Monday 9th September Arriving in Switzerland

Monday 9th September 2013

We arrive at Zurich 

Swiss online train booking and information

http://www.viefrancigene.it/le-tappe/svizzera.html 

 What a long journey! we departed Brisbane airport at 2 pm Sunday 8th September. We had a 4 hour break at Bangkok airport - not much to do or see there... Our flight from Bangkok was delayed by an hour, so we finally arrived in Zurich at 8:30 am Monday 9th Sept local time - about 33 hours traveling. I managed to snooze for a couple of hours on the last leg of the plane flight.

Once we arrived and went through all the customs etc... We found the Train booking and information service at the airport and booked our train tickets - all so easy and organized here in Switzerland!

We caught the  train to Lausanne, and then changed for Martigny.  Total journey time around 3 hours 10:13 dep Zurich airport, change trains at Lausaunne, then arrived at Martigny at 1:40 pm

One of the most expensive train trips I've paid for-  162 Swiss Francs for both of us. In one 3 hour train trip we changed languages, signage and announcements from German to French!

Gorgeous scenery on the train- particularly around Lausanne, with views over the Lake - terracing squeezes every possible bit of space for the vineyards! 

Martigny is a lovely town, surrounded by the mountains, lots of lovely buildings, Roman ruins, and a castle.

Tried to get my first stamp for my Pilgrims passport, but there wasn't anyone at the Catherdral, I'll try again tomorrow.

Accommodation in Martigny 

All the accommodation here seems very overpriced for what it is - we found an room available at the Motel des Sports , 148 Swiss Francs for the night - very basic room with bathroom, at least it's clean.

And, as a bonus we have a view of some new excavations of Roman Ruins behind the hotel!

View from the front of the hotel, castle on the left - Chateau de la Batiaz. Cathedral spire on the right, and real mountains all around!

After checking into our room, having a lovely shower and settling in, we thought a little snooze before dinner was in order - turned into quite a long snooze! we slept from 5pm to nearly 11 pm 😴 oh, well too late for dinner, more sleeping! 

Tomorrow, on our way to Orsieres we'll  walk past the St Bernard dog Museum and the Roman amphitheater.