DAY 7, SWITZERLAND TRIP: BRIENZ CRUISE, BALLENBERG MUSEUM

Sep 4, 2014: Brienz Cruise, Ballenberg Museum

The weather was not promising when we checked the meteocentrale site early morning.

We had already been up Jungfraujoch as well as First on 2 sunny days. So we decided to experience a cruise or 2 on this day when the cloudy weather will impede views on the mountains.

We had checked the boat schedules and knew the cruise on Brienzersee was at 9.07 am… the cruise on Thunersee started only at 12.
bls.ch/d/…download-schiff-fahrplan-2014.pdf

We had an ambitious plan to take the Brienzersee cruise from Interlaken ost to Brienz, take the bus to Ballenberg museum, spend a couple of hours there and return back to Interlaken ost. From there we wanted to take the train to Interlaken west and then take the Thunersee cruise up to Thun, explore Thun and return by train

With this plan, we started off early from Lauterbrunnen and reached Interlaken ost before 9.

 The CGN ferry was already at the pier near the train station.

After hunting for a counter outside to buy tickets we went into the ship itself. We wanted a one way cruise and a combo bus plus Ballenberg museum ticket. The girl at the counter said the combo is available only with a return cruise ticket. We decided it’ll be too much trouble to get just the one way cruise and then buy the rest as we went along. Bought the whole combo as they had a discount and with our ½ fare card it was pretty reasonable

The ship had just a dozen other passengers and we had a serene cruise passing some lovely scenery along the way.

The 2^nd class ticket was more than OK as our lower deck was practically empty.

 Reached Brienz in 90 minutes.

The bus stop was right near the pier. Bus numbers/destinations were marked. After 5 min, bus 151 marked Ballenberg pulled up and we got in.



It was a short ride thru a lovely small town and we were deposited right at the entrance of the museum. We already had the tickets and we marched in.

A horse carriage was standing at the entrance, we paid up 6 CHF each to the driver for a ride to the central part of the museum… for a full ride the cost is 70 francs pp!! yes… it’s priced like a mountain cable car ride! But then the museum is HUGE—66 hectares.

The driver invited us to sit with him in the front... GREAT! We were happily riding away in the carriage through tree lined slopes with quaint houses studded here and there.

Ballenberg is an open air museum that displays traditional buildings and architecture from all over the country--it has over 100 original buildings that have been transported from their original sites. 

Since the 1970s old farmhouses, stables, bakehouses or barns are no longer demolished when they are due to be replaced by modern buildings. Instead, the buildings are dismantled stone by stone, and rebuilt here. 

The buildings are set in surroundings appropriate to their type (farm buildings surrounded by small fields etc.) with pathways snaking across the 660,000 sq m (164 acre) site.

Our horses pulled us up a winding path flanked by nice houses, stopped a couple of times for a breath and then deposited us at the central region—the first official stop

711, 712 were just near the central region where we got dropped by our horse carriage.

The museum has some 250 animals/birds;  house 711 had a family of papa bull, mama cow and baby calves happily grazing away in the open. After admiring them, we went on into the house… awesome wood workshop, very nice specimens of Swiss wood craft and a craftsman was giving a live demo… lovely seeing a wood cow getting chiseled in front of our eyes!!

There are several wood wall art and sculpture showing the various stages of creation—from beginning to final product. Lovely specimens of rustic scenes, nativity, Santas, animals… you name it they have it… all so pretty

Nativity

711 had stories about the forest –we saw the bark of a 640 year old larch tree from 1312 among other things.

 712 had an enchanted forest theme. Very interesting. Kids can crawl through a small track designed just for them.

We kept walking up the winding paths and entering the houses… it was like time travel. We felt as we were in a bygone era and visiting friends houses. Each house so well furnished, kitchens with gleaming utensils, dining tables, beds made, articles of personal clothing hung up, nice Swiss cabinets, embroidery, lace work... all authentic and lovely.

We always take picnic lunches and we had our food in the grounds enjoying the ambiance... they have barbeques with free wood as you can see in the pic...

There are donkeys, goats, rabbits, birds, roosters, an apiary with bees…

How many donkeys in the pic??

Bees!

There are kitchen gardens with veggies growing, trees laden with fruits, colorful flowers, very pretty sight.

sunflowers... 2 varieties

Time flew and we obviously did not keep our original plan of leaving the museum in a couple of hours. It was too interesting!

We had checked the timings of the boat from Brienz to interlaken ..initially it was at 11.40, 12.40, 1.40, 2.40, 3.40, then 5.40 and last 8.40.

We had to catch the bus from Ballenberg museum and reach Brienz before 5.40...

Otherwise there will be a long wait for the 8.40 cruise, or we would have to waste our cruise return ticket and take the train.

Decided to use the bought cruise tickets. We reluctantly walked out of the museum grounds by 5.15, caught the bus and reached the Brienz pier. Our ship was already waiting. We hurriedly popped into the COOP just opposite and bought a box of 6 Strawberry-vanilla cone icecreams (just 9CHF for the whole box) and ran to catch our boat.

COOP right opposite the pier... top right corner of this pic

Enjoying our icecream

Had a relaxing cruise, enjoying our icecream.

Reached Interlaken ost by 7. We had initially thought we’ll do some souvenir shopping at Interlaken main drag but we could not figure out how to get there. It was just a concrete jungle with tall buildings. We had been on our feet the whole day at the museum, so decided to just catch the train back to Lauterbrunnen.

That was the end of another beautiful day in lovely Switzerland.

The next day will bring some disappointment as we made a bad decision… but more of that in my next instalment:

http://adventuretrav.blogspot.com/2016/04/day-7-switzerland-trip-schilthorn.html
covers Schilthorn, Stechelberg, Gimmelwald, Trummelbache falls