We woke this morning and eagerly opened the blinds hoping to see the snowy peaks, unfortunately a heavy fog had rolled in and we could barely even see across the street. It gave us a real feeling however that we were absolutely in the mountains of southern Switzerland, a nice change particularly as less than 24hrs earlier we had no plans to be here yet.

With the views obstructed for now, we rugged up and headed off the the train station to get information on trains to take us up Jaungfroujoch tomorrow. It's not exactly cheap, if your looking for cheap don't bother coming to Switzerland, but it's worth every single cent. It would take 3 trains and around 2hrs to get up to the Jaungfrou station (the highest train station in Europe) with the last leg of the journey taking a path entirely inside the mountain.

With the next day all sorted we set about exploring Interlaken and being a smallish place it's quite easy to do on foot. The heavy mist was in no hurry to lift and Interlaken appeared to be in no real hurry to wake up, making our stroll around town somehow more enjoyable. There was an atmosphere you'd usually associate with 6am, however by now it was almost 11am as we made our way up along the river. There is a cog train that goes up to the small peak of Harder Kulm overlooking Interlaken and so we put that on this afternoons post-lunch agenda.
We had one absolute priority to attend to first. Before we could see any of the incredible scenery here we had to find & purchase a new camera and get the battery charged up. This is not the place to be without a camera!

As we walked back to the hostel you could see the morning fog rising up to reveal the true reason for coming here. Snowy peaks surround us, a clear blue sky now overhead and 2 icy blue lakes on each end of the town. Perfection....?
After filling our belly's and losing some of this mornings clothing layers we headed back toward the cog train for the small trip up Harder Kulm, stopping on the way to pick up a Swiss army knife for each of us with our names engraved proudly onto them.
The trip up Harder Kulm only takes about 8-10minutes with the carriage climbing at a sharp angle against the mountainside. From the top the entire Jaungfrou region stands before you. The peaks of Schreckhorn, Eiger, Mönch, Jaungfrou and a number of others dominate the view. In the foreground the lakes Brienzersee and Thunersee reflect in a brilliant icy blue at either end of Interlaken and it's neighbouring towns of Wilderswil, Matten, Unterseen and Bönigen.
We picked up a trail at this peak and took a short walk through the wooded mountain top, turns out it would take over 5hrs to complete the trail in full so lucky for us we turned back when we did.
What could possibly top this...? Ice cream of course! We shared a bowl, which had a generous amount of Baileys poured over it, while we sat and absorbed the splendour of the Jaungfrou region.