Trip to Luzern and Mt Pilatus

Our journey to beautiful cities and high peaks continue in Switzerland with trip to Luzern and Mt Pilatus on sunny Saturday of July 19, 2014. Lucerne (Luzern) is the most populous city in Central Switzerland surrounded by beautiful Alps.

This city paints the picture of a perfect Swiss town overseeing Mt Pilatus, Mt Rigi and Lake Luzern. The chapel bridge on Reuss River is the oldest covered wooden bridge in Europe (first erected in 14^th century), which houses beautiful paintings from 17^th century. We took a train from Zurich HB to Luzern and a Golden round trip from Lake Luzern to Mt Pilatus. 

The round trip starts with a boat ride from Lake Luzern to Alpnachstad (Pilatus Bahn). The boatway provides a scenic route and eye catchy views across the lakeside. After a boat trip comes a next thrill to get to Mt Pilatus in cogwheel train, which is supposed to run on steepest rail in the world. The more you move up the better views you get. 

Cogwheel Bahnof...

Interior Paintings at Chapel Bridge (From 17th century)

Chapel bridge at evening..

The route provides a view of mountains, lush green landscapes and a lake Luzern. It even gives a sporty feeling by looking at mountain bikers; paragliders moving up and up in the sky from height of Mt Pilatus. We hiked to few observation decks and took gondola to return back to Krien. It was a nice breezy evening that had set up everything to get a nice walk around Lake Luzern and Chapel bridge. The day ended well with delicious dinner at Kanchi, an Indian restaurant.

View captured from cogwheel train

View capture from cogwheel train of a cogwheel train

View from the top...

Hotel Pilatus Klum at Mt Pilatus

Mountain hikers, bikers en route to Mt Pilatus

This tourist town with its spectacular location left us mesmerized with beautiful views and memorable trip with our group. Another must visit for a true traveler….

Photo Coursey: Samsung Note 3

Trip to Rapperswil

On the afternoon of Jun 28^th 2014, Saturday, we started our journey to Rapperswil. Rapperswil is famous for roses and an hour trip from Zuirch by train and couple of hours trip by boat from Burkliplatz. 

The train journey saves you a time while a boat journey gives you a chance to get closer to Alps beauty and provides you a spectacular panorama view of Zurich lake. Myself being a nature lover and above it a traveler, who would always want to take the best route to the visiting place chose to take a boat ride. We occupied seats on the top floor of a boat, which itself was an amazing experience along with few rain showers. 

View from a boat

We enjoyed a food and a view along the ride and reached Rapperswil in around two hours. Rapperswil has a private castle, which is rented by richies to celebrate birthdays, weddings, etc. and a traveler gets to walk around the open area in castle, which encompasses one of the beautiful rose gardens and a deer park. The top of the castle also provides lovely views over the Zurich lake.

Rapperswil Castle

Roses.. something for which Rapperswil is known for

View captured from the castle

The other attraction, which we liked was a stroll on Europe’s till date longest wooden bridge and a park adjacent to it. We were in a group of 8 and enjoyed walking through together and took some breathtaking pictures as well. There’s also a boat station and a picnic table, which can be used for potluck parties in a group.

Europe's longest wooden bridge... A must visit 

Beach volleyball court...

If you are looking for a short trip of 6-8 hours (including travel time), Rapperswill could be one of your options. We also had a thai food in the restaurant adjacent to Rapperswil Bahnof and took a train back to Kloten.

Trip to Rhein Falls

On the sunny day of June 23, we along with friends made a trip to Rhein Falls. It is known to be a Europe's largest plain waterfall. The falls are located on the High Rhine between the municipalities of Neuhausen am Rheinfall and Laufen-Uhwiesen, near the town of Schaffhausen in northern Switzerland, between the cantons of Schaffhausen and Zürich. Our journey to falls began from Kloten to Winterthur by S7 and then Winterthur to Schloss Laufen em Rhein Falls by S33. S33 is the only train, which stops at Rhein Falls. We then took tickets to the castle and enjoyed view of waterfalls from various angles while walking down the yard stairs of the castle. Mid-way, we found a tiny cave which gave us the closest view to fall and we felt the moist of pure water from the patio outside the cave. 

