We bid farewell to Lucerne and took the train to Interlaken.
I had always wanted to go there as it was very popular back in the day with backpackers and I had missed it. (The hostel is right near the train station and it looked so nice!! Josh is hoping that all hostels will be so nice for his trip!)
What a beautiful ride!!
The train is really the way to travel in Switzerland.
We didn’t have much planned for the day – wanted a day to relax! So we just walked around town.
We checked out the church, the little town and Josh wanted to try a McDonald’s burger that they don’t have at home, lol.
We found a cute little place for Schnitzel and spent the rest of the night relaxing. Nothing too eventful!
I caught up on a bit of work (but it’s the enjoyable kind!)
We were all pretty excited to get out into the mountains today!
We decided to head to Mt Titlis – which required a train ride to a cute town called Engelberg – a total ski town.
Although we ski, we knew that this was not going to be a skiing trip (it’s lot of work to go skiing in Europe from home!)
But we did want to get some incredible views.
And that we did.
I’ll let the pictures do the talking – but basically we took a rotating gondola ride up halfway and then switched to another type of lift (rotair).
We headed all the way up and walked along the suspension bridge (Europe’s highest).
We checked out the panoramic views.
We then went through the glacier tunnel which was cute.
We stopped and grabbed a pizza at the top and then headed back down.
We missed the train by 2 minute – we saw it pull out as we arrived – grr .
So we found a cute cafe and sat with a dessert before heading back.
The trains are great! The scenery is stunning and it’s nice to have some down time (we all read, listened to music, napped and watched the beauty. It was quiet time for us all:))
The train station – so beautiful!
Walking back to our hotel – always some time for silliness between Josh and Rob.
We were totally wiped so we went to an Italian restaurant right near the hotel and had some pasta. They always have such good pasta in Europe!
We woke up, enjoyed another breakfast of meat, cheese, eggs, yogurt and sparkling apple juice and grabbed our bags and off we went.
I asked the boys to go find some chocolate for the train ride. They came back with this – which was delicious – but they misunderstood the price so it ended costing a fortune ( not unlike everything else in Switzerland!)
We took the train to Lucerne (Luzern) about 50 minutes away and then wandered the streets to find out hotel.
And this time I really do mean wandered 😂. We got a big lost and I had us lugging suitcases up hill!!
We finally found our hotel and settled in.
A day if site seeing was the plan and so we first headed out and crossed the Spreuer covered bridge.
We then headed to the Jesuit church (jesuitenkirke) which was beautiful.
We crossed Chapel bridge and found a little Italian restaurant by the water. We’ve been skipping lunches and just have early dinners but we were all pretty hungry!
Beautiful streets!
After lunch, we made our way to a few of the sites in the town – including the famous Church of St Leodegar.
We found a super cute souvenir shop and bought a few things.
We continued on our little walking tour and made our way to the Lion Monument.
We wandered through the town. Stopped in a few shops. Josh loved the Coo Coo clocks, but they are super pricey and is it one of those things you regret when you get home?!??!
It is not super big. We wanted to check out Lucerne’s towers so we headed towards them and got some amazing views of the city.
We ended up super close to our hotel – and called it a day.
We finished off our day with a schnitzel. Both Rob and Josh were so full and ended up not being able to eat it all! (I guess the big lunch wasn’t the best idea!)
We were a little slow moving this morning but made our way to breakfast and then set out.
We chuckled at this sushi restaurant in the parking garage, lol.
Gorgeous views everywhere!
We went to see the view from Lindenhof.
We basically wandered old town. I had a list of places to hit – but at one point we had walked around the same block three times!
But it was so stunning. Lots of high end stores. The boys looked in a lot of watch store windows on the Bahnhofstrasse.
We also went to St Peter’s Church.
Another church:
Some more great views:
We went to the famous and iconic Grossmunster where we climbed the 187 very steep steps to the tower.
