The Matterhorn was our goal today, if the weather cooperated enough to allow us to see it. The mountain often veils itself in fog, mist or snow. But before heading upwards, we explored Zermatt itself - its spare cobbled streets and thickly-timbered houses that looked like they had been battered by the weather since Genesis. They sat cheek by jowl beside sparkling new hotels and spas. We had arrived during the off season, but the streets were still filled with tourists.

Beyond Visp the train wound us through green pastures and then into calamitous gorges, jagged rock and tunnel after tunnel. The mountains around us were nearly vertical. Mist reminiscent of those you see in Suibokuga-style Japanese landscapes clung to the slabs of compressed rock, and every now and again there would be a chalet or two hanging somehow onto a steep green valley.

The city is home to many great churches, but one in particular stands out—Grosmuenster. Once catholic, it is today Lutheran to the teeth. In fact it was at Grosmuenster that the Protestant Reformation accelerated. Martin Luther, a catholic priest, lived in nearby Wittenberg when in 1517 he dramatically parted ways with the pope and Church after hammering his 95 theses to the church door.

I awake to the sound of children, their voices lively and excited with the same high pitched excitement that children everywhere have. I peek out of the hotel window to see a group of these Lilliputians, marching along in colorful tassel caps, heavy snow pants, brightly colored jackets, and fur lined boots. It's a chilly April day – 45° and mist and light rain fill the valley between this little enclave and Jura Plateau of southern Germany.

Once you stand at the shore of Lake Geneva, there is nowhere to go, but up. And so we do, shoving our little Mitsubishi rental car along for our visit to Michel and Silke, who promised to take us on a little hike, and visit around the hills before heading to Zurich.

We originally met Michel and Silke almost exactly a year earlier in Fez, Morocco (that story to come). We hardly had pasesed half an hour together with them over coffee and fruit in the same Ryad before they were off, but felt an instant connection remained in touch throughout the year. Both are serious travelers having covered much of South America and Morocco and most of Europe in the RV they outfitted and took with them around the world. (For South America, they rolled the car onto a cargo ship and crossed the Atlantic that way.) Both of them also sailed a catamaran from New Zealand to New Caledonia, just the two of them.

"Almost killed us ... twice," said Silke.

If you are able to climb high enough into the alpine hills around Lake Geneva, you'll see the lake is shaped like a croissant, bounded on one side by France and on the other by Switzerland. The Rhone River feeds it and should you follow that north far enough, you'll be looking up your nose at the Alps themselves, covered in snow as they were the day we walked out of our hotel.

Our goal today was to explore a bit of that part of the world, and, for a start, that meant clopping down Lausanne's steep hills to the lakeside village of Ouchy (OO-chee) where we would board La Suisse, an authentic steamship designed to ferry tourists and locals in a grand loop to every village that dots the lake. Michele and Silke had suggested it.

It’s my mother’s birthday and I realize how much she would have enjoyed our explorations of Switzerland. She loved learning about different cultures and she didn’t mind a bit of Belgian chocolate or a fine Cabernet from Spain either. I remember her telling me all about her visits with my father to Madrid and Belgium and France when my dad worked for Westinghouse. I’m not sure she ever made it to Switzerland, but I’m positive she would’ve loved it. Not that she had spent a lot of time traveling in her life. She was a coalminers daughter from southern West Virginia, but loved new places and, especially, the interesting people she met. Thinking of you, mom.

Christian, our friend from our transatlantic voyage, has picked us up and whisked us north along Lake Geneva. It’s morning and the big lake is frosted gray beneath the Alps, capped in fresh white snow. Beyond, in the thin mist, I can see the mouth of the Rhône river and the great valley it took millions of years to create on its journey to Lake Geneva. As we rise higher a sign along the highway indicates that as we cross through these Alpine foothills all water to the right will fall to the Rhône River marching its way to Marseille and the Mediterranean Sea, while every drop to the left will find its way to the Rhine and Rotterdam Bay.

One of Lausanne's largest tourist attractions is the Olympic Museum and Park located along Lake Geneva in the village of Ouchy. It takes a steep walk from Lausanne to reach its beautiful, terraced gardens which feature fascinating sculptures throughout (see photos) as well as some 10,000 artifacts in the museum itself. With the largest archive of Olympic Games in the world. it attracts more than 250,000 visitors each year.