Interlaken Area - Day 3

Thursday, 23 July 2026

For our last full day in Switzerland we went for a run down by the local river - we're all still feeling some muscle fatigue from Swiss O week so it was pretty slow and easy - and crucially, flat!

 

    

After a leisurely breakfast of scrambled eggs we headed to Strandbad Bonigen, where we spent a super fun afternoon swimming in the lake, playing on the water inflatables and paddling about on a paddle boat.  It was a great way to spend our last day in Switzerland.

 

    


Back at home it's time to do our last pack for our flight tomorrow from Milan to Dublin. We'll be leaving at 5.30 am and either arriving with hours to spare, or just making it, depending on the traffic!

Switzerland has been nice - the orienteering was an adventure (and a challenge!) but overall it was superfun. Being a regular tourist is very very very expensive and we think we've seen all we really wanted to see so we're all looking forward to Ireland starting tomorrow (traffic willing)

Interlaken Area - Day 2

Thursday, 23 July 2026

Today we were out the door by 6.45 so we could use our 'good morning' discounted tickets up to Jungfrujoch which is the saddle between 4000m peaks and calls itself the 'top of Europe'.  The discount was worth taking because a) it was soooooooo expensive and b) it made it a bit quieter, at least when we first got there.  The journey was half of the experience- we drove to Lauterbrunnen - a very popular amazing looking swiss town deep in a valley. Took a train up (and it really was UP) to another station, then another train up again to the top station.  From there we could do the 'discovery tour' and walk around and outside and see some ice sculptures and learn a little bit about the history of building the railway and also buy as many expensive watches as we wanted (we felt a little bombarded by expensive shops actually). We could resist the $3000 watches but we couldn't resist the highest lindt shop in the world! Due to our discount tickets we also had an extra hour than we really needed up there, so we took it really slow and did a couple of laps of the tour and spent some time outside.  

      

The trip down was much busier but still a lot of fun. Back in Lauterbrunnen we took a quick walk around the town but it was pretty packed with tourists and we were tired so we didn't stay too long.

 

One thing that is obvious each time I come to Europe is that the things that are spectacular and easy to do (like Lauterbrunnen), are probably going to be too busy to really enjoy, while the things that take a bit of work to get to (maybe by booking a parking spot and getting up really early like we did at Tre Cime), or a bit of sweat (like all our hikes) are the absolute best as they just aren't heaving with masses of tourists (and I acknowledge we are part of the problem in these areas of course).  Orienteering is such a great activity to do to really experience different places as we generally aren't in tourist hotspots but we get to do really cool things and see lots of stuff we wouldn't otherwise.  I think I'm more and more averse to these hot spots unless it's possible to get in and out really early or late in the day when it's less busy

I'll end this post with a couple of photos of our accommodation. We're upstairs in the very swiss style house - it's spacious but the ceiling is really really low - making Jett look like a bit of a giant as he moves around..

 

 

Interlaken Area Day 1

Tuesday, 21 July 2026

Today was a much better day for me! After a slow start we left our lovely swiss Airbnb..

 

and headed to Grindlewald where we took the breathtakingly expensive gondola to the top station where we had great views of the Eiger, Monch and Jungfrau.

 

 

From there we followed the busy tourist path on the cliff walk, then 3km over to Lake Bachalpsee which is supposedly a stunning alpine lake (and it was fine I guess, just not amaaaazing).  

 

 

From there we did the really fun part which was to leave the busy area and head all the way back to the township, dropping from 2265 metres above sea level down to 1000 metres, in a bit over 10k.  It was actually a pretty gentle descent (compared to what we've done), and the top 1/3 had amazing views - we watched a farmer herd his cows back to their stables to bed, looked at waterfalls and across at the mountains - while the bottom 2/3 was beautiful, almost Nordic forests - it was a delight the whole way.  By the time we made it back to the very busy Grindlewald it was 6.30pm.

