A trip to Switzerland

What do I love about being in Germany you ask? I love the fact that I can travel all around Europe and most places are not more then 5 hours away. A friend of mine and I went to Lucerne, Switzerland on Saturday, we had a great time, I wouldn't mind going back when the weather was a little warmer and so I can see the Swiss Alps. So when we got there we got off the bus and had a tour of the City, the first stop was the Lion Monument which was dedicated to all the Swiss mercenaries killed in Paris in 1792. On August 10 that year, French revolutionaries stormed the royal palace, the Tuileries; in the face of the mob, the Swiss palace guards were ordered to lay down their arms by Louis XVI and were subsequently massacred. It was very sad and you can only imagine what the mercenaries went through.

Also right now there is an event going on pretty much in all of Europe called Fasching, I have cut and pasted what fasching is here Fasching is carnival season. Originally it was a Pagan festival which came out of ancient Rome or Greece. In recent centuries, however, it has become more associated with the Christian Church. Officially the season starts on 11th November at 11:11am, although I've no idea why. It continues pretty low key for about 3 months. Things really begin to happen in February or March - 7 weeks before Easter. This is the week when people are allowed to "flip out" and behave recklessly before the beginning of Lent, which is a much more serious time. They definitely "flip out" with costumes and just down right acting silly. Here are a couple pictures of that, in these pictures there were several bands dressed up and just playing music down the streets, very loud music I might add.

The other place we visited is a world famous Bridge called the Chapel Bridge, it is the oldest wooden bridge in Europe, The covered bridge, constructed in 1333, was designed to help protect the city of Lucerne from attacks. Inside the bridge are a series of paintings from the 17th century depicting events from Luzern's history. Much of the bridge, and the majority of these paintings, were destroyed in a 1993 fire, though it was quickly rebuilt. Also in the bridge there are paintings from the war and while we were there they changed the pictures out for the fasching festival. In these pictures you will see theWasserturm (water tower) which was used as a prison, torture chamber.

on the tour we were able to roam around for 4 hours on our own we did some shopping and me and another girl from the tour went up to a Fort/Wall to protect the town of Lucerne it was built sometime in the 1300's. Here are some pictures of that as well.

Here are just some random pictures I took, first one is my friend Sonica and I the background is the Chapel Bridge, the second one is is a restuarant decorated for Fasching and the last two are a beautiful church we visited.

Also on the trip we took a boat ride on the Ruess River it was very pretty, however we were supposed to be able to see the Swiss Alps, we didn't because of the fog but I did take a picture of what the fog and the Alps were supposed to be! The first picture is of a Jesus Monument, the second is a lighthouse that a famous German Composer lived in for 6 years and the last one is supposed to be the Swiss Alps.

Well I have many more pictures I took over 150 of them, I plan on doing a scrapbook of my trips around Europe. I should probably get it started before I have too many to do and never want to get to them! I hope you enjoyed the pictures and until next post, hope everyone has a very pleasant week.