The creation of meringue and the death of Sherlock Holmes are the two claims to fame of the old town of Meiringen, Switzerland. From the way visitors approach the place, though, it seems that many have difficulty deciding which story is real and which invented.
The town has long been a favourite trek resort of the English, being the heart of the Hasliberg hiking region. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, creator of Sherlock Holmes, stayed in genteel Meiringen many times, and the town's sole attraction is the Sherlock Holmes Museum in Conan Doyle Place (May–Sept daily 10am–6pm; Oct–April Wed–Sun 3–6pm; Fr.3.80, or Fr.8.50 combined ticket with Reichenbach Falls funicular; SMP).
This interesting little den is in the cellar of the English Church, and includes a life-size replica of the detective’s study at 221b Baker Street, complete with taped commentary. The town church, north of the centre on Kirchgasse, has a free-standing Romanesque tower with a wooden spire, some fourteenth-century interior frescoes, and interesting archeological investigations below the crypt of the eleventh-century predecessor. Meiringen was popular enough with English visitors of a bygone age to attract not only Conan Doyle, but also semi-official trinket hunters: ancient bits and pieces from Meiringen’s old church now sit in the vaults of the British Museum in London.
