The Jungfraujoch

Yesterday, we went to the Junfrau Region with Grandma and Grandpa McNeely(2). This has the infamous Eiger(3) and the Jungfraujoch(1), the highest point everyone can go to in Europe. I really enjoyed it, though I got a bad headache at the observation deck. The train that went up to the Jungfraujoch went THROUGH the Eiger! The thing that makes this amazing is that this railroad opened in 1912. The train stopped at two places for five minutes were you could look and see at the first place a valley, and at the second place an ice field(4). There was also a great place that had nice ice sculptures(5) called the Ice Palace.

Rigi

Yesterday, we went to Mount Rigi . My Grandparents came along. we took a ariel cable car, then we switched to a cog-wheel railway. At the place where we switched, there was a huge chessboard with chess pieces the same size. I had some fun with it. At the top we ate lunch, then we went to the top of Mt. Rigi. The view at the top; was great! We saw lots of mountains including Stanserhorn, which we went a week ago, and Mt. Pilatus, which we also saw from Stanserhorn. I noticed these interesting telescopes which had a ball under it telling the different sights. If you moved the sight you wanted to look at into a selector and looked through the telescope you saw the sight. The Rigi trip was great!!

The Spring Festival

On Monday and the day before, Zurich had it's Spring Festival. On Sunday there was a children's parade. The children were dressed up in costumes from different periods ranging from the Renaissance to the 1920s. My favorite was during the time when Napoleon ruled. They wore wigs (top right) and one girl was caried in a sedan chair. I thought that was funny. Another group had a maypole (bottom right) and they went around it when the parade stopped. After that came kids dressed in world costumes. I noticed there was a Peru group, with real llamas. There were also a Thai group, whose costumes reminded me of the Khmers' wear. The parade ended with the winterman, which foretold the advent the next day.

Yesterday, there was another parade by the guilds of Zurich. The winterman was on a huge stack of wood, which was set on fire. The winterman was packed with explosives, and while it was engulfed in an inferno men on horseback galloped around it while burning debris came down. Acording to this website it took 12 minutes and 9 seconds for the winterman's head to fall off. This supposedly tells how good the summer will be. I saw this in 1998, but I was too young to remember it.

Day Around Stans

Yesterday, we went to Fortress Fuigen and Stanserhorn mountain by Lake Lucerne. Even though Switzerland is neutral, it has lots of camouflaged fortresses. Every Tunnel and Bridge has explosives to blow them up. Fortress Fuigen was built during WWII and was modified during the Cold War for protection from a nuclear war. At the end of the Cold War it was retooled with weapons from it's WWII and early Cold War days and turned into a museum. You can aim and fire some of the weapons (the ammunition isn't there;-) ). I fired a cannon (upper right) and a machine gun (lower right). Afterwards we took a train to Stans to go to the Stanserhorn mountain. We took a funicular up, and then switched to a cable car that took us to the top of the mountain. There was a great view of the Alps. The nearest mountain was Mt. Pilatus which has the steepest cog-wheel railway in the world! I also made snowballs!!

Easter

Today is Easter and I got some chocolate from Lindt (a chocolate company). I got an Easter bunny and some chocolate eggs. I'm glad that I'm having Easter in Switzerland because they have the best chocolate in the world. How was your Easter? I hope you enjoyed it. Sarah, don't get jealous about me getting Swiss chocolate you will get some too.