Mt Titlis and my adorable mother

There was a sweltering sun and a standing fan in our hotel room in Switzerland since they don't have air-conditioners. There was never a need for them, I guess. But oh, the sweet repercussions of global warming. What an age to be alive in! ANYWAY, I had been receiving several side eyes from my mother for insisting on bringing a pair of warm clothes for each of us. Mt Titlis offered up an opportunity to make use of our jackets.

 

We took a train to Luzern from Kriens Mattenhof, and then a longish train to Engelberg. Technology has been my best friend on this trip. There's an app for Swiss trains. And the Swiss travel pass is my other new love. The journey to Engelberg itself was full of astounding views out of the panoramic windows. Honestly, I could live on a Swiss farm if they had space for all my books, which I'm guessing they will. New life goal: befriend an established Swiss farmer and live with them. On that date, my cellphone is flooded with photographs of undulating landscapes, picture perfect houses and Swiss cows. 

 

The person who organised our trip had said we should get off the train at Engelberg and follow the crowd. Well, the crowd branched off into two and went in opposite directions. My socially awkward self decided not to ask anyone for directions. Eventually, we sort of drifted the right way and Ma posed for a photo on a little bridge. 

 

Why are cable cars/ropeways called gondolas in Switzerland? I was initially utterly confused about taking a gondola (which, I thought, went in the water) up a mountain! But ascending Mt Titlis entailed taking a ropeway up lush green slopes gradually fading into white. Midway, there was a stop. We stepped out. I saw a poster that said: "If you want to go to Mt Titlis, stay inside." We power-walked back into the cable car. And started on the last leg of the journey. 

 

The destination was a five-storey building. We took the elevator up. The top floor had a terrace and, beyond that, a hanging metal-chain swinging bridge that one could walk across and either go down stairs into the building, or come back the same way. This was also the origin point for the star of the day: The Ice Flyer.

 

See, I've seen cinematic shots of these single-chair, no cover rope transport across snow-capped peaks, and honestly, I was under the impression that I would feel wimpy going on one of them. But hey! I was so cool. The Swiss Ice Flyer is a six-seat bench hanging thing that doesn't need all seats to be full. It's a continuously moving mode of transport that one has to kind of climb on while it's in motion. I was apprehensive about my mother being able to negotiate it, but well, I hope I stay as nimble as her when I'm her age.

 

So the two of us took the Ice Flyer across a white, misty landscape to a snow-covered spot. There were free snow games. You could sit on a rubber bowl and let gravity pull you down a slope. My mother, with no consideration whatsoever to my panic regarding her wellbeing, waved at me and took a bowl down. I followed. Got stuck on a flat area, got bumped into by another bowl, and plummeted to the bottom. The striking cars ride on the Swiss Alps was the most fun I'd had in a long while. Then my mother, who was trying to photograph things while standing smack in the middle of the collision zone, got hit by a stranger's bowl and fell into another stranger's lap. It was hilarious.

 

We returned via another swinging bench and took a walk along the hanging chain bridge. Posed for a few photographs with each other, and then went out to a terrace and ate croissants at a table as Swiss crows hung around. A couple of them ate pieces of croissant from my hand. So cute!

 

We wanted to catch the 3.10pm train back from Engelberg, but we got delayed when we got off the cable-car on a different floor and walked about trying to find an exit. We reached the station just as the train started rolling away. So we hung out and ate yoghurt till the next train came along at 4.10pm.

 

Ma and I tend to either overestimate, or underestimate, our travelling skills. We thought we'd get time, and the enthusiasm, to get back to Luzern and then take another train out to Mt Rigi. The delay actually helped us out since it automatically cancelled the Mt Rigi plan, and we didn't even have to admit to each other that we were asleep on our feet.

 

At Luzern station, I walked up to the SSB kiosk and the man there explained how to go to Jungfraujoch the next day — complete with printing out the train schedule right from Kriens and then back. SSB gets all of my love.

 

Back at Kriens, we discovered our hotel didn't have a lunch/dinner thing, but the very sweet man at the reception said there were several eateries around. Honestly, Kriens is like a sleepy south Kolkata neighbourhood. The added areas, if you may. There was a Subway and a McDonald's as well, but we discovered a cute little restaurant called Fontana that I'd thought must be extremely expensive, but which wasn't, right behind our hotel, and dined there. More later on food.