Today was very cold and rainy in Lucerne. Weather reports a few days ago forewarned us and we have had excellent weather so far, so no complaining. The rain does, unfortunately, limit sightseeing options a bit.

Stanz from the funicular

This morning we went to Stanserhorn, a mountain of a bit over 6200 feet. It is above the town of Stans, which is about a 20 minute drive from Lucerne. To get up the mountain we started off in a funicular train, the Stanserhorn-Bahn. This was originally built in 1893.

Funicular station

Views along the funicular

Part of it was destroyed in a fire in 1970 and only the bottom 1/3 of it was rebuilt. The rest was replaced with the Stanserhorn Cabrio which is an open-topped (2 story) suspended cable car that goes to the top of Stanserhorn. Now keep in mind that it was raining, so the views were limited and not many wanted to spend time on the upper, open level.

Beginning of the cabrio cable ride

Rainy view

As we got to the top we basically were in the clouds and it began to snow. Usually there are great views of the valley and lake from here, but we couldn’t see those today. The snow, however, was very pretty. We walked in it a tiny bit, but spend much of our time in the cafe watching the snow from the heated indoors. We figure itt actually was more fun than spending a few more hours in rainy Lucerne…plus Paul loves to watch snow fall. I, fortunately, was wearing 4 layers (under my coat, not kidding) plus chemical handwarmers, gloves, and a wool scarf.

Snowing at the top of Stanserhorn

Paul in the snow

Rainy return back down the cable car

Big lop-eared bunnies by the funicular station

Moooo

Back in Lucerne for the afternoon it was in the 40s with pretty steady rain. We ventured out for lunch…to the train station. It is quite close to our hotel on the edge of Lake Lucerne and has a large shopping and restaurant area in the basement. We did make sure to bring some chocolate mousse back to the hotel. We decided we would benefit from a warm, dry, relaxing afternoon inside.

The rain dropped off for a while and we walked into the old town for dinner. We ate along the river.

Chapel Bridge at night