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June 09 Gimmelwald--the Swiss AlpsThe journey to Gimmelwald was beautiful, how could it not be? But first let me tell you about getting the tickets to get there. There were a bunch of components that were all hurridly explained to me while I just blinked back knowing I´d figure it out as I went. Thankfully the hostel I stayed at outlined this journey in their instructions to get to their place but in the meantime, imagine hearing this all explained in about 20 seconds: "This is your inter-city train ticket to Interlaken Ost, from there you will take a regional train from Interlaken Ost to Lauterbrunnen, then a bus to Schtekelberg and then here´s your cable car ticket from Schtekelberg to Muerren and then to Gimmelwald." Yeah, that was a bit to take in and then see that there is only a 3 to 7 minute stopver between the times for each of these. Was sure hoping they were well signed! Oh and while I´d gotten good at at least reading French if not speaking it. . . this was the German part of Switzerland not the French part so now I had to maneuver around in a new lingual arena. Don´t worry, I managed ok!
Everything was very obvious to transfer from trains to buses to cable cars and as soon as I stepped off the cable car into the 120 person town of Gimmelwald I was practically at the front door of my hostel. The place was very cool as everybody had the same look of awe on their faces from the incredible views. It was a little unnerving not having a locker to put my belongings in but it wasn´t the easiest thing for some one to run off with your stuff and gallop to an easy getaway down the mountain. So that you have an idea of where Gimmelwald is, it is a town about halfway up the Shilthorn Mountain which is I think the second highest peak in the Swiss Alps. The only one higher is its neighbor Jungfrau whose claim to fame is that it truly is the highest mountain peak in the world. There are cable cars that go to the summit of both peaks. The temperature at my hostel was a perfect 75 or so, just right for hiking in a tank top and shorts. Because it is summer you have to go to the very top to get some snow action. I can only imagine what life is like in the tiny towns in the mountains in the winter. Don´t think I´d want to live through that.
As soon as I got there I dropped my bags off and started to explore the town. There is one main road that zig-zags up from the cable car station and my hostel to the top of Gimmelwald and then continues on to the town of Muerren which probably has three times as many people. It was so peaceful. The homes were all cabin-lodge like (just what you would picture for Switzerland highlands) and there were cows and goats everywhere all with large bells on. All throughout the valley and the towns you constantly heard the ringing of bells as the animals chewed endless amounts of grass and wandered about. It was really a charming sound. The only downside was that with all of the animals when you were walking the paths you needed to watch out for the giant cowpies. The animals were all in fenced areas but apparently made it out quite often. Many of the townspeople produced their own cheeses, breads and sausages and sold them along with eggs, butter and milk that they produced or harvested themselves. I never quite figured out the economy of the town. The folks with hotels or B&B´s made sense to me but the others must work in the other towns where there is more tourism. It didn´t matter though, everyone looked happy and in love with their way of life.
For dinner I bought some cheese, bread and ham from Esther along with her amazing homemade strawberry yogurt. I´m not a huge fan of yogurt but if I could have that every day I might be swayed otherwise! In the evenings all of the people staying in the hostel (would guess about 40) hang out in the dining hall area and the bar/ pool table area. I met a lot of people and we exchanged a lot of information about where to go and what to see. A lot of people were headed to Italy and Greece so I had plenty to share including my favorite places to stay in Santorini and the Cinque Terre. By the end of my two nights there I had people coming up to me every hour asking for my blog address and my little business cards I printed with the information on it. There was a cool wooden barrel type of hot tub outside that I wanted to go in but after watching hiker after hiker come back all sweaty and tired going in the tub first and then hitting the showers I decided not to.
