Rushing water and mountain scenery

Today was our last of three full days in the Swiss Alps. Of our remaining travel plans, today was a visit to Grindelwald, one of the more touristy destinations in the Alps, mainly due to its location. I also wanted to visit Reichenbach Falls. For those that don't know what it represents in fiction, Reichenbach Falls is where Arthur Conan Doyle killed off Sherlock Holmes and Moriarty.

I've added some photos to the Swiss Alps set:

https://www.flickr.com/photos/81692166@N05/sets/72157645537279210/

As well as adding a new set for Grindelwald:

https://www.flickr.com/photos/81692166@N05/sets/72157645543302097/

We'd started out a bit later than planned, meaning we got to Grindelwald at about 2 in the afternoon. We drove around for a while trying to find the best place for a panorama, before driving in to the centre of town:

Grindelwald town

After getting some smaller change, we wandered around for a while. It was very touristy, and prices were outrageous - around AUD$60 for a steak! But then everything in Switzerland is expensive.

The views though are amazing. It's basically surrounded on all four sides by the Alps, and the results are quite spectacular:

The mountains in Grindelwald

We got as far as the train stations, where trains leave to go to Jungfrau, one of the more famous mountains in Switzerland, behind Matterhorn. By then we'd mostly had enough, so we wandered back to the car and headed towards Reichenbach Falls.

It was fair way there, and by the time we'd got there, the cable car up to the falls wasn't running. So we instead made the half-hour hike up. Dad went on the roads instead, so it took a bit longer than planned, but the end result was absolutely spectacular. You can see the mist being pushed by the falls from the bottom of the hill, and the volume of water smashing into the rocks is something to behold:

Reichenbach Falls area

There was also some decent scenery on the way up, with a view of the towns in the valley below. It was getting quite late, so we hurried back down to the car and then back to the chalet. After a late dinner, we'll head off to Strasbourg tomorrow. See you there!