The Hills Are Alive with the Sounds of Cowbells
SwitzerlandWe reluctantly left Hans and Sabina in Bavaria and headed south by train. We were on our way to visit Rem, a Team U.S.A. teammate and his awesome wife Christi in Zürich, but had a few days to burn. Luckily, our new friend Flo came to the rescue. We met Flo, a Swiss ultimate player at Rü´s party and he offered a place to stay in his beautiful home in the picturesque little Alpine town of Sachseln. When the mountains call, we do not decline.
Flo and his wife Femke (along with her mother who was visiting at the time to help take care of their newborn daughter Carlota) cooked us an amazing veggie lasagne meal the first night...delicious!
As we were eating dinner, a very short rainstorm passed over and honored us with our very own atmospheric lights show. This is the view from Flo´s porch...not a bad view to wake up to every day, especially since there is a milky green alpine lake if you look in the opposite direction.
Flo´s family has part ownership in a cabin up in the Alps not too far from his house, so he offered to house us there for a night. We jumped at the opportunity to hit the trail for two days, but were skeptical of the storm clouds that were headed our way on the doppler radar. We knew it was supposed to rain but tested our luck anyway and headed out early for our 6 hour hike to the cabin. The above pic is Mike and I on the "trail" from above Sachseln.
The trail was very well marked in some points, and very well hidden in others. Because there are cattle all over the mountains, when the trail wasn´t well marked it was very difficult to discerne between cattle tracks and human trails. More than once we found ourselves following those tricky cows, and having to reorient using the topo map Flo had provided us. It was really fun to dust off the old orienteering skills using the topo, but luckily we didn´t have to rely on them too much.
There are Swiss flags and crosses dotting the mountain tops. Mike looks like a crusader or missionary soldier here. Interesting historical side note break!: As most of you know, Switzerland has maintained a "neutral" stance in many of the world´s tiffs since the early 1900s in an effort to maintain its sovereignty. But they do have a standing army, and take their potential defensive capabilities very seriously. Crosses, Swiss flags, and happy cows are not the only thing that dot the mountain tops; all over Switzerland there are bunkers filled with machine guns, explosives, and other weaponry in case an emergency need to defend arises. Not only that, but every male is required to serve in the military and, until they are middle aged, spend 2 weeks in basic training a year (which their employer covers and does not take away from holiday time). After serving your introductory two years, every male is given a semi automatic machine gun to take home. So I feel comfortable saying that even though they are politically neutral, they are not messing around with their defensive military capabilities. Their national plan is to run to the mountains!
More fun mountain pictures. The clouds are moving in at this point, but we still had great views and at this point were almost to the cabin. Raising milking cows is obviously a huge industry in Switzerland with all the delicious cheeses they have to offer, so we were entertained by more cow bell symphonies on our hike.
The plan was for us to do the 6 hour hike and then Flo was going to meet us at the cabin with his motorized bike (you can take a small vehicle almost all the way up). We arrived just before the rain and clouds came, so although we couldn´t see all the beautiful peaks that surrounded the hut and nearby lake, we made it to shelter just in time.
A cool picture of the still lake right below the cabin.
The lake is stocked with fish since it is jointly owned by a few families in a fishing club, so Flo and Mike did a little fishing while I read my
book as the cloud bank moved in. Unfortunately, the fish were uninterested.
The clouds finally parted long enough for us to enjoy what was around us and snap a picture from outside the cabin porch.
Flo and Mike raising the Obwalden flag at the cabin. Obwalden is one of the 26 Swiss cantons. Switzerland is split into 26 cantons, which are represented by their congressmen and senators in their federal government much like the USA. We learned from Flo that Switzerland's constitution is modeled after ours.
Drinking "Alpine farmer coffee", an absolute treat and very traditional mountain drink. Here is the recipe (passed down for centuries =). Bring a large pot of water to boil. When boiling add 3 tsp coffee grounds, stir, and take off heat. Add 1 cup of cold water and then open and slam the door (very important!). Pour into thermos to enjoy for next 6 hours. Serve in a bowl, add 2 sugar cubes, and a splash of Swiss moonshine (kirsch plum liquor with rare Swiss alpine flower that, if ingested enough of, has hallucinogenic properties).
Flo also treated us to Alpine Macaroni, which was a delicious twist on regular mac and cheese, with potatoes and onion mixed in. We had a wonderful night of playing Swiss card games, learning about the Alps and Swiss geography (Flo is a geographer who has written books on the waterfalls and alpine lakes of Switzerland!), and hanging out while watching a mini thunderstorm pass. We slept like babies in the loft and awoke early to a downpour. We were planning on hiking down, but instead we hiked down to the nearest village and hitched a ride with a produce van that had just arrived and was going all the way to Sachseln...sometimes I just can´t believe our luck.
When we got down, we bid Flo and family adieu and hopped on a train to Interlaken, in the heart of the Swiss Alps. Andy and others had highly recommended it, and we still had two more days until Zürich, so why not enjoy even more beautiful mountains? Well, it turns out that it is hard to enjoy mountain vistas and hikes when it is raining 20 hours a day. So with hiking, appreciating mountains, and other adventurous ventures out of the question, we were left with only a few options. So, of course, we ate our faces off. Our first stop was cheese fondue (above), which was obviously delicious and the closest thing we have had in a month and a half to queso (so it fulfilled some deep seeded need for melted cheese).
And of course you can´t go to Switzerland without eating the chocolate...so we did. Every day, we spent about 10 Swiss Francs on various types of chocolate. Well worth it.
The Aare River that runs through Interlaken is full of glacial flour, giving it the milky look.
So we slept, we waited out the rain with fingers crossed, and we bought food at the grocery store to make back at our hostel. We couldn´t do much else since the internet was 18 dollars an hour (wtf!?), and everything else was so freaking expensive. Seriously...I don´t know how they sustain those prices, but just to give you an idea, the BigMac Meal at Smack Donalds was over 12 USD. If McDonalds prices are in the teens, you can imagine how much a proper meal would cost.
Finally!! Our luck prevailed once again, and on our last day in Interlaken the clouds parted and we could finally see the mountains. We decided to venture into the mountains for half a day to see what we could find, so we took a train to Grindelwald, a small city nestled even further in the Alps.
Since we didn´t have enough time to hike (or appropriate clothing), we decided to take a bus up to a mountain hut and have a nice lunch looking over the mountains. This is a picture from the busride up to the hut.
I can never get enough pictures of mountains. The snow dusted peak in the distance is Eiger, one of Switzerland´s most popular mountains after the Matterhorn.
One of the few remaining and quickly retreating glaciers of the Alps.
When we got to the top of the mountain, much to our delight, there was a very small traditional Swiss festival going on.
Complete with competitive rock throwing.
And Swiss sumo wrestling. Mike and I like to call it that, but it is really a very old folk wrestling sport called Schwingen (sounds a bit like "Swingin´"). They wear potato sack "belts" (which look like diapers) and hug while giving each other wedgies for a few minutes before someone finally gets the other guy to the ground and pins his shoulders. Very amusing to watch as an outsider.
Cool color contrast on the walk down.
We did a short one hour hike to a nearby gondola and rode it all the way back down to Grindelwald. The views were incredible!
My new best friend, Monsieur Croissant. If you haven´t noticed in the blahg so far, we like the huge paper mache food items that they have everywhere. And we have been eating our weight in croissants since U.S. bakeries can´t really compare.
We left Interlaken for Zürich finally satisfied, well rested, and certainly well fed.
