Lucerne or Luzern - our first vacation

We have been here for about a month. That must mean it’s time for vacation.

We knew going into this move that our travels were going to be different than when we were in the UK {Tiny humans take sooooo much stuff} and they were probably going to be a little less frequent {School calendars to work around} and they were going to have to be much more planned {rocking up to a city at 11pm with no cash and unsure about how to get to the hotel was okay for 29 year old Amanda but is not the way 39 year old Amanda with two kids travels}.

When we realized that Charlotte & Adam had off from school & work on a Thursday & Friday we decided to take advantage & plan our first trip. My criteria were rather simple; 1. I wanted to go by train – the girls haven’t experienced train travel and we see them all over town and Charlotte has been begging to ride on one. 2. I only wanted to travel about 2-3 hours – though the train sounds exciting, I know the attention span of a 4 & 1 year old. I can only keep them contained and entertained for a few hours. 3. I wanted somewhere low key that we didn’t feel like we needed to see a ton of things – we’re easing into this vacation thing, not making a mega trip. I handed all these criteria over to Adam who came up with Lucerne. It was the perfect fit – we could get there is just over two hours via two trains (changing trains at an hour in was also a good idea to break up the trip!) and though there were a couple of small touristy things to do, it wasn’t overly jam packed with things we felt like we needed to see.

The main highlight if you read any of the tour books is Lucerne’s bridges, the Kapellbrücke (English: Chapel Bridge) is a beautiful wooden walking bridge over the Rüüss river. There was also a transportation museum which kept coming up in all my searches which I kinda laughed at, but a few Moms at C’s school told me it was actually pretty neat so we put it on the short list as well.

So off we went.

First, can I tell you how proud I am that team Powell managed to fit our travels into two carryon suitcases & a diaper bag?? I realize we only went for three days, but there are times we go to the grocery store & I feel like I’ve packed more stuff.

The first train was great – we were able to get seats together and the girls did pretty well looking out of the windows (and of course, snacking…we can’t possibly be somewhere more than 30 minutes without a snack).

The face you get when you tell someone to slow down on eating the blueberries...

For the second train, we were less successful. The station was quite busy and when the quite full train arrived there was a mad rush to get on it. Charlotte & I got separated from Olivia and Adam. We carried on into the train in search of seats – there were none – we ended up standing in an aisle. I texted Adam who confirmed that they had made it onto the train but were stuck in the luggage / bike storage area and weren’t able to make it into the passage compartment. Thankfully he was able to open up the stroller and put Oliva in it so she at least had a place to sit. We made it through the 45 minutes or so of being squashed and detrained with most of our new found best friends.

We made it!

We had about a mile and a half walk to get to our hotel. Olivia was ready for a nap. We were all beyond ready for lunch. So we decided that we’d walk in the direction of our hotel and stop to eat lunch along the way. We found a little cafe on a side street which suited us perfectly. We could sit a little in the sun and enjoy the city around us.

After lunch, we checked into our hotel where Olivia fell asleep the second she saw her pack & play set up. Charlotte & I decided to walk around a bit to explore the city while Adam stayed with Olivia.

We found the lake & ducks! We spent nearly 20 minutes watching the sailboats.

When Olivia woke up, we decided to take a walk up to the Old Town and see the old city wall. I’d read about the historic clock tower and wanted to see it for myself. The dial of the clock has digits large enough to have been read by fishermen on the lake. Its bell, the Leodegar Bell, strikes the hour one minute before the other church clocks in the city so it can be heard clearly through the entire city.

At the main entrance into the old town.

The clock tower

The inside of the clock

This 100+ ft tall tower was erected in 1442. And guess which 4 year old wanted to climb to the top…

Okay, the view might have been worth the stairs.

Back down at ground level, we found a lovely restaurant for dinner then headed back to the hotel with two VERY tired children.

Being in a hotel, it was difficult to have our evening routine of a glass of milk with our cartoon before bed. So, Adam went down to the hotel restaurant and ordered one glass of milk. Fanciest evening milk glass we’ve ever had! I don’t think my plastic IKEA cups are going to cut it anymore…

The next day we decided to try out the Swiss Transportation Museum, aka Verkehrshaus, based on the recommendations from all the other moms.

It was amazing!

Anyone interested in trains, planes, cars, boats and anything else that goes needs to plan a visit. The enormous complex has several indoor halls, each centering on a different mode of travel. We pushed buttons, we rode on things, we did very little reading of any of the educational material that Adam & I wanted to take in, but the girls had a blast.

We ended up being there all day - much longer than the 2-3 hours I’d initially thought. We were too tired for ice cream on the way back to the hotel. Oh wait, no we weren’t.