     

 

 

 

Bonneville & Tour De France

Tuesday, 21 July 2026

When Zali suggested we take advantage of the tour being near the final stage of the Swiss O Week I  knew instantly that I didn't want to be part of it.  I had waited for the tour way back when it started in the UK, and it couldn't have been more boring (in my opinion) - I believe it's one of those sports (like triathlon and surfing) that are much better enjoyed through a good TV coverage and waiting for hours on the side of a road was not my thing.

What I didn't know (but should have) was that being an assistant to the tour watchers was a LOT worse than actually watching. Our plan for me to drop them off near the top of the final climb, then pick them up after the stage concluded was, in hindsight, very flawed.  Firstly I had to drive up a narrow windy road with the bike and car traffic to drop them off and then in a much much much worse scenario, I had to return at the end of the day against the flow of traffic and 1 billion bikes (overtaking the slow traffic) to get back up to pick them up - and that wasn't even the most stressful part (although that WAS stressful). The most stressful part was at the bottom of the hill where there was traffic going in both ways while the road was almost completely blocked by parked spectator cars and then as we are squeezing past each other there are also thousands of pedestrians and cyclists trying to squeeze though the gaps that are opening and closing - it was the worst and most stressful driving situation I've ever been in.  

In between those two driving events the road closures had hampered with my hiking plan a and plan b, so I decided to walk around Bonneville until the tour came through. It was really hot (33 degrees), there was barely any shade in the whole town, the public toilet was out of Train Spotting, and aside from all of that, waiting for cyclists is SO BORING and a complete waste of a day (again, in my opinion).   I made the best attempt I could and found some nice streets and the local swimming option (a swampy lake), but really it was difficult to enjoy and I should have just stayed with the tour watchers from the start. Next time (there won't be a next time), I'll make sure to put hundreds of kilometres between myself and the race. 

 

 

 

 

 

In the meantime everyone else had a good time and scored some good tour merchandise.  Once I picked them up again we still had 3 hours of driving to do but by that time I was so cooked I resigned all driving and navigating duties to Jon and Zali.

 

 

Swiss O Week - Day 6

Sunday, 19 July 2026

Today we had our last big climb to the start and then possibly some of the nicest sections of orienteering terrain that we've had so far.

Looking back to the arena from the start

It wasn't my cleanest run but it was fine - I ended up 12th (53 competitors) over all 6 days - I think in 2019 I was 13th, but I'd say this time I had some better results with a few top 10s, while last time my placing was lifted by a good sprint race and not much else. Jon finished 13th (83) overall which was pretty good as he mispunched one event so couldn't drop another one. Jett had the hardest hand dealt to him with some races with huge amounts of climb and did well to finish 33rd overall (76) with very little training prior to our trip. Zali missed a few controls and one whole event but had a good run today.

 

After the race we took our final gondola back down the hill, then a shuttle back to our car and drove the very pretty trip to Scionzier where we just have one night then a day of watching the Tour before we head on to Interlaken.  It was nice to get here early enough to do some washing and catch up on some tv.

 

The view from our Airbnb in this otherwise non-descript town is pretty nice...well..

 

..in one direction anyway... 

 

Swiss O Week - Day 5

Saturday, 18 July 2026

It was weird but very convenient being able to  get completely ready for an orienteering event at our apartment, then just walk out the door with our compasses to the start.  

 

The forest sprint was delightfully quick - just 20 minutes and pretty error free for me, then it was a 2 minute walk back home afterwards.  

We could have spent the rest of the day relaxing but since the weather turned out to be beautiful and not storms (as predicted) we decided to grab our maps from the cancelled event and undertake the 3 chair lift journey to the arena then another to the would-have-been start area at Avoriaz which was the weirdest ski village I've ever seen. Apparently it was designed in the late 60s and definitely stands out in its environment. Despite it being summer it was absolutely buzzing with people enjoying the mountain biking and all the other activities on offer.  

