Adelboden, Switzerland 2005 - Travelogue

Saturday, 20th August

In the morning it was a hive of activity as everybody set to to clean the chalet. It was hard work but with everybody doing their bit we got the chalet sparkling clean as we found it. We passed the inspection by the owner, boarded the coach, and said farewell to our home for the week.

Our last stop in Switzerland was at Bern, the federal capital and oldest city in Switzerland. The bear is the cities mascot and bears have been kept in Bern since 1480. The coach parked adjacent to the Bear Pits where a number of the Scouts bought carrots from the vendor to feed to the bears.

A short stop gave the opportunity to see some of Bern's sights, including the Münster Cathedral, House of Parliament and Clock Tower, and to do some last minute shopping. For some it also gave them their last opportunity to visit a Swiss McDonalds!! It started raining as we all returned to the coach. As we crossed the bridge over the River Aare, little did any of us know that by the following Tuesday torrential rainfall in the northern Alps would cause the river to burst its banks and flood many of the streets of Bern.

Once on board the coach we settled down once more for the long journey home. After driving back out of Switzerland and into France, we stopped at about 8.30pm at the services for a bite to eat before heading off once more into the night.

Sunday, 21st August

We arrived at Calais at 3.00am and were immediately loaded onto the ferry which was sailing at 3.15am, an hour earlier than the sailing we had been scheduled to sail on. As we set sail for Dover, some of us visited the restaurant for an early full english breakfast (yes it was only 3.30am at the time!). We had just enough time to look round the "Duty Free" before we landed at Dover.

Back in England, we were now on the last leg home. We stopped once more at the services at Maidstone where we said farewell to our driver Chris. Howard was going to stay with us all the way back to Silver End. After a quick stop at Boreham services to clean 18 hours worth of rubbish from the coach we continued up the A12 towards Silver End. General consensus amongst the leaders was that the coach would fit under railway bridge at Rivenhall End, luckily the height sign agreed, we had 3 inches to spare!! We finally arrived back in Silver End at about 6.30am where all the parents were there to meet us.

Having unloaded all the luggage from the coach it was an emotional farewell as we had all made a number of new friends during the week.