Europe, 2022, Day 5, a day on Lake Brienz

Woke up early to this view.

The mountains woke up to this view.

Here’s a shot of the Main Street of Gimmelwald I took leaning out my window.

No hikes for me today. My legs are a bit sore so I decided to head to Interlaken and hop on a lake cruise.

Interlaken (the gateway town to the Bernese Oberland) means something like locked between two lakes. Lake-locked. There are two large lakes on either side of Interlaken, Lake Thun and Lake Brienz. Both have cruises that are covered by my Swiss Pass travel card since the boats are essentially buses that serve the villages along the lake.

A canal in Interlaken connects the two lakes.

After breakfast (banana, Alp Cheese and a pretzel) I took the 45 minute trip down the valley from Gimmelwald which takes a gondola, a bus and a train. Here’s the gondola ride down (type-lapsed.) I love taking these.

I pondered how little direct sunlight the valley floor gets each day. The cliff walls are so high that they shade the valley floor most daylight hours. Interesting ecosystem.

It was around 11am by the time I made it to Interlaken Ost train station which is one of two stations this town has, Interlaken West being the second. The cruise didn’t depart until 1pm. I has time to wonder around, grab a few snacks and the Co-op grocery store and do a little shopping. I took the bus to Interlaken West station and then meandered through the downtown area. Interlaken has a million little Victorinox (Swiss Army Knife maker) shops, plus tons of little souvenir shops and high end retailers. I had fun looking around. I mostly avoided spending too much money. Mostly.

I made my way back to a Interlaken Ost (which means East, I think…?) and munched on a Nutella croissant while I waited for my ship, the MS Jungfrau, to arrive.

Here’s where I sat during the cruise.

The lake is a lovely turquoise color, an effect of the glacial slit that pours into the lake from the surrounding Alps.

The ship zigzagged across Lake Brienz, stopping at the little villages along the shore. Here’s one of the stops with a pretty waterfall.

I got off at the village of Brienz and took the train back to Interlaken. (I hopped on a train going the wrong direction at first. Oops! Fortunately I just got off at the next station and got on the right train.)

The train zipped along the shore of the lake racing the ship I just got off of back to Interlaken.

A train, bus and gondola later and I was back in Gimmelwald. I didn’t have lunch so I grabbed a pizza from the Mountain Hostel across the street from my guest house.

The sky was super clear so I walked down to a little vista point and the far end of Gimmelwald. I spent a couple of hours here and played around with my various cameras taking pictures and video. It was a fun place to just hang out. Plus, cow parade.

In the two time-lapse videos below you can see the shadow of my side of the valley slowly creep up the other side as the sun goes down.

It was getting cold as the sun went down so I headed back to my room.

Despite being a pretty relaxing day I was done. I was ready for bed before it was completely dark outside. Here’s the view out my window before turning in.

And good night to you.