  

The stage was originally going to be a sprint with a transition to a middle distance and a run back down the hill to the arena at the bottom. We all ran our sprint courses (there were no controls out)  then I took the chairlift back down with Zali and Julia who also did some filming of everyone.   Jett & Jon and our other Tasmanian friends also attempted the middle distance but bailed out after a while as the terrain was not that nice to run through.

Down at the bottom I had a delicious crepe while I waited then ordered some others for the runners before we took our 3 chair journey back to the car. It was a great afternoon.

Tonight we have to pack up and restore the apartment to its original state, then prepare for our last orienteering stage tomorrow.

Swiss O Week - Day 4

Friday, 17 July 2026

Back at the previous event centre, this time we had a chairlift ride, followed by 1.5k downhill walk to the starts, followed by our courses, then another 2.5k downhill back to the arena. 

 

A slight frustration of this week has been that the organisers keep getting the distances and/or the elevation wrong. For example the day 3 options of walking downhill for 2.2km  or 200m/60m elevation walk back to the chairlift was in fact 3.8km downhill, while the uphill alternative was 1.5km and 160 metres climb. Today the walk back was advertised as 1.5k but was closer to 2.7. I'm not sure what's going wrong but something is!!

 

Anyway - the orienteering itself was fun - not as fun as the few days before it but still lovely to be up in the alpine meadows in the sun.  I had my cleanest race but wasn't rewarded with placings as it was probably the least technically challenging of the days so far. 

After we had all made it back to the arena we used our passes to take a different chairlift up another hill to enjoy more of the sunshine and view.

 

In the late afternoon Jon, Jett and I strolled down to our local gondola to go for a joy ride - we went back up to the day 1 arena which was so quiet compared to our last visit! The views were nice although it was definitely getting cloudy in anticipation of the late afternoon's thunderstorm.

 

 

 

Tomorrow we have a 'replacement' stage around our local forest because the forcast weather has made the planned stage too risky.  Which is a shame as it was going to involve 3 chairlifts to the arena then another to the start, followed by a sprint, a transition, then a forest downhill which I was looking forward to. Oh well  - a little forest sprint is better than nothing and we have the convenience of our accommodation almost being in the finish chute!

 

 

Swiss O Week - Rest Day

Friday, 17 July 2026

In a bit of a departure from our normal rest day activites, on this rest day we did actually do a fair bit of resting.

Jon, Jett and I went to the french supermarket in the morning, then we picked Paul and Dani up on our way back home. After dropping off Jon and Jett and I continued down the valley to drop Paul and Dani off at a biggish train station for their onward trip to Geneva.

Back at our place the kids did the nearby creek walk, while I spent most of the rest of the day in the deck chair, except for the bit where there was a sudden thunderstorm, bringing a short rainstorm followed by lower temperatures.

  

At about 6 we drove back over to France to have a catch up with some of the other Australians attending the event. It was all very relaxed.

 

 

Swiss O week - Day 3

Wednesday, 15 July 2026

Day three's orienteering adventure was a 30 minute drive to the competition centre, a 10 minute chairlift up, then a 2k walk down the hill on the other side, where we all did relatively short races (mine was 34 minutes).  Then we had to either trudge back up to the chairlift or trudge 2/3 of the way up to the chairlift, then another few ks down the other side right back to the competition centre.  We all chose the former but it took us a while.

 

 

The orienteering itself was really nice - not too steep (except at the end) and lovely meadows and mostly open areas with little gullies and rock features. I had another respectable run (2 in a row) and managed to finish with Jon in the top ten again.

 

 

Despite having early starts for once, it was still well into the afternoon by the time we made it home, so after some lunch and recovery time, Paul, Dani, Jon and I went for a gentle stroll up the local rivulet which was nice.

 

 

Afterwards I dropped them off back in France and then Jon went down the valley to pick up Zali's friend Julia who has come to spend a few days with us.

