BRITANNIA

                     ROYAL YACHT 

 While in Edinburgh we read that the Royal Yacht was moored in Leith Harbor on the Firth of Forth. We bought a bus day-pass for two pounds and was able to ride the bus all day.

With the day more or less planned we took off with bus route map in hand and walked around the corner to get the bus. We took the bus down to the harbor and saw new territory on the 45-minute bus ride. I was willing to give up the Botanical Gardens if I could see the world’s oldest floral clock, and then walk through the park. After that we caught a bus to the zoo.

At the harbor we bought senior tickets and wandered through a picture gallery before boarding the Britannia.  We learned the 461-foot long, 17-foot wide yacht was built on the Clyde in Glasgow, was commissioned in 1952 and set sail in 1954. The yacht draws 17 feet of water and cruises at 22 knots.

She was the 83^rd royal yacht since the first one in 1660. By the time she was decommissioned in 1997 she had sailed over a million miles and put into 600 ports in 135 countries!

I remarked, “The upkeep for something this big must be tremendous. But still it’s a shame that the public outcry of the expense forced her to be retired.”

We were given new punch-button phones that guided us to each numbered station. It was nice to wander at our own pace. There was a lot of information in a very understandable format.We lingered at some stations and replayed the information. Someone  did an excellent  job planning and routing people through.

The aroma of fresh baking bread filled the air. Two parts of the yacht that really intrigued me. One was the royal dining room with its U shaped table that seated 54 people. It takes three hours to set the table. It was all set, including place cards, for a function that evening. Artifacts from around the world, that were gifts to the Queen, surrounded the room’s perimeter. I wanted to take a picture but it was prohibited, and I didn’t want to risk being a naughty girl!

Behind the dining room in the stern of the ship is a large comfortable sitting room with delightful colors and décor. The room extended from port to starboard.

It was noontime when we exited the self guided self-paced tour through the gift shop. We took time to eat lunch in one of the many restaurants in the Ocean Center, before catching the bus back to New Town.

It was a fun and interesting morning.

DAVOS and INTERLAKEN

                                          A Couple of Swiss Cities

Davos, Switzerland is the sister city to Aspen, Colorado. At 5117-feet  it is Switzerland’s highest town and mountain resort. In winter skiers overrun the town of 11,500 people. The 70 hotels have 8000 beds so people rent out another 12,000 beds in their homes. During the summer of my visit the town was a quiet peaceful one. There are 90 farms in the Davos area and the focus has changed from beef to milk. A good part of the four million liters of milk a year is made into cheese. Most of our hiking here was through lovely quiet forested areas.

Switzerland offered many different foods which I generally found very good. In Davos we were served kirschwasser---a brandy distilled from cherries. Such kirsch is common in much of Europe and it is made from many different fruits. I always find it a bit potent for my taste.

It was most of a day’s ride from Davos to Interlaken via the Glacier Express. We all had taken a book to read on the trip, but the scenery was so spectacular that we all scuttled that idea. Along the route we passed through the eight-mile long Furka Tunnel, the longest narrow railroad tunnel n the world.  The Rhone valley was stunningly beautiful.

The climb up to the Overalp Pass was slow affording us good views of the wildflowers growing in the fields. The scenery was breathtaking.  The snail’s pace up a couple of the mountains made  us wonder if we might roll backwards. The train tracks literally overhung the mountains in several places. It was a stunning eye-catching day!

In Brig we had a layover between trains so many of us headed into town for a look/see. We walked the cobbled streets and alleys admiring the many towers and church steeples. The country is full of them and all seem to be different. Maybe I’ll return one day to do nothing but photograph steeples and towers.

Interlaken has a train station at each end of the city, but only a little over a mile apart. Trains for different destinations leave from each station. Interlaken is located in the southern part of Bern Canton between 12-mile long Lake Thun and 9-mile Lake Brienz. The first steam ships sailed the lakes in 1839. Many small villages are located around the perimeter of both lakes. At 848-feet deep, Lake Brienz is the country deepest lake and four fishermen make their living from the lake. It takes a two-year apprenticeship to become a fisherman. Most of the fish from the lake is perch.

The city of 15,000 is a popular winter ski area. As in Davos, private beds add to the 4000 beds to total 70,000 hotel nights a year. The city’s 5-star hotel, The Victoria, was built in 1869. The hotel Interlaken built in 1400 is the oldest hotel in town. The hotel boasts a stay by Lord Byron in 1816 and Mendelssohn in 1832.  The old wooden monastery was replaced with a stone on in the 1300s.

The city has Japanese, English, and Alpine gardens. The Japanese garden is largest and is a symbol of friendship between the two countries. Horse-drawn buggies roam the streets from Easter to October.

Switzerland is one of my favorite countries and I hope to return yet again one day.