Our Day on the Zugerland Sensory Trail

Last night we made plans to visit the Flumserberg "Wild Man" Nature Theme Trail showcased in this blog post, but then this morning after realizing it also had this amazing ropes course, we decided to save it for when Dad comes to visit - hope you're ready for that, Joe!

Finally we settled on doing the Zugerland Sensory Trail. We decided to cram into Malorie's car for this one, since it was only about a 20 minute drive, but would have taken us over 2 hours to get there by train/bus since there was no direct route. Malorie dropped us off at the trail head just after noon, and we planned to spend a few hours hiking and playing at the playground, and then visit the nearby town of Einsiedeln with its gorgeous monastery, and also a gingerbread museum and shop. However, we had so much fun on this trail that we ended up staying all day long! Hopefully we'll make it to Einsiedeln another day. Which may actually work out better, as it's easy to get to Einsiedeln by train, so Joe can come too!

Here we are at the beginning of the trail. Clear, sunny skies and gorgeous mountain vistas!
Also, everyone is looking AND smiling! Perfect!

After we had so much fun on the Riesenwald (Giant's Forest) theme trail, the kids were eager to try another one. It's so much more fun for them to hike when there's exciting and interactive stations just around the bend! This one didn't have as many stations - only eight - but they were all great. They all had to do with different sensory experiences. The first station showcased the hearing sense, with wires stretched over cowbells that you could hit and listen to the different sounds you could make. Here are the kids playing around with this one.

In addition to the stations, there were lots of carved wooden animals along the way. Katie absolutely adores these critters! It was fun to hunt for them in between all the stations. I've collected all the photos together here, but they were interspersed throughout the trail.

At just the right moment, some fellow hikers passed by and asked me (in English!) if they would like a photo with all of us. Yes, please!

Katie got the idea and put that little stone in the squirrel's paws all by herself!

This one is was in the playground at the end of the trail. She loved hugging and kissing them all!

The second station was about your sense of smell. When you pushed on the levers a little puff of scented air came out of the little metal holes. I was surprised at how strong most of the smells were! There are no kids in this picture because I had to hold most of them up to reach the holes so they could do this one. I snapped this photo quickly as we were walking away. The cherries were my favorite, but some of the kids liked other scents better. We all agreed the fox was the worst!

Everyone was eager to reach station three because we knew there was a playground and picnic area there, and that's where we planned to eat our lunch. Malorie was good enough to pack us some peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and apples to enjoy on the trail. Thanks, Malorie!

It was another pretty hot day, but it was actually nice and cool in the shady forest.

The kids insisted I photograph this tree because they said it looked like an elephant was trying to climb out of it and into our world.

The third station had the kids exploring their sense of touch. You had to reach into the holes and try to match up what you felt with one of the images above. There were things like fur, antlers, and bark.

At first the kids were disappointed by the adjacent playground - there was only a small climbing structure with a couple of swings. But then they discovered the amazing zip line! There were no other kids on the trail (probably they were all in school!) so we had the place pretty much to ourselves all day. We ended up spending a long long time playing here. I even tried the zip line! Here's a bunch of videos of the zip line in action.

There was plenty of shady benches to sit on and enjoy our lunch, and also some cool things to explore in the nearby woods. Some previous visitors had built some interesting forts to climb inside of.

We found and ate wild blackberries.

For these hiking trips I wear the Beco baby carrier on the front for when Katie tires of walking. She did pretty well on this trail, and walked for most of the way! I carried her on the steeper hills mostly, and especially more towards the end when it's usually her nap time. I tried getting her to sleep in the carrier but there was way too much to see! I also have a backpack on my back with all of our food and water and emergency supplies. So when Mary asked to bring all the drawing stuff along, I told her she would need to carry it in her own backpack, and she did! At this spot the kids spent some time working in their travel journals.

Joey's leaf rubbings

Mary's leaf rubbings

Lily's drawing of this spot (zipline, playground, etc.)

