TOPS TOUR - SWITZERLAND
This followed the
Ollon-Villars hill climb
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After a succession of wet-dry-wet days we
were warned of snow. Monday dawned to a serious dump of 3-4 inches and still snowing!!
ideal open car touring conditions…….....and for goodness sake, this was
September!
Team TOPS were Trisha and Richard in
their Frazer Nash, Jane and Alex Boswell also in a Frazer Nash, Nick Rossi in
his C type Jag, Leslie and John Guyatt in a road going Talbot, Candy and Bertie
Gilbart-Smith in their AC, John Venables-Llewelyn and correspondent in the Type
35 Bugatti and, bringing up a much appreciated rear, Alannah and Kirk Rylands'
Range Rover offering a warm dry space for luggage, spare overalls, beers etc.
We left Martin Morris and Bill Tucker at
the Park hotel in Villars, heads down in the inner workings of the Scimitar
repairing the thermostat or whatever, to follow us when mobile...The Pilks led
the way, smugly with their hood up!..onwards and upwards...
We were to have gone over the Col du
Pillon (5101 ft) but it was closed so we missed the Gstaad to Châteaux-d-Oex
loop. Wet snow was coming at you from every angle, over, under, sideways and
down, it was fairly grim going and sadly the falling snow restricted the
view...by now the wet snow had filtered through to various parts!
Several times we were stopped by groups
of cattle being brought down from them hills, they seemed to regard us with a
bemused indifference as they clanged their way through and around us, some I
noticed had much more elaborate and decorative bells than others which made me
wonder what a cow has to do to get the 'Posh' bell, 'long service with good
behaviour, or just ' biggest milk yield'?...I digress...After tantalisingly
driving past a local market (a serious offence in any language! especially as
most of the stalls seemed to be selling thick dry layers of clothing!!) we
turned up a narrow route to finally stop at Chalet Kreuz, a welcome sight
looking just like a giant cuckoo clock in what I am sure must have been a
spectacular position.
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Inside we peeled off wet layers and were
greeted with hot gluwien.….what followed was a delicious and very jolly lunch,
spätzli, fondue etc. and copious quantities of wine, while our clothing steamed
gently over the stove. Dry and warm, we set off, having discovered the heavy
duty bin liner, opened at both ends and worn round the middle like a tight
skirt stopped the damp seeping through the gaps in the wet weather gear! I must
say I feel a new fashion item emerging, watch this space for colour variations
and perhaps with TOPS or other sponsorship logos. There is a slight mobility
restriction on getting in or out of a Grand Prix Bugatti but practice and a few
modifications should sort these out... The snow began to ease and as we reached
Lake Thun at Spiez it was clear. We rounded the south side of the lake and then
on to Interlaken.
That afternoon we were to have gone over
the Susten Pass (7296 ft.) but as it was closed, luckily Trisha had planned an
alternative route just in case! We went north toward Lake Luzern. After losing
the Talbot which ran out of fuel and the Range Rover which was heading for the
Pass not having seen the closure signs, we all met up again for a coffee and a
cognac. (Dreaded mobile phones do have some use!) To make up time we headed for
the ferry to cross the lake, the Boswells took the road around the lake,
arriving before us. To me the ferry was a very peaceful form of transport after
some 3-4 hours in an open GP car in a tight plastic skirt! The Hotel Albana in
Weggis was family run with large palatial rooms and wide staircases as if from
a time gone by. After a hot bath, hair wash and dry clothes we had a delicious
meal and somehow managed to forgo the after dinner paper aeroplane displays of
the previous few nights!
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Tuesday and we woke to a crisp clear day,
with magnificent views of the mountains that we should have come through the
day before. By now Martin and Bill had joined us and we were to have a day
without cars. The first treat was the paddle steamer 'Uri' along the lake to
Vitznau from where we were to catch the 10.15 train up the mountain. We had
great difficulty in extracting several members of the team who would have
happily spent all day down in the engine room paddling round and round the
lake. Trisha had reserved an 'old style' coach just for TOPS and we were pushed
up the rack in front of the small train. This is the oldest track railway in
Switzerland, built in 1871. We climbed through the snow line to the top of the
Rigi mountain (5900 ft) and in brilliant sunshine walked on up to the
observation area to take in the view - breathtaking in more ways than one!