As it was Bastille Day, after dinner we nipped across the border to watch the semi of the world cup (sad for France) at P & Ds little apartment, then we strolled across the road to Chatel's cute little lake to watch the Bastille Day fireworks.

 

 

Swiss O Week - Day 2

Tuesday, 14 July 2026

Today we had lateish starts again which meant that Jon and I could jump in the car and do a quick trip to France for some supermarket shopping as the prices in the small swiss supermarket in Morgins were like shopping at Hill Street Grocery but everying is in Swiss Francs.  The French one was much more palatable although it was still AUD $300 for a few days worth of food.  

After a quick turnaround we headed off to the event, picking up Dani along the way. Today's adventure involved a 30 minute drive, then a long chairlift up to the event centre.  What we forgot to factor in with our timing was that we had a 10 minute walk to get to the chairlift from the parking (consequence of late starts) , then a 20 minute wait in the queue at the chairlift - not because of orienteers but because we were clearly at the french epicentre of downhill mountainbiking and there were hundreds of people going up with the chairlift with their bikes as well as us.

 

Once at the event centre, I had to leave fairly quickly to get the next chairlift up to the start of the long and very steep walk to the actual start. I had no time to spare but then I made it worse for myself by forgetting my whistle and having to rush back to our gear to grab it. Luckily I was only turned away at the chairlift, not at the start!

At the top of that chairlift we had a steep descent followed by a lung busting long climb up and up and up. 

By that time I had resigned myself to being late to my start for the first time ever, so I didn't further stress myself by looking at my watch or attempting to run the uphill.  Amazingly though I made it with zero seconds to spare - my only resting time was the 4 minutes they give you in the pre-start area. 

 

The start flag 

The orienteering itself was pretty cool - at least the downhill parts - it was very very tough going and despite the huge climb to the start there was still a fair bit of climb in the course. I think I enjoyed it? I definitely enjoyed finishing it!

 

Here I was procrastinating as I had to go down and then up to the right of the outcrop in front of me.. 

Zali chose not to attempt the run  today - put off by the climb to the start plus the climb on her course, and spent the time sketching on her ipad - I love her sketch of the view from where we were sitting. 

 

 

The cows at the last control.  A little while later they wandered calmly through everyone at the arena, crushing at least one compass along the way! 

 

After we all made it back we chairlifted back down to the car and spent the rest of the afternoon doing as close to nothing as possible.

 

Swiss O Week - Day 1

Monday, 13 July 2026

Today was the easiest day for us logistically - a short walk to the cable car, a quick ride up to the event centre, then a short walk (500m) to the start of our course.  We also all had relatively late starts so I went for a stroll down to the village to get some baguettes and some brie for lunch.  I got some oreos for snacks from the local supermarket which cost way more than the sizeable chunk of brie.

  

 

walking down to the cable car 

 

While the course was very scenic, particularly at the end, it was pretty tough physically though - some of the slopes felt almost vertical and we were forever going up or down. We all went ok, not great - happy to get around and have the steepest day behind us.

 

After the event we just relaxed on the grass outside our apartment with Paul and Dani then I dropped them off back in france (5 minutes away), and later we went down to cheer a friend who won his class.

Appenzell & Morgins

Sunday, 12 July 2026

We did at least get a free breakfast at our eyewateringly expensive hotel, so we were up early to make the most of it then left around 8 to get to a cable car that would take us to the start of a ridge hike Zali had planned for us.  

Unfortunately the altitude and uphills have been taking their toll on Zali who is feeling particularly fatigued at the moment, so after half an hour she reconsidered and took herself down the mountain via an alternative route. 

 

 

 

Jon, Jett and I continued on and it was pretty spectacular although brutally steep - both up and down.  We took around 3 hours to do the 11k circuit from the top of the cable car, along the ridge, down to the lake then further down back to the car.  The last 3km took us past a beautiful little lake where we passed about a zillion people who had walked straight up from the car park to see it.

