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On the ICE in Basel

We are home!  We had a pretty much stress free journey home.  On arrival to the station in Luzern, we found out that our scheduled train to Zurich was cancelled - argggghhh!  However, Swiss railways being sensible allowed us to cut the corner and get a train to Basel which meant that we could pick up our train to Frankfurt in time.  We did this, and the rest of the journey was perfect.  We think that the DB timetables changed on 1st September which helped us out.  

Beer o'clock

We were sad to say goodbye to Switzerland, we had had a good (and expensive) time there. The part of Germany we passed through was dull and flat, but the trains ran on time and were fast so we can't complain and we had reserved seats.  We managed to grab some pretzels for lunch in Frankfurt station as we switched trains.  We arrived in Brussels on time and our hotel was directly outside Brussels Midi which was good.

We dumped our luggage and had a little bit of down time before tea.  At the same time, Matt got a text from Bob saying he was in an ambulance after falling off a ladder which was a bit alarming! He was supposed to be picking us up tomorrow, so we quickly got in touch with friends and made alternative arrangements and then kept in touch with Bob and Jude as he went through A&E etc.

In the meantime we headed out to Le Bistro, just up the road from the hotel.  We went there last time we were in Brussels and knew it to be good.  It was again.  We had a fab night - a HUGE lasagne for the boy, chicken kebab for Matt and rabbit & beer stew for me.  It was a lovely end to the holiday.

Didn't get much sleep that night as we were worried about Bob, turns out that he has broken his ankle in 3 places and was admitted to hospital.  

On the catwalk

The journey from Brussels to home was uneventful.  We arrived in London on time, took our suitcases to the Premier Inn we stayed in on the way out - they were happy to look after them for us for a small donation to Great Ormond Street Hospital and then we headed to Camden Market for a look round and lunch.  We were starving because we had got up very early, plus the hour's difference!  Most eateries were still getting ready, however, we did find one which was ready, it did chicken karage, gyoza and noodles so we ordered a bit of each and were very very happy with the result - it was the best meal of the holiday.

We then headed back to Kings Cross and got the train to Leeds and then another to Ribblehead, where Jon met us and drove us to our house.  

We had a great holiday - well travel experience, it wasn't restful like some holidays, but completely worth it - we saw and did loads.

Le Bistro

Notes for future similar trips:

+ Take swimming stuff and goggles for the boys (they are lost without their goggles).  European swimming pools are much better on the whole than ours!

+ Quick dry materials are best for clothes

+ Sandals are essential, don't take many socks!

+ If an hotel offers to do a basket of laundry for a set price jump at the chance.

+ We don't actually need that many clothes, just one jumper.

+ All local transport in Swiss towns are free of charge if you are staying in a hotel - make sure you ask about this everywhere you go.

+ Tom can't cope with going to bed at the same time as us - he gets too tired.  He can only get to sleep if all lights are off, so if there is a bar use it, if not, it is early to bed for us too with a silent phone to play on!

Hotels we used - these were mainly 3 star hotels, all very different and on the whole very good:

+ Zurich - Hotel Bristol, quite basic, but clean and friendly staff.  Laundry service was amazing and cheap

+ Interlaken - Chalet Swiss, fab place, two storey room, with loads of space, we enjoyed this one a lot.

+ Montreux - Bon Porte, very very basic: no wardrobe even in the room, very noisy with restaurant on top and extremely hot.  They had taken the knobs off the room fan to stop you putting it on a higher speed, boiled eggs at breakfast were grey?! The guy behind reception wasn't great!

+ Zermatt - Jägerhof - lovely hotel - huge room, lovely bar / restaurant area, lovely staff, couldn't ask for better

+ St Moritz - Laudinella - huge room, huge hotel, huge bar / restaurant area, free entry to amazing pool across the road.  Great experience, although full of US tour groups!

+ Lugano - Hotel Walter au Lac - 2 rooms for the price of one, lovely staff, freebies in the room, air conditioning, right on the lake, beautiful view, breakfast overlooking beautiful view.  What else can you need? 

+ Luzern - Hotel de la Paix - happy staff, great location, comfortable room and good breakfast.

Would happily use all hotels again except for the one in Montreux.