Trip to Rhine Falls

Rhine falls is a beautiful waterfalls about 1 hours drive from Zurich. Its supposed to be the largest in mainland Europe, but its not that big (i personally think Jog Falls in Karnataka is bigger) but its really beautiful and there is a climb which takes you right upto the waterfall.

It was our first weekend trip from Zrich and we went the first Saturday I arrived. I've always wanted to get out and travel in the weekends and we are quite keen to make the best of the summer here. It was a sunny day, and the hubby was keen to take his new SUV for the first long drive.

We are not early risers, and by the time the kids had their breakfast and were ready to leave it was already 10 am. A mad scramble to find my passport (we have to drive through Germany to get to the Rhine Falls and a colleague had a bad experience at the border checkpoint as he had forgotten to take his passport) pushed it to 10:30 and we felt we had already lost half

the day.

We had a slightly tough time getting out of Zurich city as the hubby was not familiar with how the GPS worked, and even on the highway we went much slower than the speed limit as he was getting used to the car settings. It did not help that A wailed in her car seat at the back continuously for the entire trip! We reached there in an hour (I think can be done in 45 mins once we are familiar with the city exits) parked our car and started the trek down to the lake. I had A in a sling and S walked with the hubby.

Along the way we stopped to show S the ducks on the lake and A was extremely excite

d on seeing a dog next to her. She kept pointing at it, and the owner opened the leash and let it come towards us. She immediately got scared and clung to me :)

We then walked to the boat point and bought tickets for a one hour cruise around the lake, which goes to many points on the lake and along the waterfall, and then realised

that we had just missed the boat and would have to wait another hour. We managed to exchange the tickets for a much shorter ride, just to the waterfall and back, which left every 15 mins. S was highly disappointed as the one hour boat was a pink boat and the boat with the shorter ride was not!

The boat took us to a set of steep steps just next to the waterfall. The steps were quite steep and narrow and rose sharply and there was a lot of crowd on the steps so midway I got worried about S and A. So we just quickly went to the top, looked around and came back down. There was a group which kept on taking photos at one of the landings in between, and with their various permutations and combinations of people standing for the photos, hogged the entire landing till we got frustrated and went down. C'mon just take a photo and get on, and allow other people to come and see the view!

The waterfall was beautiful up close and S was quite excited to see her first waterfall. There is a castle on the top of the waterfall, but we decided to skip it and keep it for another day.

There was a long queue at the he self service restauarant and everything was in German, so the hubby got me the only thing which seemed veg - ricotta cheese and tomato salad !!! (i had said no fries) so that was a most exciting lunch. A refused to eat the cereal i offered or anything else (she chomped on some teddy bear shaped snacks though) . S had her staple fries and some croissant. We made up with yummy ice cream.

After lunch we walked around the place, spotting a playground which we had promised S. She was hesitant at first to go on the big slide but after seeing other children (and some aunties!!) go on it, she tried it and really enjoyed it. A was lazing cosily on my lap while I watched the beautiful view of the waterfall.

We set back for home around 3 pm, this time A slept in the car so it was quite an uneventful ride back. I gave A a late lunch at home, and S got some maggi (the highlight of her day after the slide I'm sure). A fun trip overall, though I was a bit tired from carrying A around in the sling. But the pram would have been impossible on the steps, so will just have to become stronger!!