Loche being Loche, woke up the next day (Wednesday 15 August) at 4.30am ready to leave Venice for Switzerland. Luckily this was a caravan park where you could leave early (many of them have noise restrictions and you can't drive your car between 11pm and 7am). We were out of there by 5am and made it to the border by about 8 or 9 I think. After around 20 kms into Switzerland we came to the conclusion the tunnel we had been keen to travel was via another route. At around 30 kms into Switzerland we were stopped at a set of traffic lights and funneled into one lane. Yes here it is, this is it.. The tunnel is 16.8 Kms long and just a single lane in either direction. At the 8 km mark our external temperature gauge was reading a whopping 37 deg C in the middle of the tunnel, the temperature outside the tunnel was around 25 deg.

The beautiful scenery and alps start pretty much at the border and it wasn't long before we started climbing. The GPS was taking us up the Sustenpass and we checked to make sure this was suitable for caravans (well, it wasn't listed as unsuitable)! We were later given a Caravan Club book that lists all the passes (thank you Paul & Jill from Glen Innes) and this is what the book says about the pass - "Negotiable by caravans (recommended for small/medium sized only) with care but not for the faint hearted". Some passes do not allow the towing of trailers at all and many are of course closed at various times through winter.

Loche had concerns with overheating the automatic transmission again on the Landrover as there is no oil cooler fitted but the light didn't come on at all. A steady pace of between 20 to 50 Km/hr and the Alps were well in hand. The tight hairpin bends, steep inclines, steep drop-offs some without Armco railing kept Loche on his toes the entire time. In this region there is no room for misjudgment or for relaxed driving especially with a van in tow.

After around 40 minutes of constant climbing we finally reached the top. What a pleasant surprise to find snow still by the side of the road, something we had not expected. We stopped to give the car and driver a well-earned rest, this worked out well as Cara was itching to get out and play in the snow.

We arrived in Lauterbrunnen about 1pm and were amazed by the beautiful town and the waterfall running right over the cliffs. Lauterbrunnen is situated in a valley between the alps and the taller mountains still have snow on their peaks.

After we discovered the reception was closed for the usual 2 hr lunch period we were greeted by Barry the grounds man from the UK who soon allocated us a site. We setup and were very keen to have a look around so off we went for a walk to explore the village. On the way back to the caravan park, we noticed the pathway that led up to the waterfall nearby. We decided we'd walk up for a look. The path leads you up the hill and then into the cliff face via a tunnel. More stairs take you higher again and you eventually end up almost behind the falls looking down into the valley. It was a beautiful view from the top and we watched a helicopter land on the side of the mountains on the other side of the valley.

The next day we decided to have some R&R and investigate the options available to explore the area. Loche was sitting in the van around midday and noticed a land cruiser with a slide-on camper drive in (land cruisers are not common in Europe). As he watched he thought he'd seen a Queensland number plate. Thinking he was seeing things he went off to investigate. A quick hello and surprise surprise they are Aussies. Paul and Jill have been traveling in Europe for 6 years and originally shipped their land cruiser to Singapore and then drove it up through Asia and Eastern Europe. They come over every year for 6 months. Yes it did have Qld rego.

The very next day Loche saw a second land cruiser, again with Queensland rego plates. He didn't get a chance to speak with them, but Paul did. Paul told us they had driven from South Africa, had been travelling for 18 months and were now on their way back to OZ.

We caught up with Jill and Paul that evening to discuss options for trains and transport in and around the Alps. They recommended we buy a 7 day travel pass for 230 Swiss Francs (240AUD). You get one adult ticket to travel for free (for 3 of the 7 days) on about 80% of the trains, cable cars, boats and buses. You get a 50% discount on the remaining 20%. In short it cost us about $600 AUD (we had to pay 60 Francs each for the last leg up to Jungfraujoch) for us to see the Alps over three days, which worked out to be the cheapest option for us.

Jungfrau Alp is 3,471 meters above sea level and is the pinnacle of the region. We decided we'd do this first. We were off on the 8am train after a 15 minute walk to the station. You need to change trains half way up and with it being peak season we missed out on seats. Kindly some people from Hong Kong offered Cara and I a seat, which we were very thankful for. But overall we weren't impressed, Loche stood for 50 mins on steep inclines and we paid a fortune to do so. Loche wasn't the only one standing, the doorways and the aisles were so packed that you could hardly move. The train stops twice at view points where you can get off to take some pics, but this was hopeless - it was a struggle to get in and out of the carriages as they were extremely overloaded. We were told they only sold a certain amount of tickets to the top and we had to get in quick to get one. If they limit the tickets, I would have thought they'd only sell enough for the seats on the trains, especially when you are paying a minimum of 130 Swiss Francs per person to get to the top.

Finally we reached the top and it was off to the snow. Cara was excited to see snow again. We were going to walk through the snow up to a restaurant, but walking in the snow and I believe the high altitude, was starting to affect Cara and she was struggling to walk and tiring easily. I think the altitude affected all of us in the end, it's not often we are much higher than sea level! Loche started to feel a bit nauseous and I had a pretty bad headache by the end of the day. After a play in the snow we went off to follow the signs that said "Tour". Apart from the over crowding and pathetic arrangements to get to the top everything else is well laid out and we thoroughly enjoyed it. You follow tunnels, lifts and escalators through to two excellent lookouts, a museum and an ice cave with ice sculptures. You can see for miles and miles from the lookouts and you feel like you are at the top of the world!