The next morning I got up early enough to take the cable car up to the top of the mountain (Shilthorn) to have a champagne buffet breakfast at the rotating restaurant at the top. This is the very same restaurant that was blown up (pretend of course) in the James Bond movie On Her Majesty´s Secret Service. On the way up I met Janime from Canada/Florida. She was going up to do the same thing so we decided to brunch together. We had a lot of fun and enjoyed the over-abundance of tasty food. The views were gorgeous as usual and we took a lot of postcard worthy shots. In fact we both decided that we loved our picture-taking skills so much that we should open a postcard business together and sell our photos. The postcard business is one giant market. I have never been a big buyer of them until now and they are everywhere and everyone seems to buy them. Oh well, something to think about for the future. . .
The cable car ride makes 2 stops on the way up from Gimmelwald, one in the town above, Muerren and towards the top with nothing to do. On the way down I got off in Muerren to explore that town. As I said it is bigger and had a number of touristy shops. After I decided to do the lazier hike down in the valley so that I could take in all of the views around me so I went down to Schtekelberg and walked 2 hours to Lautenbrunnen. There were some threatening clouds looming above and I made it into an internet cafe at my the end of my hike just in the nick of time. An hour later the skies had cleared and I headed back up to the hostel. That night was pretty much the same as the one before except that this time I played some terrible games of pool. The games weren´t bad, I was. Oh well, at least it was entertaining! The next morning was a very long travel day to Nice. . .
June 08 GenevaWednesday afternoon I arrived by bus from Chamonix to Geneva. I was very lucky to have met this woman and her son from the states who where in Chamonix on a day trip from Geneva because they said they took a bus that only took an hour and a half to get there. That was fantastic news because the trains do not go directly and would have taken about 4 hours to do the same journey. Now I must thank Alan for his advice to cut Chamonix to only 2 days and work Geneva into my trip. My original plan would have been too long in Chamonix and two half days in Geneva was just right as was the help in the budget to work another night of hosteling in. Thanks Alan!
Geneva isn´t a really exciting town but it is very pretty and everyone seems very relaxed and happy. I attribute that to the lovely long promenade along the lake, Lake Geneva that is, and the lovely fountain that goes off every 15 minutes. That afternoon/evening I spent my time walking miles along the lake front taking in the views and exploring the great parks that they have. Was so peaceful. Eventually I got hungry enough for dinner and decided to start looking for a place to eat. I went to the neighborhood where there are supposed to be the most people, restaurants and a lively bunch of students. It was that when I was there. . . but I´m sure you´ve heard about how things are so much more exensive in Switzerland. In looking at some of the shops I didn´t really see much of a difference. However when it came to the dining experience I was in giant sticker shock!
My feet were killing me and I desperately wanted to sit down somewhere for dinner. I investigated the menus posted outside of about 15 restaurants in the area and couldn´t find anything under $40 for even just a salad. Totally crazy! The prices were unbelievable. There was no way I could stomach that. I should point out that it was all in Swiss Francs as the Euro just doesn´t cut it for the Swiss. I had vowed that I would not eat at a McDonalds on my trip (and yes, there was that little stop with Elizabeth in Florence but that was a tiny snack and was more for her sake). . . but the only food I felt was even close to my budget comfort range was an $11.60 hamburger meal there. At least it was delicious.
The hostel I stayed at there was very cheap, felt very new and the cleanest I´ve experienced. The next morning I stopped in a little mini mart for some fruit and a cheap snack for breakfast rather than going through the struggle of finding out breakfast isn´t cheap here either. I had half a day to check out what lie on the other side of the lake which included a church (are you surprised) and a few other so-so places including the Hotel de Ville where they held the first Geneva Convention. I watched the fountain in the lake a bit more and then headed to the train station to make my way to Gimmelwald. As you can see Geneva was worth a little visit but the equivalent of a day was just enough for me. I think you´ll also see that for the majority of the rest of my trip my pace has slowed down a bit. Fewer sites to see each day and more relaxing vacation feel. I am finally figuring out how to slow down. Yeah! Of course, I did sort of intend that in my trip which is a good thing because while I thought that I would be developing some super-human foot strength with all of my walking. . . apparently they tire out at the same rate every day. And sometimes they just need a break altogether! |
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