Geneva, Switzerland
This year our event actually began in Geneva, where we met and spent our first evening at the President Wilson Hotel, located in the heart of Geneva.
That evening we drove across the bridge and dined at Le Lion d'Or a restaurant in the hilltop village of Cologny, Geneva's Beverly Hills with a view. Windows in the restaurant frame the sun setting over the Lake and Jurua Mountains. The main dinning room and the first-floor bar look towards the city. We sat outside on the shaded outdoor patio-terrace for a fun, noisy evening of friends talking, laughing, eating great foods, drinking wonderful Swiss wines. My favorite part was the fruit and cheese cart, loaded with the incredible cheeses you only find in Switzerland!
That evening we drove across the bridge and dined at Le Lion d'Or a restaurant in the hilltop village of Cologny, Geneva's Beverly Hills with a view. Windows in the restaurant frame the sun setting over the Lake and Jurua Mountains. The main dinning room and the first-floor bar look towards the city. We sat outside on the shaded outdoor patio-terrace for a fun, noisy evening of friends talking, laughing, eating great foods, drinking wonderful Swiss wines. My favorite part was the fruit and cheese cart, loaded with the incredible cheeses you only find in Switzerland!
Jaeger - LeCoultre
The following morning we left Geneva and headed to the Jaeger LeCoultre watch factory in Le Sentier in the Valley de Joux, Switzerland. We were given a private, behind the scene tour of the factory. Jaeger LeCoultre is a world-know brand, dating back to 1833 when Antoine LeCoutlre first opened the doors of his factory. All parts used in the watch are still made on this site.
Montreux, Switzerland
We had lunch on the grounds of a fabulous restaurant near Montreux then drove on to Interlaken.
Paul Jackson meets old friends 11,000ft up on Europe's biggest glacier!
"In Interlaken it is a beautiful Swiss day, with unusually high temperatures. A few miles and several thousand feet away, at Jungfrau, it is also sunny but the air is cold enough that you can see your breath. Standing on top of Europe's biggest glacier, the Aletsch, we look south over an uninterrupted panorama of snow-covered mountains with the vast flat to of the frozen river cutting a track between the crowded peaks. At this time of year the cracks in the ice are beginning to show through the thin covering of snow which remains over the Place de Concorde, the area of the glacier immediately below us, running down from the saddle between the Eiger and the Jungfrau.
'Not much good for skiing,' I say to Heinz, the taciturn mountain man who is acting as our guide around the Top of Europe, at this small complex of rail platforms, restaurants, shops and a research station calls itself.
'This is not a ski resort even in winter,' he says. 'You can find good runs down the numerous valleys which run off the main glacier, but only for a couple of months in the spring. The ski resorts are much lower and he points down the opposite side of the mountain towards Wengen and the spot where the great downhill race, the Laberhorn starts its precipitous descent.
In spite of Heinz's lack of interest, there are a few people skiing down very short runs on to the glacier bed from a high outcrop just around the corner from our vantage point, which overlooks both valleys. There are also teams of huskies ready to take you for a sleigh rider across the snow field.
Inside the glacier you can visit the Ice Palace, a large area of tunnels and galleries carved into the moving ice. Each year, as the glacier rolls slowly forward, the architecture has to be re-cut. From the outside the research station looks like a high-tech castle build for a Bond villain; it stands at 11,000 ft - more than two miles - perched on the rock, bristling with antennae and dishes, the steel of its dome glistening in the bright sun. Inside the mountain once could easily be in the bowels of a madman's lair. Numerous tunnels link parts of the complex. Dark passages suddenly burst into bright views of the craggy slopes down which 007 will soon be skiing, pursued by a Lycra-clad gang of seductive snow-boarding assassins.
Seven eating locations, including the incongruous Bollywood Indian Restaurant, are cut into the rock in the heart of the mountain. We sit in the Crystal which has a stunning view of the white peaks, and drink a delicious Swiss red wine. The menuy and wine list are remarkably varied given that everything on them has been lifted all the way up the mountain. The food and service are excellent. A sign on the wall behind us invites visitors to make a mobile call from here - the highest place on Earth where this can be done, it proclaims.
