into the casino for an exposition of one of the greatest rock bands in the world. Of course, I'm talking about Queen. Yep, good ol' Farrokh Bulsara aka Freddie Mercury had an appartement in Switzerland at Lake Geneva and a suite in a hotel. The casino exposition is the actual Mountain Studios where the band record sixof their last albums including Made in Heaven. Many of the relics there are real: costumes, instruments, letters with songs Freddie was working on. Apparently, the rest of the band want the Experience to be free to the entire public. There's also a wall in the studio with many letters from fans to Freddie after his passing. I, too, wrote a note to thank him for his music, how it means a lot to me and those I love. May he always be remembered and voice sing on wherever he may be. In the city is also a gorgeous bronze statue of him created by Irena Sedleckà to keep his memory alive. He remains to be an inspiration to everyone and fans still lay flowers there. Montreux also celebrates the 40th annual Jazz festival.
July 23: We paid a visit to the Aletsch Glacier, the most important glacier in the land. The view is truly majestic like all the other mountains. I even had the rare chance to see and take a picture of a marmot. We've seen marmots before, but I was very little back then. Still very rare.
July 24: We paid visit to the home of another famous celebrity: Charlie Chaplin. The Manoir de Ban or Chaplin 's World in Corsier-sur-Vevey. A British comedic genius through and through, Charlie was a pioneer of many great silent movies and a few talkies like Modern Times, City Lights, The Kid, The Gold Rush, The Circus and the Great Dictator. He had his own movie studio, did all his own stunts and music and many of his movies are based on his actual life before he became famous. Raised by an alcoholic father and a hard-working mother in poverty, Chaplin worked his way to the top to become one of the greatest actors the world has ever seen. He met a lot of famous people around the world in his life like Stan Laurel, Buster Keaton, Peter Ustinov, Albert Einstein and Walt Disney, even famous japanese actors just to name a few. He kept inspiring people everywhere even till this day. Even Michael Jackson loved this guy. Many people claim that his dance in Modern Times is the predecessor of the Moonwalk. Chaplin was one of the first people to mock Adolf Hitler and the nazis. His entire famous speech from The Great Dictator, which is still relevant this day, stands on the walls outside his home.
After Chaplin was accused as a communist because he supported the Russians to join the war against Nazi-Germany, he was sadly not allowed to live in the United States. He and his family decided to live in Switzerland where he's living a great life. His manor is absolutely beautiful along with a big garden where he and his family played with a view over lake Geneva and mountains. Chaplin was a very funny and active man even at a later age. Retiring was completely out of the question for him, ideas kept coming into his brain so he could make more movies. Chaplin himself once said: "To work is to live. I want to live." One of his last movies would've been named 'The Freak', a project that he worked one of his daughters, Victoria, is about a girl in South America that suddenly grew bird wings. But it never came to be. One of the reasons is Chaplin's health going in a worse state due to strokes. During that time, the political atmosphere in America began to change causing the people to focus again on his films instead of his views. Chaplin had more movies planned, but his condition sadly worsened and passed away in his sleep.
After a visit in the manor, we watched a small film about Chaplin in a studio. When the film ended, the curtains raised. Allowing us to step into his magnificent world filled with settings from his movies and other relics. I wouldv'e loved to buy a bowler hat, but swiss franks have sadly become to expensive these days.
We also paid a visit to the cemetery where Sir Chaplin and his fourth and last wife Oona are buried.
July 25 & 29: Quiet nature walks in the mountains and woods.
July 26: We paid a visit to the Saint-Bernard Pass. A place in the Alps which serves as a refuge for those who get lost during harsh winter times. It's also a place where they breed the well-known Saint-Bernard dog, known to save people from being buried in the snow. In the past, the first Saint-Bernards looked very different. Now with the succesfull breeding, they didn't only become more beautiful but also lead longer lives than usual. The puppies are in a different location. This place also has a douane for where people can cross the borders from Switzerland to Italy. When we were done with that we came to a town where we saw a small amphitheater, a remnant of the Roman Era.
July 27: A visit to Zermatt and the famous Matterhorn. We took a cable lift all the way to the top where we could see it from up close. a height of 4,000 meters. We even took a special cable lift with a glass window in the floor that allowed us to see how high we are. Among the mountain range was also the Mont Blanc which we visited two years ago. Another fun part was walking in the snow on a place where people are also skiing and snowboarding while still seeing the Matterhorn. It was quite cold, I kinda felt like a clown wearing my shorts. But I got over it.
July 28: Some nature walks where we went through a gorge, saw some glaciers and path where people back in the day took ice from the mountains to their village. We also saw a waterfall known as Cascade du pisse vache (Waterfall of the pissing cow) because people say it looke like a pissing cow.
July 30: We went to a bigger gorge and then to a beautiful lake where we put our feet in the cold water.
July 31: We took it easy by going to Bridgerbad, a thermal swimming pool that uses the natural sources of the glaciers and mountains. There were baths with warm water and cold water, steam baths and nude saunas. Had a great time, especially on the slide.
August 1: We visited a well-known underwater cavern with a boat.
And now I'm back.
Welcome back
Welcome home. That sounded like a totally awesome trip
I am so jealous of you right now. But I'm also glad you had a great time!
Glad you had a great time! I went on a cruise to Alaska this year in June with my family. We had a lot of fun!
Glad you came back.
A shame one of those movies never quite became a reality. Would've made for a rather intriguing watch. Who knows? Maybe someday someone will get back into it. With all the technology we have to work with nowadays, maybe someone will decide to make that one man's dream a reality.
You have a lot of adventures, Dinodisneylover1.
Oh, I've been to Switzerland once when I'm on a Europe tour with my parents.
welcome back Dino XD
Whoa! So much!!
i can't wait when i'll go here.
As someone who went to Zürich with his high school band once, I can relate completely the natural beauty of Switzerland.
Glad u had a fun time and welcome back!!
That's sounds like one heck of a vacation I honestly never been to Switzerland but I'm glad you had fun funny enough I'm going on vacation myself to the Florida beach I will leave August 19th and will be gone for an entire week
It's good to see you again and have a great time.
Welcome back, Dino.
Welcome back to the U.S. Mr. Dino, I can’t wait for Night on Bald Mountain Part. 2!
What a trip u had bro! Welcome Back!
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Actually I'm from Belgium.
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Wow! It’s amazing to have an international community on this website. I’m originally from British Columbia until I moved to South Dakota about a year ago.
Mahatma Gandhi and Salvador Dali are also some of the people Charlie Chaplin met.
To reach Oeschinensee, we first took a car train.
You know who has also been on the Saint-Bernard Pass? Napoleon Bonaparte.