Mount Pilatus - Switzerland

This is a mountain of 7000 ft height near Luzern. And in order to go there, we can take a train (a cogwheel) which has the highest gradient in the world of 48 degrees.
We left zurich with the 11.35 train to Luzern. Our next stop was Alpnachstad, for which we had to take a train from Luzern at 1.05. we reached Luzern at 12.25 pm and thought of roaming the place there for sometime. Nilesh Jesani was with us and hence we thought of showing the old bridge of Luzern to him. We again went to wodden bridge and this time too it looked beautiful. I guess that is the speciality of Switzerland here. No matter how many times you see things, you will like them all the time. We did some timepass over there. Then we left for Alpnachstad at 1.05 we reached at 1.30.
From here, we had to take the cogwheel up. the journey up the mount pilatus takes about 30 minutes and the journey back down takes 40 minutes. This cogwheel has the highest gradient of 48 degrees. we were lucky that the cogwheel was made, else we would have had to climb up the mountain on muleback, just like queen Victoria had done many years back :)
There are various myths surronding the mount pilatus. People believed that a dragon with healing powers and spirits inhabited the rocky crevices. Ghost of roman governor once found lasting peace in Lake Pilatus. And so for a long time, it was forbidden to climb the mountain- for calamity struck anyone who disturbed the Pontius Pilate.
While on the train, as we were rising up to 7000 ft, the view below went on becoming spectacular. The trees looked so tall and this time we saw mountains, rock mountains. The rock also was looking beautiful. This view was wonderful. Till now we had seen snow covered peaks, trees greenery around. This time it was a little different with the granite rocks (I hope it was granite). We were always loking at the gradient at which we were travelling, it was always like 37- 43 , 38- 48 % and all. This is supposed to the only cogwheel which travels at this graident. We reached the top and we could see everything below us so clearly. We could ahead and see Titlis and all the other snow covered Alps. and we could look below and see so many lakes and the Luzern city. We climbed up higher on the mountain, and looked everywhere. Now slowly, mist was forming around us, since it was likely to rain. For a time, we thought that this mist will block all our view and we wont be able to see anything. But slowly our view cleared again. I really wished that you should have been there to see all these things. Dad would have definitely loved it. We clicked a lot of snaps. We could see altogether 5 lakes. Some we could make out, some we could not. One of them was Zug lake. The other was Luzern lake. The Luzern lake had a very different shape. Some of the water we could see as green, and some of it we could see as blue. Above us, we could see many peaks, all snow covered. We could see the cogwheel with we which we had climbed up. Everything was so wonderfull here. Did not wish to go down leaving this heaven. We had been to mount titlis, but from there the view was only of snow everywhere. But from here, we could see the greenery, snow, water... all in just one shot.
We started to move down at 5.30. this time, we were going to take the Gondola from Pilatus to Kreins. This ride of 30 minutes was also beautiful. We were moving between the trees. We wondered how these people had built all these new technology things and yet had kept the nature unharmed. Not like in our cases, where whenever we are building something, we just donot care about the nature. It was fun to see the trees on both sides and moving in between them. From Kriens, we took the bus to Luzern and reched Luzern in 15 minutes.
We left Luzern at 7 pm and came back to Zurich at 8.15 pm.

Legend of Pilatus :
From time immemorial, local people around Mount Pilatus believed that the tiny lake in the Oberalp dip was to blame for the terrible storms in the area. Devastating thunderstorms appeared as soon as ripples were made in the waters. People feared the restless ghost of Pontius Pilate, said to rise from the waters every Good Friday to wash the blood of Christ from its hands.

How the ghost of Pontius Pilate found its last resting place in Lake Pilatus
Soon after the death of Roman governor Pontius Pilate, the myth spread that he had met a disreputable end. This belief was strengthened by the lack of a grave and conflicting reports of the cause of his death. Since the 15th century, it had been said that Tiberius Caesar had had Pontius Pilate thrown into chains as a punishment for condemning Jesus Christ, whereupon Pilate committed suicide. His body was thrown into the Tiber, but the river rebelled against it with great floods. The body was pulled out again and sunk in the Rhone. Alas the ghost of the damned once again caused trouble. It was then decided to sink Pontius Pilate in a tiny remote lake on Oberalp on Mount Pilatus. This apparently resulted in some degree of peace. Only once a year, on Good Friday, did Pilate allow himself to be seen, during the Passion, seated on a chair in the middle of Lake Pilatus – with flowing grey hair and wearing the purple regalia of a judge.

Ghost banished in 1585
In the mid-16th century, fear began to abate and in 1585, Lucerne's priest, accompanied by a plucky band of townspeople climbed Mount Pilatus to challenge the ghost. They threw stones into lake, churned up the water and waded in it – but the ghost did not react: the spell was apparently broken. To make sure that the ghost of Pontius Pilate had also ceased its thunderstorm invoking activities, in 1594 a gap was dug in the wall of the pond on Oberalp to dry it out. It wasn't until 400 years later, in 1980, that people ventured to close the gap again. Today the peaceful lake exists once more. And the ghost of Pontius Pilate rests in peace.


Dragons :
In medieval times, it was believed that dragons with healing powers lived in the rugged clefts and crevices of Mount Pilatus.
And today on Lucerne's own mountain you can still occasionally meet PILU®, the friendly PILATUS-BAHNEN dragon, a distant relative of the legendary Mount Pilatus dragons.

In the summer of 1421, a powerful dragon flew to Mount Pilatus and landed so close to a farmer by the name of Stempflin that he fainted. When the farmer came to, he discovered a lump of coagulated blood and a dragon stone, the healing powers of which were officially confirmed in 1509.

In autumn, a youth fell into a deep cave on Mount Pilatus, landing between two dragons. However they did him no harm. When spring arrived, one of the dragons left the winter quarters and flew away. The other beast gave the youth to understand that it was now time to leave. The dragon crawled to the cave exit, held out his tail to the youth and so pulled him out of the cave.

The chronicle of Petermann Etterlin tells how Regional Governor Winkelried killed one of the Mount Pilatus dragons: he wrapped a spear with thorn twigs and thrust it into the open mouth of the dragon, finishing the beast off with a sword. In the process, drops of poisonous dragon's blood spurted on to his hand. These drops - and the poisonous breath of the dying dragon - froze the blood in Winkelried's veins and he also met his death.

In the early hours of the morning of 26 May 1499, a wondrous spectacle was seen in Lucerne: after a terrible thunderstorm, an enormous, wingless dragon rose out of the wild waters of the River Reuss at the Spreuer bridge. The beast had probably been taken by surprise by the thunderstorm and washed down from Mount Pilatus in the Krienbach, which flows into the Reuss beneath the Jesuit church. Several well-respected and educated townspeople authenticated the truth of this story.