V is for Views

Finally getting to the end of the alphabet series, now onto the letter V and what better word than views. I have seen lots of wonderful views and was hard to pick only five on them, so here goes!

The first photo is of Lake Zug, then we have the city of Zurich from the Uetliberg, then it is Lake Gruyeres from the castle, then the beautiful city of Mahon in Menorca and finally Mont Blanc from Chamonix!

Which ones do you like the best?

Wishing you all a great weekend!

Gruyeres Castle

We visited Gruyere Castle back in September, when we were returning from a long weekend Chamonix, the plan was to stop and visit the town. Then we decided to visit the castle too, and it is well worth a visit, with lovely views of the mountains and lake.

The first thing you can do is watch a multimedia show which gives the history of the castle and the town. It was very interesting and helpful to know a bit about the castle. The castle between 11th and 16th centuries was the home to 19 Gruyere counts, the last one to live there Michel delcared bankruptcy in 1554. The towns of Berne and Fribourg shared his lands. In 1938 the state of Fribourg bought the castle and opened it as a museum.

Then we walked through the rooms, everything looked well preserved even Alessio liked it. The garden looked lovely but unfortunately we could not visit it.

If we had, had more time it would have been nice to visit Lake Gruyere, so another time for that trip. With my parents coming again in September there will be lots of places for us to visit. Before that there is a trip to Hong Kong and Paris.

Have a great week!

Gruyeres

On our trip back from Chamonix we decided to stop in Gruyeres, it was a place I had always wanted to visit and being in the region we thought it was a good place to take a break. We were lucky with the weather too, it was one of the last really hots days of the summer!

We parked the car at the bottom of the town and walked there, as it is a car-free area. The medieval town has amazing buildings to gaze at on both sides, it hard to take it all in. The main cobbled street is full of restaurants, hotels and some shops. We had a lunch very delicious at Fleur de Lys restaurant, then carried on our walk through the small town. We also checked out some of the shops and bought cheese and honey.

We headed up the castle and decided to do a tour, which I will do a separate post on that. We got some great views of Gruyeres and the surrounding area. Gruyeres is of course well-known for its cheese and if we had had more time we may have gone to visit the cheese factory. Also if we had had more time it would have been nice to visit the lake which from the castle we could see.

If you are looking for a day trip it is well worth from Zurich, especially if you include a visit to see how they make cheese.