Gosh - starting our fourth week cycling 🚴‍♂️.

So we realised that our next stage was not actually intended to be a full day, just the stage along the lake. But we had tortured Booking.com for an affordable hotel (for Switzerland anyway 🙄💶💶) in Montreux which in cycling terms is no distance at all from Lausanne 🙄. But the weather was going to be great 😊 ☀️ with no clouds and the lake does look so lovely 😍.

Also the lake front has Lots of Things to See and Do .

There are two World Heritage sights 💪🏻 And you know that we are experts in this.

First up were the World Heritage steeply terraced vineyards of Lavaux. These are on the steep (really steep) hillside behind Lausanne, Vevey and Montreux. Now being vineyards, they are on south facing slopes facing the sun full-on.

Our cycle route was offering us a steep climb up through the terraces. On the other hand, Google maps was tempting us with a cycle track ALL ALONG THE LAKE FRONT.

All the way 😍.

Did we want to cycle steeply uphill in blazing sun?

🤔

No.

So along the lake front it was.

We started off by looking at a Roman mosaic, then moved onto the archeological park with the ruins of Roman Lausanne (was Switzerland in the Roman Empire 🤷🏻‍♂️).

So did we want to do the Olympic Museum? Lausanne’s No 1 attraction. Google maps suggested that if we wanted to see copies of the Olympic medals from every Olympics, dubious statues of sports persons and photos of the founders of the Olympic movement - then this was a great place 👍🏻. All for £17 per person 😳.

But 🥱, this did not excite our attention over the excellent Youth Hostel breakfast. So that was a miss.

On the other hand there were some great lakefront bars and cafes. We set off late after a long and slow breakfast (lots of options to weigh up) and after a few km we stopped for “Morning Coffee” 😂. 10:30 am. And watched the lake steamers ply their trade.

We were speculating as to whether we could squeeze in 11’s between Morning Coffee and Lunch. 🤔

Anyway, the lake front trail took us to Cully which is a pretty village. It had a tree-shaded park by the lake, and on Sundays it has a pop-up foody market 🤤.

So we bought some lunch and ate it under the trees watching the lake steamers ply their trade.

We had a long lunch. Really, it was quite a looong lunch. Did we mention the lake steamers? 🥱😴.

And then we thought we needed some more km under our belt. Barely double figures by this stage 😂.

Now whilst Google maps has a cycle trail all along the lakefront, in reality the town councils have banned cycles and roller bladers from that trail 🙄. So we diverted onto an on-road cycle track on the Rue du Lac. Not as nice, but the road was quiet (there is a bypass and motorway up the hillside).

And then we realised we were cycling through those World Heritage terraced vineyards after all, but a little lower down the hill 💪🏻 and there were wineries and caves along the way. And an air conditioned visitor centre (and admittedly, retail opportunity) by the cycle track, so we spent some time reading the wine labels slowly and carefully before deciding that even the wine labels were probably outside our price range. 😂.

And then we came across our second World Heritage sight of the afternoon. It is a Le Corbusier house which he designed and built for his parents in the 1930s. It is run by enthusiastic volunteers who carefully explained the history of this fascinating house (it is small and has a similar shape to a residential caravan- long and thin). And they issued iPads with virtual reality thing on it so you could see Le Corbusier in the room with his mother and the various furnishings and photos of him with Picasso. We really liked this house. The volunteers were impressed by our cycling and got us a glass of water from Le Corbusier’s kitchen 👍🏻.

We still had a few km to go and we made it to Vevey and had an iced coffee in its cute cobbled streets.

Then finally made it to Montreux. By this time, late afternoon 🙄🙄🙄, people were driving up and down the Rue du Lac in fancy cars. Several Ferraris, Lamborghinis, Maseratis, Porsches were quite common but these were high-end models which I’ve never seen before. Also, some dodgy-looking black luxury minibuses with blacked-out windows driven by guys in a uniform. And black limos parked with engines running outside hotels like Eden Palace, Le Montreux Palace, Hotel du Grand Lac Excelsior etc.

Ours was the Hotel du Parc et Lac in case you were wondering. We spotted our room from the Promenade as it was the only one with washing hanging out to dry on the lake view balcony.

The pavements in Montreux have glittery stones embedded in them like someone’s dropped their diamonds and they have been squashed into the tarmac.( I should perhaps have a check 🤔🤷🏻‍♂️.)

And then there was the statue of Freddie Mercury (he had a recording studio here).

And lots more lake steamers 😂.

So you see, lots of things to see and do 💪🏻.

We looked for a coffee bar or patisserie for breakfast tomorrow. Nothing doing. Jewellery shops, yes. Fancy cars, yes. Interior design shops (Wow!), yes. But coffee bar, no. So that’s a hotel breakfast tomorrow then. 🤷🏻‍♂️

We had a swim in the lake near Freddie. The water was quite warm but refreshing. Then we had a beer on the terrace of the Eden Palace Hotel (😉💪🏻) and a nice meal out somewhere affordable. But we did sample some of those local vineyards 👍🏻.