Tuesday, August 30, 2011

Say Cheese!

As Switzerland is the cheese capital of the world (sorry, Wisconsin), we thought a trip to a genuine Swiss cheese factory was in order.

[NUDITY ALERT:  This post contains nudity.  It appears suddenly, with no warning.  Skip the entire post if this will alarm or offend you.]

So we headed to one of the most famous cheese towns of all:  Gruyére, which is only about a 45 minute drive from Lausanne.

We started the day with a tour of the Gruyére cheese factory.  This was a really fascinating look at cheesemaking from beginning to end.  They provided all visitors with a headset tour in the language of their choice (our second experience of this technology here).  We learned that what the cows eat is important, and we looked into giant vats of milk and watched the milk curdle and be molded into cheese.  We even got to see the cellar where thousands of wheels of Gruyére were aging.  A computer-controlled cart rolled endlessly up and down the aisles, pulled out one cheese wheel at a time, gently turned it, and placed it back on the rack.  And they gave us free samples of cheese!

Say Cheese!

Next Gruyere ad campaign?
We then traveled the short distance to the medieval town of Gruyére.  This is a pedestrian only, super cute village with lots of cafes, shops, and museums, just like in medieval times, we're sure. 

Hanging out in Gruyere
And, of course, a medieval castle was around the corner at the end of the block. The castle, the oldest parts of which date to the 12th century, was home to a long succession of Gruyères counts.  They had the usual castle stuff: tapestries, armor, swords, a video that explained the history of the castle, a dungeon, a chapel with 15th century (I think) stained glass windows.  Like many Swiss castles, it was a private residence in the 19th century, and many rooms had 19th century furniture and art, which hardly seems at all old in this context.  As we've commented before, the layers and layers of history at sites like this -- sites that have been more or less continuously occupied for 1,000 years -- add to their fascination. 
The guys on the Gruyere Castle rampart walls.
Both the cheese factory and the castle, by the way, were free in the sense that, like almost every other museum or museum-like place we've been, they were covered by the (not inexpensive) Swiss Museum Pass we bought on our first day in the country.  Definitely a worthwhile purchase, mainly because it means we don't ever have to think about whether or not it'd be worth the 8-12 franc per person admission fee to visit places like this.  We just show our passes and go in.  If it's boring (which few such places are) we leave quickly, not feeling like we have to stay to get our money's worth.

But if you asked Christopher and Matthew their favorite part of this outing, they'd say a place that was not covered by our Museum Pass:  the Moleson-sur-Gruyére "fun park" -- a ski mountain in the winter transformed for summer fun, including helicopter rides, mini-golf, and ski lifts that pulled you up the mountain on a go-cart or scooter that you then rode down.  We decided to try out the bob luge: a two-person bobsled-like contraption that you rode down on a winding track they built on the side of the mountain.  A good time was had by all.

We then rode the funicular up the mountain (a ride covered by our other excellent first-day purchase:  the public transport half-fare card).  Here, almost at the top of the mountain, we enjoyed another spectacular vista, ice cream, and beers.

For the fun (and exercise) of it, we decided to walk rather than take the funicular back down the mountain.  The signs at the top said it would take 50 minutes to walk down.  In our experience so far, these signs (which are everywhere there is a walking path, which is nearly everywhere) are accurate plus-or-minus 2 minutes.  Still, as we do not have proper hiking shoes, doing a 50 minute walk down a pretty steep slope may not have been our wisest decision.  Matthew wiped out in the first 50 yards of the walk.  But we brushed ourselves off and kept going.



And the boys needed a pit stop about 50 yards after that.



This photo gives us a chance to share our observation that the Swiss seem more comfortable with public nudity than Americans are.  We sort of expected the topless women at the beach (which by the way isn't that common, maybe 1 in 30 women, not that we've been counting, and the boys haven't even noticed or, if they've noticed, haven't cared enough to comment on it).  But we did not expect the old man at the beach to change into his suit right in front of us (no photo available).  No one seemed to mind.
Back to our walk down the mountain:  All in all it was a lovely walk on a beautiful day, complete with cowbells ringing in the distance. And, as we sometimes do to pass the time, I told one of our favorite stories (Gingerbread Man) as we walked, and we played name that tune.  We made it down in one piece, and we made it back to Lausanne before dark.  It was a school night.

1 comment:

  1. Beer, cheese, and public nudity: it doesn't get much better than that. I'm glad you all are having fun!!

    ReplyDelete