Matterhorn

We had decided earlier in the week to take a road trip today. We thought driving down to Zermatt to see the Matterhorn would be a good trip. We woke this morning to a gray and raining sky. :(

"Should we wait until tomorrow? It would be a shame to drive 3 hours and not be able to see anything. No, let's go. The weather will clear and may be completely different down south."

Anybody want to hire me as a weatherman? It was beautiful in Zermatt. Very sunny, clear skies, no wind and in the upper 30's. We're sure glad we went today.

Zermatt is a skiing and mountaineering village in southern Switzerland. It's about 10 km from Italy. To prevent air pollution, which could disfigure the town's lovely view of the Matterhorn, the entire town is a combustion-engine car free zone. I think is it a great idea. You can drive towards Zermatt but go no farther than Täsch. From there you take a cog train up the valley.

We spent the afternoon taking pictures, looking at some shops and had lunch at McDonald's. Parker pretty much slept the whole time.

We drove down one way and came back another. Going down we went by Lausanne and over to Zermatt. Going back we headed pretty much north towards Bern. We got a surprise on the way back. We zigged-zagged up into the mountains and came to a toll - $25 CHF. It wasn't a toll road though. The next leg of the journey turned out to be by car train. We drove our car onto a train, put it in park and shut the motor off. We rode in our car on a train through a tunnel in the mountain with hardly any light for about 15 km (10 miles). It was so cool and such a surprise. How often do you do this sort of thing?