For our final day, we took in the sights of the Kapellbrücke. The bridge is a covered wooden footbridge in the center of the city. It was named after the nearby St. Peter's Chapel. The Kapellbrücke is the oldest wooden covered bridge in Europe, as well as (at least according to Wikipedia) the world's oldest surviving truss bridge. The bridge contains a number of interior paintings dating back to the 17th century. The paintings were executed by local painters and depict events from Lucerne's history. Many of them were destroyed in a 1993 fire and have been subsequently restored.

We boarded our train back home with an 18-month old who had again skipped her nap & she wasn’t impressed by it.

Neighbouring Feldkrich

This weekend was our first real opportunity to venture into Feldkirch as tourists. There aren’t many urban areas around our new home but we were pleased to discover that Feldkirch is a very walkable city center with enough restaurants, coffee shops, bakeries and specialty stores to add some much needed variety to our everyday lives. It also retains much of its middle ages charm with cobbled streets, timber buildings clad in ostensibly painted stucco, multiple churches with bells chiming the hours, a broad market area in the city center that is free of vehicular traffic and the old castle perched on a hilltop overlooking the scene.

We started the day with a tour of the old castle.

While not a world class museum by any stretch the interior of the castle does maintain an interesting collection of religious and secular artefacts dating back to the early middle ages along with what appear to be original frescoes throughout. You can also tell that the castle has been through a number of renovations and upgrades over the centuries by the way rooms and hallways occasionally connect at odd ends and changing levels as you meander through the serpentine museum path. 

Not a Fresco!

The top few floors of the castle are devoted to the armoury museum (included in the tour) with pieces spanning its 800 year history as a defensive bastion against invading French and Germanic forces from the north. In fact, Napoleon once sent Messena and his army into the region to defend against 2nd Coalition forces looking to dislodge the French from Austrian and Italian strongholds.    

After touring the castle we walked the streets of the old town for a bit until hunger and the weather overtook us. Bascilico Pizzaria passed the 4 yo taste test BTW, despite the apparent displeasure of getting her picture taken.

Also not a fresco

By the time we finished up lunch it was time to head back home so the little one could get her nap in but we will certainly be spending more time in Feldkirch over the next 3 years!

Kindergarten in German is Kindergarten

In Dallas, Charlotte had been attending pre-school four days a week at a small facility run by our church. She loved it. She loved her friends. She loved her three teachers. She thrived on the routine and was making great progress on her social skills.

When we came over for our visit back in February, we were excited to find a small international school just across the border in Switzerland which would support a global education, in English. It is also an IB school, so we knew the academics were going to be good too. When we visited, the staff spoke about that the students come from 31 different countries and that there are at least 29 languages spoken by students & staff. We were really excited for Charlotte to be able to grow in that community.

When we visited, it was the school’s ski break (yeah, that’s a thing here, you get a week in February to go skiing and then another week in May for Spring Break). But it allowed us to walk into all the classrooms and take pictures since there were no students on campus. I took a few pictures of the kindergarten classroom and play areas in hopes that Charlotte would also get excited.

You know what she was most excited about? The pirate ship. That’s what she talked about for three months. “I’m going to go to a new school with a pirate ship playground”

In fairness, I would too.

Fast forward to us living here now.

The school is year round, meaning they didn’t finish the ‘21-‘22 until the end of June then started ‘22-‘23 in mid-August about the same time US schools started. The school allowed us to enroll her early to finish out the last 6 weeks of classes so that she could get a little flavor for the routine and also make some friends. We thought that was a great idea to help her get settled in. So off we went to the unofficial first day of Kindergarten.

On her first day, we also happened to hit the monthly bake sale / PTA fundraiser so we ended up buying a brownie to celebrate our first day. Needless to say, she thought this was the best school ever. Also, please note the state of her knees at the end of the day - she had a GREAT day on the playground.

As we got to know the school more, we realized how much they taught through nature and exploring. The main lesson or “unit of inquiry” as they term it for the last six weeks was on mini-beasts (or small bugs as I eventually figured out). The class would often take a hike to explore a field and look at what bugs they could find. One day a farmer let them all pet sheep. Charlotte came home so excited that she’d found all sorts of flies. GRRRREEEAAAAT!

They also are not afraid to get messy. They filled the sand pit with water one day and let the kids play in the mud.

My washing machine will never be the same.

Potentially Charlotte’s favorite day was when they brought in a small pool and told all the kids to bring a swimsuit as part of PE. Bless the teachers who got them back after “swimming” and feeding them ice cream pops.

We’re excited to see where “real” Kindergarten takes her next year.