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More gluwein whilst waiting for the train
to take us down a stop to lunch, needless to say the juvenile amongst us
reverted to snowballing and the construction of a rather handsome TOPS snowman.
After lunch the party split up, John Guyatt opted for the cable car down, the
main group went back down on the train and spent the afternoon being indulged
by the work force in the train workshops. A small energetic faction walked down
the winding mountain track with waterfalls and caves in abundance. We arrived
back at the paddle steamer station whence we had started, to find Kirk dozing
on the jetty in the sunshine listening to a string quartet playing for the
outdoor Tea Dance.
A truly wonderful day - Another noisy
dinner and a drinks bill that I am sure must be funding the Swiss National
Guard!
Wednesday and after saying our goodbyes
to Martin and Bill, off to catch an earlier ferry home, we leave the lake and
it's bright blue water, greener than green fields and the neatly placed 'cuckoo
clock' houses to climb again. At Andermatt we head west to the Furkapass (7975
ft) and on to the Grimselpass (7103 ft) another coffee and cognac stop on the
top. On leaving, Nick Rossi and the C Type are suddenly surrounded by a swarm
of school children who appear from nowhere in this barren spot! Then the long
drive down through spectacular scenery and even more spectacular winding bends
in the road!! (This passenger found it more scary going down than up - 'I hope
the brakes work?'...'What brakes.' !)
The lunch stop was a large hostelry at
Guttanen, reassuringly full of local workman...another huge plate of
cholesterol, delicious! John and Leslie part company with us as they have to
dash back to the UK for Friday morning. The afternoon run is a pleasant route
north of the lake this time back to Interlaken, just before this we spot a
second-hand shop - Rylands is reluctant to stop, but once persuaded is lost
like a child in a toy factory! Amongst the tat (foreign tat is so much more
interesting than our own!) there are some real good finds, ridiculously cheap
in comparison to the cost of food and drink...if we could have got the two
cupboards and the wooden luggage trolley into the Range Rover we would have.
Onward for Wengen and Murren to spend the
night in a typical wooden chalet hotel in the valley below at Lauterbrunnen, a
very pretty picturesque alpine village. We leave the Bugatti to deposit yet
more oil in the hotel car park (at lunch someone had placed a piece of
cardboard underneath!). The evening is spent eating good food, drinking good
wine in great company...inspite of The Plant Incident .... .... (Censored – Ed)
Thursday the Boswells leave early to be
in Dijon by midday for some group 4 racing at the weekend; the Gilbart-Smiths
leave to make their own route home; the splendid idea of lunching at the
revolving restaurant, Piz Gloria in the James Bond film, on the top of the
Shilthorn (9744 ft) is abandoned due to lack of visibility and cost (£30 for
the cable car!), the Pilkingtons and Rossi visit the caves of indoor
waterfalls. The Bugatti and the Rylands set off back to Villars to pick up
trailers, which took us via Gstaad and over the Col du Pillon, missed on the
first day due to the snow, it was a beautiful run and most of the snow had
disappeared. With the help of mobile phones we all meet up again at a very
swish venue at Vézelay near Avallon in France. The hotel has a very interesting
interior decor (a bit Lawrence Llewelyn-Bowen!!! No Relation)
Friday we have time to spare so we take a
cross country route with a noticeable lack of Broquant shops!.. We split, for
the trailers to motorway it, and the tourers to take a more scenic route to Le
Havre - just enough time to meet up, after a Rylands trailer puncture in the
rush hour traffic which produced a crowd of little perishers swarming over and
in the HWM, for yet more gourmet food before a night-cap on the ferry. Another
very enjoyable TOPS Tour.
C.I'A
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