A Trip to Dragon Mountain

Last week, we decided to take a day trip down to Mt. Pilatus near Lucerne. Its name comes from the legend that the spirit of Pontius Pilate finally found peace on Mt. Pilatus (why there, I don't know). It also has the nickname Dragon Mountain, because legend also has it that dragons used to live high on the craggy sides of the mountain. Friendly dragons, but still dragons.

Needless to say, when LGG heard about this, she immediately decided we had to go. That was months ago, but as ZMG said, we've been a little busy. It was about time, so off we went.

There are two main ways up Pilatus: the cable car and The World's Steepest Cog Railway (TM, and used over and over and over in advertising). We decided to use the latter. This turns out to be quite an adventure, beginning with the scrum to get on board. In the States, a big attraction like The World's Steepest Cog Railway would have a long line leading to the ticket booths, and then a long, well-organized line from there to the cars, contained within ropes or something so it's basically only one person wide. Normal to an American eye.

This is not how things are done at The World's Steepest Cog Railway. Instead, there is a throng of people streaming off the boat and the train to get to the thronging point to get tickets, and then a throng of people thronging toward the turnstile to get through to The Hot and Crowded Waiting Area For The World's Steepest Cog Railway. There are no lines, just streamflow and controlled chaos. In the end, it worked out OK, but I was grumpily planning how to reorganize things for the entire hour we spent waiting for our trip up The World's Steepest Cog Railway.

Once we were released to board The World's Steepest Cog Railway, we grabbed seats in one of the cars (like this one, which is moving sideways on a special track so that they can move it out of the way of the next car - pretty cool):

and snapped a couple of semi-family portraits:

Here are various other views along the ascent - which is, in fairness, darn steep.

The Alpnachersee, where we started

We are going all the way up there - note the clouds and the pretty hillside

About 25 minutes into the 30 minute ascent up The World's Steepest Cog Railway, we passed through this stereotypical Swiss Alpine meadow (note the green grass, the Swiss flag, and some of The Stunning Alps in the background).


The meadow came stocked with several cows, who placidly munched lunch while we rolled by. They see this kind of thing every day, after all.

At the top, we stopped for a quick lunch and some pictures before heading out for a couple short walks. First, a shot to show how steep Pilatus really is:

and a portrait of ZMG and LGG holding LGG's Zak and Wheezie toy from PBS' Dragon Tales (warning: Flash used there). LGG really wanted to bring Z & W along since we were going to Dragon Mountain.

You can see Lucerne in the upper right in that picture. Also note the clouds - Pilatus has a stunning view on clear days, apparently, but it was not clear when we were there. Visibility varied from a long way to about 30 meters depending on whether or not we were in the clouds at a given moment.

After stuffing Zak and Wheezie into the backpack, leaving their heads and arms out so they could comfortably see the view, we went for a walk on two of the trails at the top. Along the way, we passed many pretty flowers - here's just one picture so that I don't bore you:


We also had a treat: many mountain goats, starting with a kid hiding in the grass on a very steep slope and culminating in this adult with great horns:


We were amazed at how close they came to the trail we were walking on, despite the fairly constant foot traffic. I guess they're used to us humans hanging around.

The storms were brewing up and we started to hear thunder, so we turned around. At about this same time, the horrible event happened at the top of Pilatus: somewhere along the trail, Zak and Wheezie decided to jump out of our backpack. Despite me searching the trail three times, and ZMG once, and asking at Lost and Found, Zak and Wheezie have found a new home. We expected LGG to have a complete meltdown, but in fact, she took it really well. We all agreed to think that Zak and Wheezie are either visiting their dragon kin or are now sleeping with one of the mountain goats.

Anyway, it was getting stormier, so we headed off down the mountain. We chatted along the way with an American from Dallas who was visiting his Swiss friend who lives in Lucerne, and then boarded the train back to Lucerne. There, we finally had a negative experience with Swiss public transit: the train broke down and we sat for about an hour before finally being towed back into the previous station. There, nobody really seemed to know what was happening, but eventually we got on another train to Lucerne, which arrived without complication. LGG was amazing during the delay -- sitting quietly, drawing, chatting with us, and being very patient. It could have been so much worse, especially after the loss on Pilatus.

We agreed it was dinner time, so we walked along the river in Lucerne until we found a British pub - a Guinness sounded just right to me. We were treated to this lovely view:


That's the Wasserturm (water tower) and Kapelbrücke (Chapel Bridge) in the near background, and Mt. Pilatus in the background on the right. Please note that the summit is now clear as a bell. Arrrrgh. Oh, well, the Guinness was great, the food was good, and we had a nice chat with the folks at the next table - one of whom turned out to come from the same town in New Zealand as a graduate school classmate of mine, and whose brother works at the same institute as several of my friends from New Zealand. It's a small world, isn't it?

We wrapped up our day with a short walking tour, including this final shot of LGG dancing in the streets of Lucerne:


It was certainly an eventful day at Dragon Mountain!