Interlaken

My husband has been working crazy long hours and even had to work some of Easter.  This weekend past was not officially a long weekend but Tuesday was a public holiday and Scott finally had the chance to take some time off.  After a cool April with constant rain the weather was forecast to be warm and fine, so very last minute I contacted a camping company and asked for a cabin anywhere within 3hrs drive of Basel.  They has a spot free in Interlaken.  Unfortunately it was only for the weekend, but 2 nights was better than none.  Wow Interlaken is beautiful.  Nestled between two lakes with the Bernese Alps all around.

View of the Jungfrau from Interlaken

Interlaken is the adventure capital of Switzerland, but with three young children, white water rafting, rock climbing, skydiving, parra-sailing and late season skiing were not high on our to do list.  This is also a great base for walking, serious walking, again not overly great for young kids.  We could have caught the train up the Jungfrau to the "roof of Europe", but a 4hr return trip did not overly appeal.  We have girls who are not very excited about trains, or more snow and ice (we will wait till we have visitors to do this).  Lake activities were not open yet for the Summer season.  So we decided to visit Ballenberg, the Swiss Open-Air Museum, perfect, lots of walking between "villages", but with so much to look at the kids were kept interested and didn't realise they were doing so much walking.

Enjoying walking around Ballenberg

Historical Buildings (relocated) from all over Switzerland

Great views

Old time farmyards and fields

Vegetable gardens

Playground with carousel

Historical home that's lower levels were converted into an Enchanted Forest for the kids

Entering the Enchanted Forest

Exiting the Enchanted Forest through a hidden door in the kitchen

Rope factory

We enjoyed our day so much at Ballenberg that we got season membership and returned for a second morning to finish looking around.  It is rather large with lots to see.

So that was our weekend in Interlaken.  Lucky it is only a short drive from home as there is so much more to see and do.