Monday 23rd.
A wet Monday, according to the forecasts, so we thought we’d take the CAR out. It has only been used as a storage space for the 16 days since we arrived, so this was quite a novel idea.
Brienz
Is the town at the far end of the lake, heading east from Interlaken. A bit further than we had managed on our bike ride the other day.
There’s an attractive lakeside promenade with free seating available –
It’s actually quite trendy – every other shop is an art gallery, there are loads of traditional and modern wooden carvings in evidence, some life size – hang on while I find an example….hmmmm…
Mind you, some of it was a bit risqué, if you ask me
But the BEST THING, in our joint opinion, was this marvellous set of hydraulic engineering gadgets drawing water from the lake. I’m not sure we were its target demographic, but great fun was had spraying water up and down the various channels, fountains, water wheels, and of course the Archimedes Screw ( fnaar).
At this point, however, the predicted rain did appear, storm clouds sweeping east towards us and thunder echoing down from the mountains
Minutes later it was chucking it down. We legged it back to the car and sat eating our sandwiches in the romantic environment of an underground car park. At which point we discussed what to do when the rain lifted…and decided …
Meiringen
Only a few miles south -east of Brienz is Meiringen ( or is it a cream bun ? Anyway…). And THAT boasts one of the most literary waterfalls in the world. How’s this for a clue ?
Great Scott, chaps ! It’s only the Reichenbach Falls, scene of the famous ‘presumed dead’ fall by a grappling Holmes & Moriarty.
The walk back down through the woods was rather nice, and took us right past the end of the track where the Dramatic Conclusion is placed. I couldn’t help noticing that you would have to be a very athletic diver to get from there into the waterfall itself, mind you.