2019 - Day 14: Lake Königssee & Jennerbahn

The summation of today is boats and our children don't mix!

If ever there was a day where the photos tell a different story to the reality today was it.  I have managed to get some angelic shots of our "little angels" that you would never believe would have me full on yelling at them in the middle of Königssee harbour.  I was that close to taking Forrest back to the hotel room for the afternoon and think I would have done had the Jennerbahn not been something I had been really looking forward to.  We have just decided that our kids and scenic boat trips don't work well together.

Not a bad view for breakfast time.

It started well with a relaxed breakfast at the hotel and bus trip down to Schönau am Königssee.  Forrest was really excited about going up the mountain later in the day but also looking forward to the boat trip first.  We had planned to do the full loop heading up to Salet for a walk to Lake Obersee and then short boat trip to St. Bartholomä for another explore before completing the loop back to Schönau am Königssee.  The commentary on the boat was all in German (understandably!) so we didn't know what we were looking at but the views were beautiful and the impressive part where they played the trumpet in the echo wall even held the kids attention for a brief interlude of peace.  Which brings me to it... they just wouldn't sit still which in a busy confined space becomes stressful.  I don't understand how on a train Forrest will sit and stare for hours watching the world go by but on a boat he has ants in his pants and does everything possible to annoy all of us especially his sister.  At this point I was the one calmly telling Matt to calm the tone down as it just makes him worse and trying to find out what the problem was (there was no problem, he wasn't tired, he wasn't hungry or thirsty or bored, he liked being on the boat and then he got really upset himself that he was making everyone else upset).

Walking from Salet to Lake Obersee.

So we arrived at Salet and all decided we would all "reset" before the 15 minute walk to Lake Obersee.  This passed without too much commotion and on arrival the kids loved having a paddle and snack.  Of course the warnings not to go too deep were ignored by Forrest and Paloma sat down in a puddle so both kids ended up short-less but on a hot day like today this wasn't an issue at all.  The mirror lake is stunning and without young kids we would have loved to explore further but today we headed back to the boat to continue our journey onwards.

Little angel?

Good friends?

Playing nicely together?

The 'mirror' effect at Lake Obersee.

The journey between Salet and St. Bartholomä is only 15 minutes but even on this journey Forrest was a pain so we were looking forward to letting them burn of some energy at the promised playground at St. Bartholomä.  Forrest was imagining a play park similar to the indoor one at Wildlands (Day 3) and as much as I tempered down his expectations there was no way I could have got them down far enough to the two swings and a slide that was the reality on arrival (we think they also used to have a couple of baby swings but these had been removed leaving only the a-frame).  So canning plans to do any further walking it was back on the boat.  By this point I was mediator between the three other members of our group and just wanted to get back to Schönau am Königssee to find some food for lunch. 

Departing St. Bartholomä.

On arrival back though I broke.  As I say, "I lost my gentle".  Forrest disobeyed Matt again and I shouted at Forrest that I had had enough.  Everyone in the restaurant next to us turned and stared!  I got down to his level and a bit calmer, told Forrest that if he didn't start listening to us then we couldn't trust him to be safe and if that was the case we couldn't go on nice trips out.  I told him he was ruining the day for everyone else and that wasn't fair.  I threatened to take him back to the hotel.  This may have been an empty threat, who knows, at that point I wasn't even sure myself if I would carry it out or not...  Thankfully we never found out as from that point onwards he was (I won't say as good as gold but he was) a million times better.

We bought some cheese and bacon pretzels and found a shaded area and finally peace was restored, allowing us all to head up to the Jennerbahn.  Originally opened in 1952, the Jennerbahn is over 3km long and travels up to a height of 1800m.  The whole system has recently been renewed with the top station only re-opening on the 8th June, although as we were to find out plenty of work is still on-going.

Heading up the Jennerbahn.

View back down over Schönau am Königssee & Berchtesgaden.

Fortunately cable cars must be more like trains than boats and so the entire journey up and down held the kids captivated.  At the top because of the building work we couldn't get out on to the mountain itself and so we were left with no choice but to have a sit down in the outside terrace and order ice-creams for the kids and a couple of (well deserved) beers for the adults!

At the top!

If we must.....

Heading back down again.

We headed back to the hotel for a 'home-cooked' dinner and reflected happily that we have no more boat trips planned for this holiday!

Blogged by Amber.