After a nice long break at this beautiful spot, we started to move on. First up was exploring the small chapel and cafe nearby. Here there was a wide open field with some great mountain views. The cafe was closed today, and the chapel was locked too. We did get to ring the bell though!

We resumed our hike and stopped only briefly at the 4th station - another one about the hearing sense. There were two metal whisper dishes facing each other. We couldn't get the whispering to work, but they did make some nice echoing noises when you banged on different parts of them. i didn't take any pictures of this one. 

The fifth station had another picnic area, including a little three sided shelter with a stove for grilling. In chillier weather it would be fun to hike up here and roast marshmallows or something. This station was about sight, and there was a little tower with "telescopes" you could use to scan the surrounding mountains. Unfortunately these were just hollow metal tubes with no actual magnification power. There were some great views of small towns in the distance though, and we saw several trains running through the valley too. For your viewing pleasure, Mary and I each made videos showing the panoramic views, and I also took some videos of Lily and Katie "break dancing on a tree stump." It was at this point that we ran out of drinking water. Oh no! 

Mary's selfie

Observation tower with "telescopes"

Joey's selfie

After this we headed back into the woods, and the trail got a lot more rugged. Glad we didn't bring a stroller!

Station 6 was a bouncy suspension bridge in the middle of the forest. The kids had fun running across this one.

Moving on, the seventh station was another one about sight. Here there were some giant painted circles you could spin for optical effects. Joey and Mary "hypnotized" Lily so that she would have to do whatever they said. Lily was going along with this one! Mary and Joey promised they wouldn't make her do anything bad. This trick did come in pretty handy though, as whenever Lily got too tired and fell behind, Mary and Joey could command her to run and catch up - and she actually would!

Another clearing with a fabulous view!

The eighth and final station was about the sense of touch. There were different squares of materials (glass, metal, wood, etc.) located both in the shade and in the sun, and you could feel the differences in temperatures. There was also a film of heat sensitive paper where you were supposed to be able to see it change color when you touched it, but it was no longer working. 

Back into the woods!

Not long after the last station the trail looped around and we came back into the clearing with the little chapel and cafe. It was then I noticed solar panels on the roof of a small shack, and when we tried the door we found a nice new bathroom with flushing toilets and a sink with running water! Hooray! Our thirst was quenched!

Hooray for water!

The rest of the trail backtracked past the first three stations again. The kids enjoyed using the zip line a few more times, and they also stopped to imprint the scents from the second station on their memories and made some more noise at the first station.

Mary and Joey discovered this "secret spot" just inside the woods behind the first station.

Rolling Swiss hills; the restaurant in the distance is where we started, and where the large playground we were saving for the end is located

The older kids reached the playground well before Katie and I because she wanted to keep stopping along the gravel road to examine rocks and hand them to me.

"Thanks for your visit!"

The trail was only about 2.5 miles long, but it took us about 4 hours to do the whole thing because of how much time we spent at all of the stations. There might have still been time to visit Einsiedeln, but the playground was too much fun and we ended up spending another two hours playing there! There was another great zip line - this one was much higher up so I could ride it more easily. I went down it at least ten times - so much fun! We also made a bunch of videos on this zip line. In the last one my sister is filming and I think her voice sounds eerily similar to mine! Also, if you listen closely you can hear cowbells in the background. This sound is becoming a familiar background noise as we travel throughout Switzerland. Every time Katie hears cowbells she gets excited. "Cows! I hear cows! Let's go see them!"

Cute little Swiss playhouse

Fun climbing structure

Trampoline!

Small rope course

A perfect swing for Katie!

This was inside of a maze course on the playground. 

Zip line! 

This is what happened when I asked Joey to smile!

Zip line with amazing views!

While we were at the playground the kids did some more drawing and playing with stickers, and we also filled out a couple of mad libs I had printed out for the plane ride. If you want to hear what they filled in the blanks, check out these two videos. They thought they were pretty hilarious.