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We hardly ever eat in the hotels where we stay – the best hotel doesn’t mean the best restaurant in town. In this case though, it does.

I wouldn’t normally post a picture of a meal, but the steak and deconstructed lobster that we had was one of the best meals I’ve ever eaten.

This morning we’re off up the mountain. A cable car and a series of gondolas takes us up to the Alpen Tower, high above Meiringen.

We hike up to the highest point. It’s absolutely freezing.

Stunning views down to distant Lake Brienz.

On the way back down we stop at a couple of hamlets alongside the lift. Thankfully it begins to get warmer.

Views back to the valley from our lunch stop at Rueti.

We returned to Meiringen on the cable car and went back to the hotel to jettison most of our extra layers. Opposite the hotel is the Sherlock Holmes museum. Let’s take a look.

The interior of 221B Baker Street, faithfully reproduced after years of research.

It’s a lovely little museum, and you get an audio guide to help you get around. A statue outside.

One of the problems with this is that it’s all covered in such meticulous detail that you forget that it’s fiction. Sherlock Holmes is an honorary citizen of Meiringen, but his creator Sir Arthur Conan Doyle isn’t. Go figure.

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We’re up early this morning to catch the train to Meiringen, which is about half an hour to the east of Interlaken. We dump our bags at the hotel and catch a local train to the Aareschlucht. A ‘schlucht’ is a gorge, and this one is pretty impressive. The Aare is the river running through it.

It’s a pity we have to wear masks, but traffic through the gorge is 2-way and the path is narrow in places.

At their highest, the walls of the gorge rise 180 metres above us.

The gorge is about a mile long.

We had lunch at the restaurant at the end of the gorge, and set off for the next attraction. It’s the Reichenbach falls.

On May the 4th 1891, Sherlock Holmes had his famous showdown with professor Moriarty here, and as long as you are in Meiringen, you won’t be allowed to forget it. A little funicular takes us up to the falls.

Here’s the waterfall.

We hike up to the top. Views back to Meiringen.

That was a big day, and we’re really looking forward to dinner.

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Ali had a rare night off yesterday, so we went for drinks in the Tanne. Today was all about domestics – we hauled our recycling up to the village and Val went to the hairdressers. This afternoon she is doing her German class while I catch up with my Tripadvisor reviews. We’ll be up early tomorrow for another mini-holiday, so I’d better start packing.

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For the first time since Thursday, we had a dry day. It’s still cold though, so we went down to Interlaken where it should be a good deal warmer. We had a good walk, and a lovely lunch at Brasserie 17, but there was something missing.

Where are all the people? This is the busiest street in town and it should be packed with tourists, but there’s no one here. Very nice for us, but absolutely hopeless for a town which relies on tourism for the majority of its income. Even the Co-op was quiet.

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We got lucky last night, the rain eased off as we walked to the village for dinner. But it was cold, and the manager at the Regina had a roaring fire going in the bar where we stopped for a drink.

We had dinner at the Berghaus. Chateaubriand and a nice bottle of red from Ticino.

This morning it was raining hard again, and even colder. A chilly 5 degrees at lunchtime according to the thermometer outside our kitchen window.

At these temperatures it must be snowing higher up, and sure enough we began to see for ourselves through a few breaks in the cloud.

We were happy to stay at home watching the Formula 1.

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Yesterday’s rain started in the late afternoon, just as the forecast had promised, and it continued all night. Any hopes of an improvement today were dashed when we woke up this morning to hear the raindrops banging on the roof.

The camera always makes it look brighter than it really is, but we need a drier spell as we have a table booked for dinner later. Wet days are never entirely wasted though – we have a beautifully clean house.

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It’s going to rain this afternoon, so this morning we dashed out for a walk hoping to avoid a soaking. It’s mild but a bit gloomy.

A Swiss housing estate at Innerwengen. Very nice apartments, and cheaper than you would pay nearer the village. The cluster of chalets is called Racers’ Retreat. Recent new restrictions on second home ownership mean there probably won’t be any more developments like this.

Across the valley, a shaft of sunlight illuminates the Spitzhorn below the Breithorn glacier. It might be the last we see of the sun for a few days.

Our walk loops back to the village, and we buy still-warm bread for lunch.