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Old 9th Jan 2018, 11:46
  #359 (permalink)  
Warmtoast
 
Join Date: Nov 2006
Location: South of the M4
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From JHQ to Switzerland on leave and an encounter with the Swiss Navy

This thread has gone a bit quiet so here's something to liven it up a bit.
One of the joys of a posting to Germany was the ease and ability to travel throughout Europe aided of course with petrol at duty-free prices when you filled up your tank whilst in Germany. During my 3½-years at JHQ Rheindahlen, I together with my family visited Holland, Belgium, Denmark, France, Austria, Italy and Switzerland, plus of course Germany from north to south.
One of my more outstanding holiday trips was to Lake Lucerne (Vierwaldstättersee) in Switzerland some 400+ miles from Rheindahlen, so a good days drive. The reason for this trip was to visit the hotel in Flüelen on the banks of the lake where my wife had worked for about a year as a commis chef shortly after graduating as a cook from a catering college in Austria. This we did and in the hotel where she had worked 14-years earlier we enjoyed the best fondue ever!














Lake Lucerne is an impressively scenic lake and we took the regular lake steamer from Flüelen to Weggis and return admiring the scenery on the way, but one thing that I remember vividly to this day was seeing the Swiss Navy in action in a boat firing a cannon at a target on the far bank of the lake. See my photo of the event. What looks like a safety boat flying a red flag can just be seen in the background and looking closely, a member of the crew can be seen using his camera to take a photo of us taking a photo of him!

From Flüelen we drove a couple of miles along the lake to visit Tellskapelle (“Tell’s chapel“) which we’d passed earlier on the boat. A memorial chapel has stood here since the 16th century and was erected to commemorate some of the deeds of Swiss folk hero William Tell. William Tell initiated the rebellion in the 14th-century that led to the foundation of the Old Swiss Confederacy.











Reputedly to prove a point he also shot an apple from his son’s head with a crossbow, (an old c.1554 print shows this event) and if you know your music you’ll probably be familiar with the “William Tell” overture by Rossini.
(Watch here:
).


The Rigi Mountain is adjacent to the lake and the summit at 1,800m is easily reached by the Rigi Bahn cog railway. So again we motored along the shore to Vitznau and took the cog railway direct to the summit.
















The Swiss in their wisdom had placed a couple of very docile cows for the tourists (including my kids) to admire and pat on the head! Views from the top are absolutely stunning and we were blessed with super weather whilst we were there.



I must have made this trip towards the end of my tour in Germany because my photos show my Volvo purchased in June 1974 parked alongside the lake (I returned to the UK in July 1975).
Anyway enjoy these photos that bring back memories of this memorable family holiday that almost certainly I would not have made if I hadn’t been stationed in Germany at JHQ Rheindahlen – so a big thank you HMG – and to think I got paid as well!

Last edited by Warmtoast; 9th Jan 2018 at 12:00.
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