After lunch we return to the station to board the train back to Kleine Scheidegg, where this specially designed mountain climber starts and finishes. The trains are smaller than the regular transport that brings you to Kleine Scheideff from the station at Interlaken on the valley floor. They have to be small to fit into the tunnel carved into the heart of the granite mountains through which we travel for most of the 40-minute journey. We stop twice on the way down at stations where on the ascent you are encouraged to get out and look through the windows in the Eiger's north face that are just a few feet from the track. The tunnel was dug at the end of the 19th century almost exclusively by Italian labour. ...At Kleine Scheidegg, where we change back on to the immaculate carriages of the standard Swiss railway....
Back in Interlaken that night we stayed in the excellent Victoria Jungfrau Hotel. In the center of town it has an ideal view of Jungfrau, framed by much smaller but closer hills. This creates the perfect lines to watch the gleaming white beauty of its high peak shining and turning a delicate shade of pink as the sun sets behind it. The hotel has been recently refurbished its spa and pool area, which provides a wonderful place to relax after a long day at high altitude. We had dinner in the hotel's Terrace Restaurant, with its own perfect view of the setting light reflected off the mountain."
'Not much good for skiing,' I say to Heinz, the taciturn mountain man who is acting as our guide around the Top of Europe, at this small complex of rail platforms, restaurants, shops and a research station calls itself.
'This is not a ski resort even in winter,' he says. 'You can find good runs down the numerous valleys which run off the main glacier, but only for a couple of months in the spring. The ski resorts are much lower and he points down the opposite side of the mountain towards Wengen and the spot where the great downhill race, the Laberhorn starts its precipitous descent.
In spite of Heinz's lack of interest, there are a few people skiing down very short runs on to the glacier bed from a high outcrop just around the corner from our vantage point, which overlooks both valleys. There are also teams of huskies ready to take you for a sleigh rider across the snow field.
Inside the glacier you can visit the Ice Palace, a large area of tunnels and galleries carved into the moving ice. Each year, as the glacier rolls slowly forward, the architecture has to be re-cut. From the outside the research station looks like a high-tech castle build for a Bond villain; it stands at 11,000 ft - more than two miles - perched on the rock, bristling with antennae and dishes, the steel of its dome glistening in the bright sun. Inside the mountain once could easily be in the bowels of a madman's lair. Numerous tunnels link parts of the complex. Dark passages suddenly burst into bright views of the craggy slopes down which 007 will soon be skiing, pursued by a Lycra-clad gang of seductive snow-boarding assassins.
Seven eating locations, including the incongruous Bollywood Indian Restaurant, are cut into the rock in the heart of the mountain. We sit in the Crystal which has a stunning view of the white peaks, and drink a delicious Swiss red wine. The menuy and wine list are remarkably varied given that everything on them has been lifted all the way up the mountain. The food and service are excellent. A sign on the wall behind us invites visitors to make a mobile call from here - the highest place on Earth where this can be done, it proclaims.
After lunch we return to the station to board the train back to Kleine Scheidegg, where this specially designed mountain climber starts and finishes. The trains are smaller than the regular transport that brings you to Kleine Scheideff from the station at Interlaken on the valley floor. They have to be small to fit into the tunnel carved into the heart of the granite mountains through which we travel for most of the 40-minute journey. We stop twice on the way down at stations where on the ascent you are encouraged to get out and look through the windows in the Eiger's north face that are just a few feet from the track. The tunnel was dug at the end of the 19th century almost exclusively by Italian labour. ...At Kleine Scheidegg, where we change back on to the immaculate carriages of the standard Swiss railway....
Back in Interlaken that night we stayed in the excellent Victoria Jungfrau Hotel. In the center of town it has an ideal view of Jungfrau, framed by much smaller but closer hills. This creates the perfect lines to watch the gleaming white beauty of its high peak shining and turning a delicate shade of pink as the sun sets behind it. The hotel has been recently refurbished its spa and pool area, which provides a wonderful place to relax after a long day at high altitude. We had dinner in the hotel's Terrace Restaurant, with its own perfect view of the setting light reflected off the mountain."