Gruyères

So we (me and Nam) visited Gruyères (grew yehr) one day and we didn’t want to come back. Gruyères, a tiny village perched atop a hill is about two hours from Geneva and this place looks like it jumped right out of a fairy tale book. 

So we get off the train and this is what greets us… 

A cute little chapel in idyllic surroundings… 

We keep walking and come across this… 

Typical Swiss countryside with cows happily munching away…

Needless to say, me and Nam were having some serious Maria moments… 

The path that leads up to Gruyères…

A beautiful house on the way…

The cows below… 

Another small chapel on the way…

And this is the small village of Gruyères…

The landscape below…

This girl made us some crepes for lunch…

My jambon (ham) crepe…

Looks like an old chapel, but now it’s a workshop or something…

Cute kid…

Even the restroom looks cute here… 

A pretty restaurant…

The castle of Gruyères…

View of the church from the castle…

So we entered the castle and the girl at the reception asked us if we wanted to see a short presentation about the castle, and she took us into this small room and this crane is seen flying above us… apparently long long ago, a  very handsome prince (he was quite dashing in the presentation) was riding around and he came across this undiscovered hill. It was twilight and the setting sun cast a reddish hue over the beautiful landscape and as the prince stood watching a lone crane slowly soared into the red dusky sky. The french word for crane is ‘grue’ and that’s how this place got it’s name and their symbol is a crane in a red background.  

Another prince of the House of Savoy… 

Some plaque in a wall…

Some outpost inside the castle compound…

Giant harp… 

The old kitchen, with medieval flooring…

Relics of the past…

Window seats, in a corner of the kitchen…

My sister,Nam, took this video of the cows proclaiming their contentedness with every peal of their cow bell.