Geneva to Zermatt

We actually had a bit of excitement before we left town in that we were technically homeless for the night. We'd initially booked an Airbnb in Zermatt, but the night before we were to arrive I'd read the review of the last guest and they'd had a terrible time due to construction on the building. I contacted our host to ask about this and got no response. We actually had to reach out to Airbnb on Monday morning via Skype calling on the hotel's WIFI (God bless technology) to have them cancel our reservation. We were not paying full price to stay somewhere getting a new roof and new facade meaning that the windows were covered and the view was nonexistent. I'm so thankful that I looked at the reviews once more before we left Geneva. Luckily we were able to find a hotel room in Zermatt at a lovely place, Hotel Phoenix Zermatt , for about $50 more than we'd spent on the Airbnb that included breakfast so it was kind of a wash. Score! 

Note: We've had great experiences and not-so-great experiences with Airbnb so we're kind of on the fence about using them in the future. They were helpful in the instance, but it took about four hours total to get the whole issue resolved and our money refunded. The host was not pleased that we didn't want to stay in a construction zone and said she'd posted on the listing that it was going on. That was a lie. She tried to leave us a bad review as guests. It was a whole ordeal. 

Anyway, we finally hit the road from Geneva to head towards Täsch, the town where we'd park our rental car to catch a train into Zermatt. Zermatt is the small town near the Matterhorn and it is a carless village. Yes, we rented a car just to drive less than 3 hours and then park it for two days. It was much cheaper, faster and allowed us more freedom than taking the train between the two cities. 

Jackson pleased to be driving his new BMW

We'd gotten some supplies for lunch at the grocery store behind our hotel before leaving Geneva so we pulled off the main road and cruised through the town of Montreux where we found a little park with an excellent view of the mountains and lake.

A picnic with a view? Yes, please.

My favorite picnic date

It was great! We were shocked at finding such a gorgeous place just by pulling off the interstate. We enjoyed our little picnic, strolled around the town and then got back on the road to the train station.

After parking in the nicest parking garage ever (the whole place had epoxy floors!), we got train tickets and headed for Zermatt.

Headed to Zermatt!

Our first glimpse at "Mattie"

We got to Zermatt and off the train and magically found our hotel. The town was bigger than people made it seem on the internet and a little confusing. It was a little cloudy when we arrived in the late afternoon. I'd kind of forgotten to even look around as I was focused on getting my luggage up the many hills on the way to our hotel when Jackson yelled out, "JENN! THERE SHE IS!" I turned and looked and the Matterhorn was there in the distance looking just as beautiful as I'd imagined her. She's majestic.

The requisite tourist photo from Zermatt

We enjoyed some banter with the nice ladies checking us into our hotel and then got settled in for the few days we'd spend there. They told us restaurants to avoid in town and sent us on our way to grab dinner.

The river rushing right through the town was so pretty

Petefish

The cutest church in the center of town

We wandered around for quite a bit before settling on an Italian for dinner. The Matterhorn basically straddles the Switzerland and Italy border which meant that the folks in town knew their way around pasta. SCORE!

Jackson enjoying some of the best bruschetta we've had

We opted to dine outside even though it was a little chilly because we were obsessed with the views. Our dinner turned out to be absolutely excellent and was just under $60. This felt like a real win in the expensive village.

Mattie went behind a cloud

We strolled around town for a bit before heading back to our hotel to retire to the evening. Our room was quite nice but did not have a fan or air conditioning (not that they need AC all that often) so it was a bit of an adjustment to sleep in such a stuffy place, but we survived. ;)