Château de Chillon

Today we visited the château Chillon, which all the guide books say is Switzerland's prettiest castle. Although I've only seen two others, I'm inclined to agree, on the basis of the castle's location alone.

This thousand-year-old castle was built on a small island on Lake Léman, just a drawbridge-length from the shore.  The castle is an hour's train ride from our hotel, some of which we spent speculating on the mist-covered mountains lining the lake.  "It looks like something evil should live in those mountains, mom," Alex suggested. "Maybe like a dragon or a bad wizard." So we made up a little fairy tale of three brave kids and their quest through the dangerous mountains, across the shark and squid-infested lake, and into the magical castle. Giant squids can be distracted with Cheerios. Who knew?

Like Schloss Lenzburg and Schloss Kyburg, the castle was incredibly welcoming for the children.The only employees we saw during our stay, those working the ticket booth, gave us a children's guide to the castle, which we  sat down and read before we took our walk through.  It covered those things that the kids would predictably find the most appealing: the dungeon, the armor, the toilets.  And the castle, although it did have a few furnishing, was mostly empty, nothing but exciting stone corridors to run up and down, twisting into a confusing maze. Since I'm generally more interested in the history and the architecture than the linens and furniture, I'd just as soon see the castle laid bare.

Joey, bringing light to the crypt

The kids made a beeline to the steepest, spookiest stairway, taking us into the lowest crypt of the castle, where they climbed around on the rocky evidence of the island that is the base for the castle. Except for Ella, who pronounced the crypt much too spooky, and ascended just as quickly.

And so Dennis and I chased three little bottoms through narrow staircases and across the tangle of rooms.

The castle, one of the most visited sites on Switzerland, was made famous by Lord Byron, with his poem "The Prisoner of Chillon."  It tells the story of the castle's long-time prisoner, François Bonivard (1493-1570).

Joey, in Bonivard's prison

"Below the surface of the lake / The dark vault lies 

wherein we lay / We heard it ripple night and day;

       Sounding o'er our heads it knock'd" 

...There are seven pillars of Gothic mould,
In Chillon's dungeons deep and old,
There are seven columns, massy and grey,
Dim with a dull imprison'd ray,
A sunbeam which hath lost its way,
And through the crevice and the cleft
Of the thick wall is fallen and left;
Creeping o'er the floor so damp,
Like a marsh's meteor lamp:
And in each pillar there is a ring,
      And in each ring there is a chain;
That iron is a cankering thing,
      For in these limbs its teeth remain,
With marks that will not wear away,
Till I have done with this new day,
Which now is painful to these eyes,
Which have not seen the sun so rise
For years-I cannot count them o'er,
I lost their long and heavy score
When my last brother droop'd and died,
And I lay living by his side...

Boo!

For some reason, Ella pronounced this room creepy, too, and she continued upward, eventually finding a better room, one with a real, honest-to-goodness secret passage.  The kids had a great time running the circuit from the bedroom, through the secret passage, and back into the main hall again.  Except, at one point they disappeared into the bedroom and didn't come out again.  When I peeked into the passage to see if they were there, all three of them, jumped out, screaming "BOO," and then collapsed into giggles.  Excellent!

(I think you can click to enlarge these pictures
if the captions are illegible to you)

We continued through the rooms, ending ultimately  climbing four staircases up to the castle keep.  The ceilings became increasingly lower as we climbed higher, and Joey amused us all by ducking, along with his daddy, to get from staircase to staircase.  The keep disappointed my children in not being laden with treasure.  "Just a small box of jewels would have been enough, mom."  But the view itself was a jewel, and the kids made sure they got to look out of all ten windows.

American universities are letting out, and so it's the time of year of the backpacker. But because of all of this American traffic, there was a large selection of English books in the gift shop.  We couldn't pass up such a treat, and I got the kids a mystery book set in the castle and an "official guide to being a knight," which Ella studied over three times.

And we didn't stop there.  Dennis and I got a bottle of the wine of the region, made from the grapes whose terraced vines so prettily cover the slopes along the lake. Ella wanted a little blank book, which she's planning to fill with a fairy tale of her own.  Alex chose a little stuffed dragon that he named Silver, and Joey picked a little knight figurine that he refers to as "dolly." But that's Sir Dolly, to you.  Joey's and Alex's new toys did sporadic battle for the rest of the afternoon.

We had our lunch in the snack bar in the garden below the castle, and let the kids play in the courtyard and explore the lakeside for a little while.  While we were sitting there, we noticed one of the ferry boats passing nearby, a really excellent old steam ship.  We decided that a short ride would be fun, especially since all ferry boats in Switzerland are free to us because of our GA rail pass. And so we puttered a little longer, playing cards with the kids and throwing crumbs to the sparrows.

Unfortunately, our ferry was a smaller boat, but it was still fun to go out on the lake.  We only took it one stop up, to the little village just up the shore.

We spotted a coffre-ouverte (open trunk) sale across the street from the ferry stop, and Ella was excited to run around and look for treasures.  She was seriously tempted by some old, gnarly keys that looked as though they should open some pirate's treasure chest, but in the end she decided to save her francs for another day.  I almost bought some books, but when I asked the vendor how much they were, he told me, "two francs."  "Two?" I asked, taking out my wallet.  "Two francs fifty," he amended, recognizing me for the expert bargainer that I am.

Were you looking for a wooden replica of an
elephant tusk? Because I know just where to
find one.

We finished up our afternoon walking through the old town, looking for a kid-friendly restaurant, but we had no luck.  Instead we settled for a few minutes on the city playground, followed by a trip to the grocery store to get the makings of a peanut-butter-and-jelly feast, to eat on the train ride home.

Joey fell asleep right before we got to the playground, and he slept for most of the train ride, too, even as a busker sat down on the floor right next to him, playing La Bamba.  Not the lullaby version, either.

Unfortunatley, his late, sound nap meant another long night for him, which we spent examining every page of Trucks And Cars And Things That Go and going through the complete Harold and the Purple Crayon treasury yet again, making me doubly glad that I picked up some new kids' books at the castle today.

On the way home: Joey's decided he knows how to play
Uno, too.

These vacations would be more fun if they didn't always end with me, sitting in the corner of the bathroom, ear to the door, waiting and waiting for the kids to drift off to sleep.  But  it was a was a really good day: totally worth it.