Hyatt Adventures

Follow along as we travel the world!

Säntis, Switzerland

The view from our room this morning. Hazy, but still beautiful!

After finally checking in with the front desk of our hotel this morning, we had breakfast at the hotel restaurant. We have been lucky that all the hotels we have stayed at have provided free breakfast. And they have all been really good.

These pretzel rolls were so good that I had to take a bite before I got a picture!
Hot chocolate for a chilly morning. Russell said it’s probably Swiss Miss!
The view at breakfast

We are realizing the language barrier will be the greatest in Switzerland. The four national languages of the country are German, French, Italian, and Romansh, but in this area most people seem to be speaking German, which we don’t know at all. I took Spanish in high school and Russell took French.

Most restaurants have outside seating

Our first stop of the day was only 45 minutes away, and what a pretty drive it was!

The clouds are hanging very low today
The architecture here is so vastly different from Spain and France
A horse drawn carriage
Sure wish we could see the mountain views!

We were really looking forward to taking the cable car to Säntis peak today. For those of you that watch The Amazing Race on TV, this is the place they went this season where they walked along a ridge and could see six countries from one spot. It looked absolutely beautiful on the show, so we decided to go there.

The cable lines fade into the abyss!
This is the loading point at the bottom of the mountain
The cable cars hold 80 people, but only a few were going up today….. hmmmm, wonder why?
Here we go!
Säntis peak is 8200 feet above sea level and is the highest peak in northeastern Switzerland.
Kind of freaky not being able to see where we are going
Looking down from the top loading area
We went out on the observation deck
This sign shows a map of what mountains you are looking at in the distance
This was literally our view from the top!
Maybe it will be better if I look through this!
This window shows how high the snow was. About 10’ high!
We made our way out to the weather station at the top
This is the trail we would have taken along the ridge. We decided to skip it.

It’s amazing to think that they found many, many sea life fossils at the peak. All this area used to be underwater millions of years ago! The Alps rose up from the sea 30 million years ago due to the collision of the African and European tectonic plates.

Here is one of the fossils showing sea life

While we wish we could have seen the magnificent views of the Swiss Alps from the top, we are still glad we were able to experience going to the top of Säntis. On the plus side, I didn’t have to take too many pictures! On to our next stop.

We were still in awe of the rolling countryside throughout this region
There were many goats, sheep, and cows in the pastures

We arrived in Bern, the capital of Switzerland, around 5:00 this evening.

We couldn’t resist sharing a soft pretzel!

2 responses to “Säntis, Switzerland”

  1. Robert Hyatt Avatar
    Robert Hyatt

    Having you two “present” in between your pictures of the scenery, especially the architecture- and the food! makes me feel I am there with you.

    Like

  2. Connie Jarvis Avatar
    Connie Jarvis

    I’m thoroughly enjoying your awesome adventures and all the pictures you take. I feel like I’m traveling along with you!

    Like

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