After our amazing lounge experience we described in our previous post, it was finally time to board the flight. Of course, the most important part of the flight was our celebration champagne.

With the champagne out of the way we had about 10 hours to kill. As expected, Sara slept through basically the whole thing. For Dave, he continues to battle a cold and barely slept a wink. Once we landed in Zurich, getting through passport control and customs was a breeze. Our bags were on the conveyor before we arrived so there was no waiting. I think we mentioned that we brought quite a few bags for our trip.

After leaving the airport, we stopped by the Sunrise cellphone store to buy a SIM card. BTW, it is very cheap here. $2.50 per day for unlimited talk and data. Hopefully we find something similar in France and Italy.

Once we got to the train platform we prepared ourselves for the first difficult part of our trip. Loading all of our gear on to the train. As the trained approached, we mentally prepared ourselves for getting all the bags on to the train in the short window of time before it left the station. Luckily the first train was a breeze and the next stop was Visp.

Things got interesting once we got to Visp. Again, as we approached the station, Sara and I mentally prepared for the transfer. At this station there were no carts and we had to transfer platforms. Upon exiting the train, we were shocked to see people in an all out sprint trying to make the transfer. With our bags in tow, we walked briskly carrying at least four bags each trying to make the train. While we were the last ones on, we made it!  Now we had one hour left until we finally made it to our destination.

The new train we boarded was significantly different from the sleak modern quiet train we took from Zurich. These trains were significantly older and had quite a bit of character. While we didn’t get any picture of the train itself, we did get a photo of the track. 

As you can see from the photo this was a cog train.  The gauge of the rail was a bit narrower and the cogs in the center are due to the steepness of the route.  In just over an hour we climbed from just over 500m to over 2000m.  Unfortunately, due to the late hour of our travel we weren’t able to see much, but you could tell that it was beautiful. Once we arrived in Zermatt it was off to the hotel in a small electric shuttle/cab.  Like a glorified golf cart the electrical shuttle whisked Sara and I quickly up to the hotel and we finally checked in.  Interestingly, we shared the shuttle with one of Dave’s company’s client, who we ended up spending quite a bit of time in the bar chatting with. Great people!

As it is the weekend, finding a place to eat was not easy.  Luckily, the friendly hotel staff got us in to the Factory at Hotel Post at the last minute.  The food wasn’t that great but the caprese salad and pizza we ate filled the voids in our stomachs after the long journey.

As I (Dave) lay here in bed at 5 am unable to sleep longer, I look forward to a fun day of exploring Zermatt and getting our first day of skiing in.  Hopefully, I can shake this terrible cold that I’m dealing with.  Stay tuned for more updates.