Smith Visit

Remember back when my brother and SIL visited in October? Well, I finally downloaded the rest of the pictures from their visit. Without further delay, here are a few photo highlights of their trip (excluding Jungfrau which I already posted).
We hiked from our house down to Lake Zurich. We love this hike. We took the path that runs along a stream/river. The hike takes about an hour, and it's my favorite type of hike -- a gradual downhill the entire way! We took a bit longer than an hour, because Craig, being the cool Uncle that he is, explored the dragon cave we found along the way with the kids. The picture doesn't do it justice -- there are about 100 steps leading up to the cave. Lest you think Ginny isn't a cool Aunt, she made it up there too. Her picture was out of focus. The boring parents stayed below with the dog.
The goal at the end of the hike was to take the boat to Rapperswil, a town at the other end of Lake Zurich. The boat rides are included in the cost of the train/bus tickets, and it's absolutely beautiful to be out on the water. I didn't think about the fact that the boats switch over to their winter schedule in October, so we couldn't get a boat ride to Rapperswil. We ended up taking a boat ride for about 15 minutes that took us just two towns further down the lake. From there, we took a train. Oh well, at least they got a sneak peek of the trip they could take in the summer season!
In Rapperswil, we walked along the old bridge. You can see a bit of the mountains in the background. These mountains are the approximate location where I later took my parents hiking. (Or at least that's what my brother tells me -- he's a lot better at geography than I am!) We also walked up to an old castle that has a good almost-panoramic view of the area. It was getting dark at this point, so none of pictures turned out.
The last pictures I have from the trip are from our trip are from the drive to the Interlaken area. See how happy everyone was in the car? I had to include one picture of the Fall colors. Coming from California, I'm used to leaves turn brown and then fall off the trees. I love the colors! They're gorgeous. I kept pestering my brother with questions about how long it would last.

And the final shot is typically Swiss -- green pastures with white mountains. You have to love this view!