Gruyere Cheese & Cailler (Nestle) Factories Plus A Little Bit Of Queen!

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We kept busy during our final two days in Switzerland; on our list of Swiss things to learn about was cheese and chocolate.

Traveling about 40km through the Swiss countryside we made our way to the Gruyere Cheese factory.  The tour was informative and interesting, we learnt all about how cheese is made.  It was amazing how much Corban and Leo learnt and could talk about at dinner that night.  Corban enjoyed nibbling on her cheese samples while watching the cheese get made; Leo was a little more hesitant with tasting.

 After learning about Cheese we continued on to the original Swiss Nestle & Cailler chocolate factory.  Once again we were in for a great tour learning all about how the company got started and how chocolate is made, it was a little more secretive that the cheese factory!  Not only was the tour good, but we also learnt how to taste chocolate and eat as much chocolate as we wanted.  Allan and Corban tasted every type!  Leo and I didn’t quite manage, but still had a good go.

On our final day we had a more quite day and walked into Montreux city along the lake.  We took pictures of the plant animals and statues.  Corban and Leo were introduced to Queen and Freddie Mercury.  There is a 3m Freddie Mercury statue on the lakefront in the city and Freddie Mercury’s recording studio is still there and has been turned into a mini museum.  They danced while listening in all the different headsets, laughed at the costumes and even got to mix some music in the actual recording studio.  It was actually really interesting, there were even lots of hand written lyrics.  Freddie brought the Mountain Studio after he was diagnosed with aids because the people of Montreux didn’t harass or bother him and he could lead a normal life there.  Queen recorded their last few albums here.  

Nuclear Bomb Shelter

Up until 5 years ago it was compulsory that buildings were built with a nuclear bomb shelter.  This was the door to the bomb shelter in the apartment we were staying in!  There was plenty of room and chemical toilets.  

Geneva City

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Montreux is about a 1-hour drive from Geneva, so we decided that a day trip was a must.

Our first stop in Geneva was the United Nations offices and conference centre.  We also took some photos at the broken chair, which is a symbol of those affected by land mines.  Taylor also visited the Red Cross museum.    

From there we continued to the lakefront where the 140m-water fountain squirts into the air and is home to the famous flower clock (which was still being planted for Spring).  We also looked at some watch shops along the lakefront; Geneva is the birthplace of fine watch making.  The most expensive watch we saw was 99,600 Swiss Franks (NZ$134, 063.04).

Heading into Old Town we wandered through the cute little streets until we found St-Pierre (Saint Peters) Cathedral.  St-Pierre was the centre of the reformation movement in the 14^th Century.  The people destroyed many of the paintings and altars, only the original pulpit and choirs seating were left.

Since Geneva is famous for watch making we visited the Patek and Philippe Watch Museum next.  Our expectations of the museum weren’t that high, however we were blown away with how amazing it was.  There were interactive presentations and the most beautiful and intricately detailed watches from the past 500 years.  Unfortunately we were not allowed to take photos, so I found a YouTube clip (it doesn’t do justice to the amazing detail and skill we saw). Watch making used to be a true craftsman ship!  Along with the watches were various pieces of jewellery, tiny mechanical birds, bugs and fans.  We are definitely pleased that we visited this museum; it was really different from other museums we have visited and the pieces were stunning.

Caux Hiking and Miniature Train Park

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A beautiful day for some hiking! We drove up a winding, skinny Swiss road to a place called Caux.  It was only 8km from our Home Exchange, but a real climb for the car.

We chose a hike that was about 1 hour 40 minutes (uphill).  Our hike started on steep walking tracks, which eventually turned to snow.  Unfortunately we didn’t make the summit.  We were warm, not even needing our winter jackets but the snow was too deep (Leo ended up thigh deep) and we couldn’t see the track.  It was still a great walk and lovely view. 

After dropping Taylor home for some study we drove around the lake to a miniature train park.  Leo and Corban enjoyed riding the miniature trains and going through the little buildings, castles and shops. 

Montreux - Lake Geneva - Home Exchange

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We're going to do this photo again, Allan is actually standing in front of the castle & you can't see the mountains that well (Home Exchange garden)

The skies cleared and the sun came out on the morning we were leaving Zurich.  The drive to Montreux was beautiful with the Alps constantly in view. As we drove into Montreux we realized how much of a beautiful place we would be staying, the mountains surround us with Lake Geneva settled in the middle. 

Our home exchange is FANTSTIC! The apartment has specular views of Lake Geneva and Chateau de Chillon.  There is a lovely garden and private play park for the little kids to play. 

We had some lunch and spent the afternoon exploring the lakefront.  With the sun shinning and the beautiful surrounding we walked about 6km past the castle and into the next village.  We stopped several times along the way to play in the parks, drink from the fountains (Leo) and skim stones in the lake.  The lake is clear, clean and calm.  We had a great time enjoying a beautiful spring day in Switzerland.

Montreux is basically on the Swiss/French boarder.  Several of the pictures of mountains taken from our apartment are of the French Alps.  The ferries in the Lake have a Swiss flag on the back and a French flag on the front.  This part of Switzerland speaks French unlike Zurich, which speaks Swiss-German.

Rhine Falls and Sattel-Hochstuckli Skywalk

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The spring weather is not being so kind, we had hoped to get out into the mountains for some hiking but there is rain and low cloud.  Due to the weather we decided to take a car trip to the Rhine Falls, which is Europe’s largest plain waterfall.

The falls are stunning at 150m wide and 23m high. In the winter months, the average water flow is 250 m³/s, while in the summer; the average water flow is 700 m³/s. The highest flow ever measured was 1,250 m³/s in 1965; and the lowest, 95 m³/s in 1921.

The next day we still hoped to get into the Swiss Alps, but the weather just wasn’t cooperative.  The mountains remained cloudy and windy.  We decided to try the Sattel-Hochstuckli Skywalk, a 374m suspension bridge even though the weather wasn’t promising.  We found the gondola to the bridge which was closed, then we found a winding one lane mountain road which took us to the top to find that the skywalk bridge was also closed.  Not the most successful day, but better than sitting around the house.