Switzerland DAY 1

Sept 5

Accommodations:  Last night we stayed in...drum roll please...a room even smaller than the two nights before!  Tonight we are staying in a beautiful swiss chalet B&B with amazing views. 

Food:  German pretzel sandwich with mozerella, tomatoes, & pesto - yum!  

Adventure:  Woohoo!   Hiked the Swiss Alps today - AMAZING!

Humor:  We were politely escorted off of a swiss train today and marched to a ticket office where they made us pay for a train ride that our Eurail Pass apparently didn't cover.  Who knew?

Rest: No rest today!  Our feet are sooooo tired!

We traveled through Germany yesterday to arrive at 10pm in Interlaken, Switzerland.  We didn't know that we booked a hostel to sleep in!  Luckily, they gave us a TINY private hostel room for the two of us, but we were sharing a shower and toilet with others and apparently you have to have your own towel at hostels???  Obviously, we didn't have any towels.  Awkward.  It was a great adventure though and we were still both were laughing about it this morning.

Interlaken is only an hour away from one of the most beautiful places on earth - the Jungfrau mountains of Switzerland.   Imagine the movie Heidi as the little girl and her grandfather climb the Swiss mountains.  Imagine a village of 30 log cabins whose foundations were built back in the 1500's and each cabin with 5-10 flower boxes bulging with bright geraniums, daisies, and zinnias.   Imagine the Swiss Alps covered in snow all summer and LOOMING right in front of you almost like you could touch them.  That's where we are today - in Gimmelwald.  It's  breathtaking.

Well...we were recommended a beautiful nature hike by a few locals.  We took a gondola up from 4,500 feet to 9,600 feet where we were supposed to take an easy hike down that would take 4 hours max.   We got to the top and started second guessing this adventure.  We asked an elderly lady what she thought about the hike and again we were told that it was easy.  Ok, if this elderly lady thinks it's easy, then it must be easy.....UHHH  WRONG!!  We did not take into account that these locals were raised with these mountains as their playground!!   I think this elderly woman might have actually been HEIDI, now that I think about it!!!!      

Needless to say.... 6 hours later with blistered feet & sunburned faces we were crawling down the mountain.   We would do it again in a heart beat....it was the most magnificent 6 hours.   Kelley loved every minute of it.  Wayne is going to love it in a few days once the trauma wears off.

Staying here for another day or two.

See pics below and stay tuned for a short video from Wayne regarding this hiking business.....

Love ya'll, Wayne & Kelley