We lined up for the train and once again had to stand. A lovely man, this time from China, stood up so that Cara could have a seat and she then started asking his family their names and if they spoke English!

The next day, Saturday 18 August, we decided we'd have a shorter day to make it a bit easier for Cara. We headed back to the train station at Lauterbrunnen and the cable car up to Murren was just nearby. We caught the cable car up the side of the cliff and then the connecting train runs along the top of the mountain to Murren. From Murren it was only a short walk to the next cable car where we could either go even further up to the Schilthorn (another high peak) or down to Gimmelwald. I'd read in the Lonely Planet that Gimmelwald was a very pretty village so we headed down the mountain. Both Murren and Gimmelwald are beautiful villages, very quiet and peaceful. We had a lovely time wandering through them and then from Gimmelwald we headed down the side of the cliff via a cable car. Paul and Jill had told us of this cable car ride and said that we must do it - well I wasn't very keen at all, but got through it surprisingly well. This cable car starts at the top of the cliff (a few hundred metres up) and shoots you out over the cliff and very quickly down to the bottom. Cara and Loche were at the front having a great time. I was sitting behind looking the other way.

We got safely to the bottom and then caught a bus to Trummelbach falls. While we were waiting for a bus we met a Chinese student and a Chinese family, Cara was quickly taken by the little boy in his pram and started singing 'The wheels on the bus' to him - he watched with great interest!

Trummelbach falls are inside caves in the cliffs. We walked up to the cliffs and you can then catch a lift to take you to the top. There are 10 chutes / waterfalls in all and pathways lead you through the caves to each one. The sound of the water pounding through the caves is amazingly loud and quite scary - and it's flowing extremely quickly. The pathways had handrails but I was still absolutely paranoid about Cara falling through. I talked to her beforehand and told her she must stay with us and listen to what we tell her. By this stage it was getting toward the afternoon and she was getting tired. At the first chute Loche took some photos and I wasn't taking my eyes off Cara. She was dancing around on the platform and I told her to stay away from the handrail. She was okay so I got out my camera to take some video footage and Cara danced in front of me. I was just putting my camera away when she fell backwards toward the rail. She hit the rail and fell on the platform in front of me and was okay but I saw her fall, panicked and yelled out. I think it was a combination of my yelling out and then her getting into trouble for not doing what she was asked that really scared her, she then refused to walk any further. So I had to carry her through the remaining stairs and pathways to the rest of the chutes. The falls are absolutely amazing. The volume and force the water is going is just terrifying, but wonderful to see.

The next day we gave Cara a break so we could get the most out of our last 'free' travel day on our tickets. So it was on Monday 20 August that we headed off early on the train to Interlaken and then onto Brienz. From Brienz we hopped on a steam train that took us up into the mountains. The steam train is a wonderful ride with amazing views looking out over Interlaken and the lakes. It takes an hour and a half to reach the top. Once there, we had a look around and a drink at the restaurant, before catching the train down. Back in Brienz we hopped on the normal train to go to Meirignan to ride on my favourite mode of transport - the cable car and chair lifts!

We had a bit of a walk from the train station to the first cable car. We jumped on to start our climb to Plan Platten, another very tall mountain. We hopped off the cable car and then had to catch the chairlifts the rest of the way. We were told by the time we got to the top, we would only have about 5 minutes to look around before they closed for the day. We decided we'd just go for the ride and jump off very quickly at the top. It was a lovely ride up and I was very brave and only got a bit jittery once or twice. Cara was loving it, sitting on the chair with her nose pressed against the glass.

We were originally going to catch a boat back to Interlaken, which meant we had to get back to the train station by 5.10pm to get the train that connected with the boat in Brienz. We would've almost had enough time but when we got back to the cable car we were waiting for about 20 minutes before it went back down the hill. So we gave up on the boat and caught the train back to the caravan park. We got back around 7pm and felt we'd gotten our money's worth out of our tickets.

The next day we decided we'd catch up on some washing and get the van ready to leave on Wednesday. We caught up with Paul and Jill for dinner again that night before saying our final farewells. They were heading to Zurich the next day and we were going to Lake Lucerne.

We discovered Lake Lucerne was only about an hour and a half drive away so we had a fairly relaxed getaway the next day and arrived at our new caravan park around lunchtime again. Loche was pleased to find the drive fairly easy with no major mountain passes.

We are heading towards the end of peak season here now so some campgrounds are accepting the ACSI card again which means we go from paying around 50 Euro a night to 15 Euro. I found a campground near Lucerne that accepted the card and once we arrived, we found they had free WIFI as well, which was a lovely bonus as we paid 15 Swiss Francs (about $17 AUD) for 3 hours of internet in Lauterbrunnen (the most we've paid so far).

We drove into Lucerne the following day and had a look around. We tried to find a reasonably priced restaurant to have lunch in and ended up deciding McDonalds might be cheaper. It was the most expensive McDonalds we've ever had, costing us around $45 AUD for a happy meal, two burger meals and a few chicken strips.