The amazing door:
The basement was pretty cool:
The tower:
Incredible views from the tower:
But then we had to go down…
We wandered the streets for a bit longer before heading back for a siesta.
After the siesta, we went to the University and took in some views of the amazing city!
We were all pretty hungry and decided fondue was on our mind – so we found a cute restaurant that served fondue and sat outside with blankets. It felt very Swiss:) It started getting cold near the end though!
Rob put another blanket on me at the end (I didn’t sit there like this:))
We headed back to chill in the room. Josh was exhausted but Rob and I headed out in the evening for a long evening walk in old town.
First things first, we needed to get a Covid test done for Switzerland. It is nice that they are free in Denmark. After doing that, we were all a little tired so took a quick power break at the hotel.
We had already done a fair amount of walking the day before and saw some of the main things – but we decided to head back to Nyhavn (and get a few more pictures).
We decided to walk to the famous Little Mermaid statue – we had seen her from the water – now was time to see her from the shore!
When Josh takes any pictures, he always likes to leave a selfie for me to see:)
It was a nice walk along the water. Not as sunny as yesterday, but warmer with a little drizzle here and there.
We saw some nice churches on the way back:
We also went to the grounds of the Amalienbirg Castle (the royal residence) and walked around there.
A few more churches:
We wanted a snack and found a hot dog stand in Nyhavn and had some street meet a la Danish. It was pretty yummy with a mixture of condiments, pickles and crunchy bits.
We headed back to the hotel, checked out and made our way to the airport. We were there nice and early so we reached relaxed with reading or a show.
Our flight to Zurich was uneventful and we took the train into the city. We dragged our luggage through the streets and found our hotel (Hotel Alexander) easily right in the heart of the old town. So cute!
We started off our day with a super yummy breakfast. Things in Scandinavia are pricey so it helps when breakfast is included!
We headed down the Stroget again stopping along the way to look at the shops.
We and made it to the famous Nyhavn street. It did not disappoint! Yes, we took way too many picture – but you can’t really resist when it is just so beautiful!
We took a canal cruise – which was freezing – but so good to see Copenhagen from the water.
We took a few more:
We were so chilled so looked for a nice pastry shop we could warm up in and had some delicious pastries.
We walked a bit to the Rosenborg castle – but the grounds were only open so we didn’t stay long.
Had some fun on the streets…lol
Afterwards we made our way to the Rundetaarn (The Round Tower) which we climbed Josh and I also got into trouble using the employee bathroom ( it was really nice, lol). We also checked out the attached church
We visited the adjoining and then headed to Vor Frue Kirke (Church of our Lady). I was especially excited to see it bcs that is where the original Christus statue is!
We headed back to relax and rest. Jet lag is still present.
We had booked an early dinner at a restaurant that served some local dishes – They served 15 different kinds of meat!!
We were all pretty tired and full – but what a great day!
Sometimes things line up perfectly, somethings they don’t.
The summer of Josh’s “16 trip” we had a ton going on. He was heading to HEFY in Paraguay, Zach was heading on his mission, and Zandra was heading to BYU-H. It was too much to fit in a European vacation.
Plus – what’s the rush?!?
So we decided to postpone it a smidge.
Then Covid hit and boom – the trip was off the table. For a while.
There were a few windows here and there but none seemed to work.
Then Josh decided to take a Gap year and work/travel. I knew we had to find a way to squeeze the trip in!
I suggested we meet him at some point in Europe – as a nice break, or maybe at the end of his trip in the summer.
He would have none of that bcs that would require too much planning and he didn’t want to be restricted with friends.
So he agreed to go ahead of his buddies with us to Europe and he would meet up with them when they arrived in Europe.
But where to? In the winter?!
The criteria was: somewhere ok with the cold and somewhere too expensive and out of the way that he for sure would not travel to with his friends.
Scandinavia and Switzerland. Obvious choices.
With Covid on the up though it was seriously touch and go right down to the last minute!
