Thursday 12th and Sunday 15th
Just up the valley from our campsite is a fancy new cable car only constructed in the 2 years since we were last here, and claiming the steepest section IN THE WORLD !!!
It’s in various stages of completion as they replace the much older lifts :
And right up at the top, there’s a very Tracy Island building , housing a revolving restaurant, with attached helipad
The history of this restaurant is jolly interesting – when the James Bond location team selected Schilthorn as the primary site for On Her Majesty’s Secret Service (1968/9) , the building was still unfinished, so by agreeing to fund the completion, they got to design it to suit the required film set ( the helipad was part of that ) – as seen in this still –
It’s referred to as Piz Gloria in the film, being Blofeld’s Secret Lair.
Disappointingly, however, it’s currently in a “Sorry About the Mess, Got the Builders In” phase, which does remove some of the ‘Majesty’ from OHMSS –
Nonetheless there’s a fab 300 degree vista ( the scaffolded restaurant obscures the rest) and useful panorama boards to tell you which peak is which. Some childish sniggers were, inevitably, triggered by this set of names:
(HINT : second from left, third from right)
Inside, you can only experience the revolving restaurant if you pay for some actual grub there. Outrageous, I know . You can imagine Blofeld blocking the entrance and barking out “No, Mr Bond – I expect you to …. DINE !”
So we saved up our pennies and returned for a breakfast a few days later. The experience of rotating at about an inch a second while swallowing was a bit nauseating, but views were fab.
And the we found the “Spy World” exhibit below. Absolute gold dust . I mean, you can morph your face into stills from the film. Rude not to !
And you can sit in a HELICOPTER ! In front of low-res video of the flight up here.
And the icing on the cake was sudden snippets of movie soundtrack dialogue which play at you in the loos while you are unsuspectingly taking a high altitude wee – like Diana Rigg asking ” What are you doing here ?” Making the piz all the more gloria-s.
Only at the final hurdle did Swiss technology fail us –
Wonderful bit of iconic film history, thank you. Plus my bit of trivia is in the clapperboard photo above, that is Joanna Lumley on the far right from George Lazenby, with the ski goggles on the top of her head! What a career she’s had! 🥰
surely there is an easier way down if the cable car is not working
https://images.app.goo.gl/TqwXbQL8dRr6fyUu5
I hear they are looking for a new Bond – just saying!
Top quality post!! Starting with the endlessly amusing innuendo of the names on the map, and ending on the laugh-out-load morphing. Gold dust as you say.
Oh, we laughed our loads completely out ! 😁 Glad you approve, Paul !
Family movie night when you get back? You can be obnoxious with repeated “I was there”s.
Any excuse to be obnoxious ! 😁
(tried and failed to add image of my OHMSS DVD)
There you go
Pingback: Isenfluh ( Over the Cuckoo’s Nest) – PlainSillyBloggers