Mt. Pilatus

On our second day, we had to get up early for a trip to Mt. Pilatus, which is a nearby mountain peak – 6,500-ish feet up.  There were a lot of moving parts to our plan for the day.

First, we needed to catch a bus for a 10 minute (or so) ride to a town near the mountain, which we did just before 8:00 AM. The bus ride was the beginning (and end?) of our international crime spree for the day.  The hotel gave us a free pass for busses within Zone 10 in the city – and this trip qualified- but I don’t think we did it right.  We just got on and off the bus and no one batted an eye.  I think we were supposed to actually use the pass to get bus tickets.  OOPS!  Fortunately, no one had to bail us out of jail.

My information said to look for, and follow, the red Mt, Pilatus signs once we departed the bus.

It was a short walk, but along the way I saw what I think was an old Swiss farm.

Just past that, we arrived at the gondola station.  The gondolas were first installed in 1956.

We had to wait a few minutes for opening time, but before long we were cruising up the “hill”.  Each gondola seated 4 people.  We shared ours with a couple visiting from Florida of all places.  Mike took a picture of me “chatting” with them.  By “chatting” everyone who knows me knows that they didn’t get a word in edgewise!  hah.

The views were lovely to see, but the gondola and seating arrangement made taking pictures a bit difficult.

There are a couple of stops along the way for people to get off to pick up on various activities offered or for hikers to connect to trails.  At the last stop, this mountain goat was there to greet us.

At this stop was an area with a restaurant, a metal luge run that is nearly a mile long and can get up to 25 mph if you don’t hit the brakes the whole way, a ropes course and a large kids’ playground.

The way ahead:

For years this stop was as far as visitors could go up the mountain via the gondolas.  Luckily for us – in 2015 the Dragon Ride was opened to complete the route to the summit.  We switched rides from the 4 seat gondolas to the 55 person capacity (mostly standing room only) Dragon Ride for the very short ride to the summit.  There were a few seats at the front and we managed to snag two -so we had a great view of what was ahead on the way up.  I got some pictures looking ahead, but again, the design of the cabin and it being full of people limited my photography.

There were a couple of times when it really seemed like the cabin was going to bash into the side of the mountain in slow motion and then at the last minute, we were suddenly lifted up and over the cliff.

I caught a glimpse of the Klimsenkapelle Chapel perched on the mountain, built in 1861.

This was the station at the summit.

At the top was an indoor area for the station, a small snack bar and a few simple shops.  Above that, was a very large open plaza for views in all directions.

There were two areas where visitors could continue higher for views by climbing stairs.  We’d walked around the different sides of the plaza and were considering going higher up the stairs, but it started raining.  So no go.

When it is time to go back down, visitors have a choice between going back the way they’d come via the gondolas or taking the Cogwheel Railway down a different side of the mountain.  This railway was opened in 1889 and is the steepest in the world. It is about three miles down and there are places along the way where there’s 48% gradients.  We chose to ride the train.

It goes down alongside of this valley.

It was a fun choice -but the angle and the cabin made for tough photo options.  I did get a picture of a second train descending behind us as it entered a short tunnel.

It was still sprinkling, so the rain drops on the windows made pictures a wasted of time.  Weirdly there was a tiny, awkward area to the side of me that didn’t have rain drops, so I got a few pictures through that limited perspective.  The gloom did’t help either!

It took about 30 minutes to arrive at the base station.

We’d arrived in a small town called Alpenacht.

They had a couple of spots with a view near the shore of Lake Lucerne

And, if we hadn’t already done our own version of “Trains, Planes & Automobiles” we had one more decision to make for our return to Lucerne.  We could take a quick train back…or take a paddlewheel boat ride back.

Even though it was still sprinkling, we decided to take the boat option.

We had to buy our tickets on the boat -I thought this ticket window was really cute.

It did briefly rain after we got on the water, but it didn’t last long.

We could see Mt. Pilatus from the lake.  To my amazement, Mike was able to spot a gondola heading up the mountain… You see it in this picture in the “curved” area to the right.  (Hint:  look for a small dot!)

The boat made a few stops along the way.  This was a church and some houses at one of the stops.

Before we knew it, we were arriving in Lucerne.  The dock for this tour was conveniently at the train station,

It was an enjoyable day.

Categories: Part 2: Mt. Pilatus, Switzerland 2026