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Sandro, Beanie and the girls went hiking yesterday, and came upon lots of mushrooms in the forest. This must mean it’s autumn. Anyhow, the mushrooms will go very nicely on home made pizza, so last night we fired up the oven in the garden. Larina with her pets.

The pizzas were delicious.

The nights are drawing in now, and before long we were in darkness and beginning to feel the chill. Another few logs on the fire soon sorted that out.

Today it was still a bit chilly, but we had a nice walk around the village and it got a lot warmer once the sun came out.

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There’s a lot of good eating in Luzern, and we were delighted to stumble upon a Greek restaurant just downriver from our hotel. We ate there last night and it was every bit as good as we hoped.

This morning Val picked up some last bits of shopping and we bought lunch from a bakery to eat on the train home. Thanks Luzern, you were great.

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We had a lovely dinner of spare ribs last night, followed by cocktails in the bar next door. Luzern is very attractive after dark.

This morning we have more sightseeing to do. Our first stop is at the Luzern lion, a sculpture commemorating some 1000 Swiss soldiers who were killed supporting King Louis XVI of France in 1792. This was during the French revolution, and we know how that ended.

Mark Twain visited Luzern, and described the sculpture as ‘the most mournful and moving piece of stone in the world’. It’s hard to disagree.

Luzern was originally a walled city. 9 towers and 870 metres of wall remain to the north of the old town. We hike up for a look.

We walk to the top of the hill and climb the many steps to the top of the tallest tower. Great views.

We begin the long descent back to town.

We had lunch in the grand cafe. The cakes are simply splendid.

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Or Lucerne, if you’re any nationality other than Swiss or German. However you spell it, that’s where we’re going today. It’s a very pleasant train ride.

On arrival we check into our hotel and go for a wander. The old town is lovely. Here’s that famous wooden bridge.

And Val on a more modern one outside our hotel.

This is a city untouched by war, and the architecture is simply wonderful. We stopped for a beer here.

We like Luzern, it should be a fun few days.

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It’s a beautiful morning for Val’s birthday. Even a walk to the Co-op is a pleasure on days like this.

Right now she’s at the hairdressers, and later we’ll be out for a few celebratory drinks.

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Emily hosted a barbecue at ours last night. We were 10 in total, mostly from Wengen but Steve came up from Lauterbrunnen and Will and Nick came all the way from Grindelwald.

We had lots of nice food and of course plenty of drinks, but we knew a storm was coming so we packed everything up before it arrived. We didn’t have to wait long. Ali got a great shot.

It was pretty spectacular, but eventually the rain drove us indoors, where we continued into the night.

A very nice evening. Today has been spent clearing up and cleaning the barbecue. It looks like rain again.

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Popped out for a few drinks with Emily last night.

Today’s trip takes us over to Grütschalp, where one of our favourite walks begins. We start in the forest.

Views back to Wengen.

The path climbs through the forest, and eventually the trees begin to thin out as we gain height.

A little further along we reach the Saustal (Saus valley). it’s wild, and absolutely beautiful.

After crossing the Sausbach river we climb again. The terrain gets steeper.

Here’s the Sausbach river again, thundering down the mountain. We can see this from our balcony at home.

Eventually we arrive at the tiny hamlet of Sulwald. A miniature cable car (capacity – 6) takes us down to the village of Isenfluh, from where we catch the bus back to Lauterbrunnen. By the time we got there it was dinner time, so we stopped at the new Turkish takeaway and bought beer and gyros. Delicious!