 

 

When we reached our car we realised just how popular the lake was as the parking places were all full to bursting and there were parking assistants directing the chaos.

With not much time for recovery we jumped into the car for the 4 hour drive to Morgins, stopping only briefly for lunch and snacks.  We're now comfortably settled in our Airbnb ready for the start of the Swiss O week tomorrow.

Innsbruck to Brusilau

Sunday, 12 July 2026

We didn't have too much to do but still managed to make a fairly long day of it.  I woke up fairly early so took myself for an easy run by the river before returning for breakfast and packup. 

 

We got going at about 9.30 and made pretty good time to St Anton am Alberg - where a school friend of Jon's has a guesthouse/hotel and he kindly took us for a tour of both his hotel and the very fancy ski-town. This town actually happens to be one of the two Austrian towns blamed for the superspeading of covid to Europe in 2020.  Anyway - it was nice to take a walk though it and meet Jon's friend Christopher and his family.

 

 

Leaving St Anton we drove half an hour on a winding road over the montains and then made our first expensive driving mistake - somehow we managed to get ourselves into a 16km tunnel travelling back towards St Anton - in fact worse - it emerged even further past St Anton than we had started 30 minutes ago, AND it cost us 13 Euros for the pleasure.  After some tense monents in the car we decided that rather than retrace our steps and take another 40 minutes to get back to where we'd started, we'd pay another 13 euros and go back through the tunnel - emerging where we made our mistake, 30 minutes earlier, 26 euros lighter and considerably more tense!

The rest of the trip went smoothly and we arrived at a guesthouse in Brusilau in the late afternoon, giving us time to relax for a bit in our very expensive, very basic room before going downstairs to enjoy some very average, very very expensive dinner. Ouch Switzerland!

 

 

We returned to our hot (no A/C of course) room and watched the world cup before falling asleep.

Innsbruck

Friday, 10 July 2026

When we planned this trip we put Innsbruck into the itinerary as a convenient touristy stop as we work our way west to the border of Switzerland and France.  Knowing it would be right after our Dolomites hike we gave ourselves two nights here to recover and wash and get our wits back.  I'd say we've managed two out of three of those things as unfortunately our Airbnb doesn't have a washing machine.

What our Airbnb does have however, is a very very comfortable couch, fast wifi (finally) and a big screen tv which we found ourselves unable to leave until the afternoon (after watching soccer, cycling and orienteering). It's not surprising that we all needed a long morning of doing nothing after the last few weeks.

 

When we eventually left (without Zali who stayed behind to do some uni work), we drove the 20 minutes to the old ski jump but then baulked at the 11 Euro per person entry fee given we were't super enthused.  So we jumped back in the car and found a park nearer the old city. From there we strolled around some gardens, through the old city, and down to the river to take some photos.  

 

 

 

 

The old town was very pretty - there were lots of people out enjoying themselves at the cafes and icecream stores.  It was all very nice but we didn't really have the energy to do much more than the stroll so after 90 minute or so we headed home to have dinner and prepare for our next destination.

 

Italy & Dolomites Wrap

Thursday, 9 July 2026

I love the Dolomites - returning was everything I'd hoped for after our brief visit in 2019. The sheer volume of the walking trails and incredible mountain views and flower filled meadows plus ample refugios for purchasing Coke Zero makes them a massive winner for me. We had great weather which certainly helped but I'd certainly love to come back for more walking or ski-ing.  The only crappy part was the stupid busses.  

I also love Italy - I think it's my favourite continental country (in my very limited experience)  - the variation of landscapes is incredible - from seaside to the mountains, the prices are fairly even with Australia and there's something charming about the slight italian chaos that seems to apply to many things.  I wouldn't mind less smoking, supermarkets that stocked a better range of food (hello indian and mexican) and better public toilets - but aside from that, it was great.

 

 
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