Pilatus

The other reason for visiting Luzern was Pilatus, a small (7,000 feet) peak west of town, but one of Europe's great mountain landmarks. My interest in Pilatus is four-fold: 1) view from the summits; 2) regard for Pontius Pilate, whose spirit allegedly dwelled near the summit (it was Pilate who asked, philosophically, "what is truth?," then went on to other things); 3) on Pilatus, supersitions about mountains began to fade after visits, in the 1700s, to the summit demonstrated that no one dwelled there and nothing bad came of climbing; 4) Wagner climbed Pilatus; 5) I wanted the exercise, but did not properly calculate the 5600 feet descent. Five-fold. No one expects the Spanish Inquisition.

OK, I took the cog-wheel train to the saddle

at the top; it is the world's highest-angle

cog-gtrain, 48 degrees at the top; depicted a

bove is how it works

The train; note its terraced structure; had I walked up, I

would not have arrived till mid-afternoon, when everything

had clouded up

Morning view, Lake Luzern below

Lucerne below

Tomlishorn, the western-most, and, I think, highest

summit of Pilatus

Tribschen and the Wagner Museum, center

But the glorious thing about Pilatus is that, on a clear

morning, such as this, you can see, not all that far away,

the whole of the Berner Alps: here, the Finsteraarhorn,

the Schreckhorn, the Weisshorn, others we camped

below in Grindelwald

Summit schema from Esel, the eastern summit of Pilatus

And, snowy in the middle, the Monch, then the Eiger, its

north face in shadow, and then the Jungfrau; totally

exhiliarating!

Looking from the Tomlishorn to the central summit

(mostly Japanese turbuss-folk), and then the Esel; I

climbed the Esel and Tomlishorn, but skipped the

crowded middle

Looking down from the Tomlishorn, toward Luzern,

trails and a high chapel

It's all well above tree-line, but not above flower-line; the

whole trail around the summits is covered in flowers and

in flower labels

Looking down toward the descent trail, 5600 feet...

Down the trail, looking back up toward Esel and the

central summit (hotel, restaurants, gift shoppes, etc.)

And, click to enlarge, a little red train about to enter the

48 percent grade

I got back down by 4pm, had a Cailliers ice cream bar, thanks to Vicki, and we headed on past Luzern to a lay-by in extreme eastern Switzerland

Cruise on Lake Luzern; Sort of...

Our most interesting drive, so far...

Switzerland consists very largely of mountains and lakes,

and occasionally they have to build roads out over the

lakes in order to accommodate the mountains, as above

Some repair was needed on this stretch, so the road was

detoured, on pontoons, well out into the lake, for a quarter-

mile or more

Like so

Vicki did not freak-out; well, only a little...but then we had

to do it on the way back, too

Richard Wagner Museum Luzern

One of the reasons we visited Luzern was the Wagner museum, in Tribschen, on the lake, now a city park area. Wagner spent most of his many years in exile from Germany in Switzerland, and 1866-72 in Tribschen. The house he lived in is now the museum, and it has many important artifacts.

Wagner museum, Tribschen; on the steps

the Siegfried Idyll was first performed

Luzern had a copy of the face death-mask; but the real

right-hand cast

Nietzche's death mask; he visited Wagner

some 23 times in Tribschen; then went on

to other things; should they ever make a

movie of Nietzsche's life, I nominate Sam

Elliot to play the role of The Philosopher

Wagner's Erard piano; if you have seen the epic movie

Wagner (Richard Burton's last film), you will appreciate

that this is the piano depicted in many scenes, as the

composer moves from country to country in his exile years

Renoir's charcoal study for his several

Wagner portraits (the Tribschen museum

also has the very famous Beckmann

painting of Wagner, Cosima, Liszt, et al.,

but the lighting had too much glare)

One of the earliest pix of The Master, in all

his megalomaniacal finery, seated in

This, his easy chair; somehow I can't imagine

the man long in an easy chair...

The second floor of the museum used to be the standard

collection of 19th century musical instruments; but now

it is temporary Wagner exhibits, this one, really

interesting for me, based on a recent book by two Swiss

music historians about Wagner's various walks and

scrambles amongst the Swiss Alps (I wonder if he

ever ran into Whymper) and how they bear on his

work, especially the Ring cycle; the large 1850s wall

map depicts his various hikes...

The Master's walking hat (alas, not a Tilley)

View of the house from lakeside

Luzern

We spent the better part of Sunday in Luzern, a city we have visited once or twice before.

Lakefront downtown

Arch

The very famous bridge and water tower

The bridge used to be decorated with dozens of 17th or

18th century Renaissance-style paintings, depicting the

city's history; beheading was a favorite theme...

But in 1993, they had a fire, and many were destroyed

Including this one

We had planned on visiting the Rosengart Collection

Our strategy in visiting less well-known museums,

particularly those featuring 20th century work, is to visit

the gift store first, check out the post-cards, and then

decide whether there was anything we had to see...

especially @ $17 per person

The Rosengart Collection lost out

So we visited the bahnhof shopping mall, the culture center,

and

Just sat in the park by the lake

And admired the view

Toys on Parade at the Susten Pass

So en route from Interlachen to Luzern, we decided to drive the fearsome Susten Pass road, one we had possibly not done before. The east side was in the clouds, mostly a white-out with 87 hair-pin turns, etc. Just short of the pass, we stopped in a parking lot for lunch, and to examine the six (Lotus/Caterham) 7's that pulled in behind us.

One of my favorite cars--sorry, Ken, no red ones...

BRG, of course

And a lime green; they all had headsets, talking to each

other

And then, no sooner had they buzzed off, than a cavalcade

of exotics, maybe 20 of them all in a line, came roaring

down the road...

I barely had time to reach for the camera

Ferraris, Lamborghinis, Maseratis, all gunning their

engines after the tight turn...

And keep snapping pix

We finally lumbered on up to the pass, where the clouds

thinned a bit

The road back down the other side

Nicer views

And then, finally in Luzern, Tribschen actually, aloft,

another toy, possibly the same tri-motor I had seen

above the Eiger; and not a Ford Tri-Motor, either...

("oh, no, dem Fokkers were flying Messerschmitts...")

Swiss Wedding Parade

We had been seeing French and Swiss wedding entourages for a couple weeks. Cars are a major part of it all, decorated with bouquets and streamers, proceeding to the ceremony, then "chasing" the newlyweds out of town. Vicki got these three pix somewhere east of Interlachen. Near Les Houches we saw a cavalcade of some 30 cars.