29/09/25 Bridges, Walls, Churches, And Fat Little Cattle.

There was one day left in Lucerne and so much to see! Off we went to the old town which was bursting with bridges and churches and painted buildings. Let me show you a little of what there was to see in old town.

The Franziskanerkirche, with allegedly the most elaborately ornamented pulpit in Switzerland.

To be honest, I don't know how to discern degrees of elaborateness and ornamentation in Swiss pulpits.  They all look very elaborate to me.

The ceiling theme was all cupids and roses and little fluffy clouds.

Fluffy and light the ceiling may have been, but some of the side crypts were just plain macabre.

I'm kind of glad I can't read German.  I don't want to know.

Close by the Franziskanerkirche was the Nadelwehr (Needle dam), installed in 1859/60 and still used today to control the water level of lake Lucerne by manual removal/insertion of the timber 'needles'.  My resident engineer was fascinated.

The Spreuerbrücke covered bridge near the Nadelwehr boasted 67 triangular paintings in its rafters, the most public and extensive Dance of Death.  These panels were intended to make it clear to the good citizens of Lucerne that there was nowhere on land, in air, or at sea where they could escape death.

Brutal reality.

At the far end of the bridge was the site of an historic hydroelectric power station built in 1867 by a business cooperative in town. This followed the burning down of the flour mills in the centre of the river, although I'm not sure what the two had to do with each other. The old power station lasted until the 1970s before being replaced and yet again my resident engineer was fascinated.

From the bridge and power station we puffed our way up a zig zag path to the remaining parts of the fortified town wall with eight towers still standing.  Fat little highland cattle came to say hello to on the way up.

Someone needs a haircut.

We climbed to the top of the guard tower, and I climbed even higher to the top of the clock tower.  From the top of the wall the city spread below us, needled with the spires of churches and threaded with the river. 

The wooden stairs were steep, old, and made entirely of wood with no nails in use.  I suspect the hand rails were a newfangled invention.

Deviating from buildings and bridges we found the Lion Monument, a memorial to the deaths of the Swiss Royal Guard who lost their lives defending the king in the French Revolution.  

OK, back to churches.  The Hofkirche St Leodegar was by far the biggest one we'd see so far, and both the church facade, the interior, and the cloisters were rich with details. 

with an overwhelming amount of elaborate gold and intricate details,

and of course, just a touch of the macabre scattered around the place.

The Grim Reaper oversaw the black board on which, I surmise, the details of the day's burial were written.

How could you not think of the Eye of Mordor?

Just a random headstone, nothing special, fat babies and ominous skeletal spectres.

I took a break down by the lakeside to rest my feet and clear my mind of the macabre by watching faraway sailboats on the water.  The lake was busy with watercraft and away in the distance the mountains made cameo appearances through the clouds.

On the way home we popped briefly into Peterskapelle, a little church that was decidedly understated after the gilt and glory of the Hof and Jesuiten Kirches.

And then back we went over the Kapellbrucke, constructed as part of the city fortifications in the 14th century, dripping with geraniums and adorned with more paintings in the rafters.  These paintings depicted scenes from Lucerne's history, and only 30 of the 150+ originals remained after a fire destroyed most of the bridge in 1993.

Not that the historical paintings were any less macabre than the Dance of Death ones.

The tower halfway along was throughout its life a lookout tower, a dungeon, and a repository for city records.

Theday was drawing to a close and my feet were tired of cobblestones with one more kirche to go.  Jesuitenkirche was established in 1666 and was the first large Baroque building of an ecclesiastcal nature in Switzerland, and allegedly had fantastic acoustics.  I couldn't comment on the acoustics because everyone inside was tiptoeing and whispering, so I did the same.

Another fantastical ceiling in the whites and pastels that seem characteristic of a lot of Switzerland's churches.

Another elaborate pulpit,

And another high-altitude pipe organ.

By the time I got home I was quite worn out and dying for a cup of tea which wasn't possible due to not being provided with a kettle or tea accoutrements in the Hotel Alpha.

"I'll have a quick break," I said. "And go out at night to see the lights on the river."

Yeah, right, who was I kidding? Five minutes in my hotel room and I was in my pyjamas, snuggled up in my hotel bed editing photos and writing blogs for my fan club. Sometimes the lights on the river just have to wait.

Old town embellishments.