View of the other bank from the castle

Rock near to the fall

Beautiful view captured from my phone

We continued and reached the boat station, from where we took a route 4, which took us to downstream almost into the german border with beautiful views alongside the river. We took a U-turn and moved towards the falls. It was an amazing experience with the moist water coming on our faces, which made our trip memorable. On our journey back, we took a train S33 back to Winterthur. In short, if you are planning a small day trip with friends and family near to Zurich, the Rhein fall is indeed a one place of its kind. 

Do write back to me for any tips, you may need.....

Is changing politics/forming a new party answer to problems of common person of INDIA?

I have been thinking to pen down the thoughts appearing in mind. It’s all around the way politics is changing in the country of Mahaveer, Mahatma Gandhi, Buddh, Vivekanand, Sardar Patel and many more. Our ancestors have nurtured the diversity and principles of ‘live and let live’, ‘love and respect’ in the country and across the universe. We are known to have genes of intellectuals. Why do I write all this? Just to make everyone aware and throw opinion whether changing the politics and creating a new party would solve the problems of common person.

Let us consider two families (X and Y) with five brothers each, the family X gets divided into five because of the arguments, difference in their thinking, fame, money, etc.  The family Y sticks to the principles mentioned above and resolves the conflict without any damage to unity. Whom do you think is best, strong, and indispensable? Most answers would be family Y. Having said that, I do not want just a single political party to rule the country; however, what I would want so-called our intellectual politicians to come on the same stage and at least go for bi-party system in Lok Sabha. I know this is just a dream and may never become true. Nevertheless, as a true Indian, the way to fight corruption, irregularities, problems is not to go on strike, dharna, resignation and last but not the least creating altogether a new political party. I want to warn some intellectual politicians, who are misguiding our Gen Y. Remember; you will taste your own medicine soon if we continue to create political parties for each problem in our lives.

I completely agree, there are leaders rather politicians (be it Congress, BJP or naïve like AAP) who are here for their benefit. However, the answer to them is not a new political party. If there is a problem in your family, as an intellectual person I would try to resolve the conflicts rather than fuming it up to form a new family leaving aside what I already have.

 Take an example, masses supported Anna and Arvind Kejriwal at Jantar-Mantar. AK created his own political party and went to become chief-minister. He was riding on common-man wave but did common person’s problem resolved, has corruption gone down during his 49 days? The answer is big ‘No’. On other hand, if he could have chosen to enter into politics by joining other existing parties, the things would have been different and we would have really got some good intellectual figures in our Indian politics. What it looks to is a blame game now.

At last, I would say, you cannot make everybody happy in this world. Hence, try to make at least 80 percent of them, which is true everywhere.

शुभ दीपावली

"दीपक की लो से, रोशन होगा जग सारा,
सब बनायेंगे ख़ुशी, त्यौहार है ये प्यारा,
दोस्तों से मिलकर, मिठाई सब खायेंगे,
दीपावली का पर्व, सब हिलमिल मनाएंगे,
रोशन करे खुद को, और बने सहारा,
ये पर्व सिखाता सबको, अनुपम भाईचारा,
"विशु" बस यही कहे सबसे मिलके,
दीपावली की शुभकामना है तहेदिल से ||"

- विकास चौधरी "विशु"

क्षमापना ही जीवन का सार है,
क्षमापना ही जीवन की मधुर बयार है,
क्षमापना से ही बंधुत्व और प्रेम है,
क्षमापना ही टूटे रिश्तो को जोड़ने का औजार है .....
- विकास चौधरी "विशु"

माँ की ममता बहुत निराली है,
माँ है तो हर घर में हर रोज दिवाली है....