We had to cut out our original plan to go to Stockholm due to flights continuously getting cancelled. Plus more countries meant more paperwork headaches. You really do have to do a lot of things to get prepared and safe to go.
So we decided on Copenhagen for the weekend and Switzerland for the week (Zurich, Lucern, Interlacken and Zermatt).
We flew via Portugal – who has a whole lot of paperwork to do just for the very quick layover. The guy told me I was very organized and we made it through but had to race to catch our connection!
I was excited to hit Denmark bcs that is where my brother had served his mission back in the early 90’s. I remember hearing so much about it – so it was high on my list to go. Of course with all the chaos and uncertainty around going, I forgot to even tell him we were going! When we arrived in the city, I took a quick picture of Tivoli (which was closed) and he then shared with me all his recommendations!
Our hotel – Plaza Copenhagen. It had old school charm and amazing breakfast!
Things were relatively open in the city. The museums were closed – but Josh is not a museum guy anyway. The churches were open and there is a ton to do via walking and a canal ride. Restaurants were somewhat open – some where closed so the open ones were busy. We figured it out and made reservations the second night after having to settled for burgers the first night.
We first grabbed some lunch.
Then we just went out to explore and happened to discover the famous pedestrian street that we ended up walking on several times a day.
Here are some photos of our first day. The photos are pretty random, but we covered:
Radhuspladsen (city hall) & sitting on Hans Christian Andersons’ lap:)
The Stroget (main walking street)
Von Freslers Kirke (unfortunately it was closed to go in and climb the tower)
Christiansborg Palace – we climbed the tower.
You can see that we stayed out and got to see the lights of the city. It was so pretty. Copenhagen is beautiful!
It has been big year of transitions for Gabe and Shannon!
And I have loved watching this girl face every adversity, challenge, and opportunity with such grace, humility, gratitude and sense of adventure.
From graduating last Dec to entering the world of full time employment, to losing her job due to cutbacks to starting her own business! She has packed and moved multiple times – including cross county, and had a fun stint in NYC.
I’ve also loved this year bcs we finally got to see Gabe and Shannon after over 2 years!
We got to see them in the summer for 10 days and a whole month over Christmas!
So we got to have a lot of “everyday” interaction too which was so so nice!
Here are 10 of the many things I love about Shannon:
She is hardworking. It was fun seeing her in action and bcs she works in the life coaching industry we have some common circles and I love hearing how much people love working with her!
She is always up for an adventure . Moving cross country? Done. Moving again? Why not?! Travel anywhere – sure!
She has strong opinions. I love that she is a strong, independent woman who has ambitions, perspectives, desires, beliefs and is never afraid to speak her mind.
At the same time, she is so respectful of others. She advocates for herself, others and her beliefs, but is patient and tolerant all at the same time.
She is always so quick to respond to any text our family (or me!) sends. I can count on her to be one of the first to respond!
She is supportive of everyone around her. If you have something going on, she remembers. She asks questions, offers help, shows enthusiasm – she takes an interest in all around her.
She needs her quiet time – and is not afraid to show it, take it and recharge!
She is resourceful – whether it be finding out how to do something, make something, go somewhere – she figures it out. She researches things and is always willing to share.
She is a planner. Nothing more to say except she’s a woman after my own planning heart!
She is a great life partner with Gabe. She is loving, kind, supportive, fun, playful, serious, honest, considerate, challenging (in the good way lol)… they are so great together and it’s fun watching them grow together in life!
So happy to have Shannon as part of our CDF family !
Happy happy birthday and much love to you! Looking forward to another fun year together!!
It’s been a while… will I do better in the future at updating this blog? I hope so! But I do have some photos documenting some things the past several (or more) months. I also rely on who sends me photos nowadays since we are almost complete empty nesters!
But here’s a massive photo dump (in random order bcs it just does that when I do a massive photo dump and I don’t feel like resorting them all!)
