Land of the Happy Dancing Goat

          Just got back from Switzerland. What a beautiful country. It is probably my favorite country (besides Ireland) by far. Two of my girl friends and I decided to take our 4 days break to Interlaken. We took an overnight train to Zurich on Wednesday night. I love over night trains, and hate them. I always think it's fun to get on a train and sleep and wake up in a different country. However, it's not very comfortable and if you have to sleep with strangers... you don't. We were lucky because our friends had 3 extra reservation for a compartment so the 6 of us women got one to ourselves. Which is good and bad. Good because we wouldn't be kicked out in the middle of the night and would not have a creepy man come into our compartment, bad because 6 women means a lot of hips. We slid down all the seats and attempted to fit all six of us across. One of the girls ended up sleeping in the luggage rack (she is small so she fit perfectly) and the rest of us spooned like it was our job. We woke up and took a few more trains till we ended up in the gorgeous mountains of Interlaken.

    It is just so breathtakingly beautiful there. I loved it the second i got off the train. The sky was blue, the mountain tops covered in snow, and the trees in full Fall. We explored the city and window shopped until 1pm when we were being picked up by our first and biggest excursion of the day. A big ole van came rumbling to our hotel and this crazy long haired man named Ziggy ushered us on with a friendly "You ready to jump off a cliff???"  He drove us up into Grimewald and we were getting closer and closer to the mountains, and closer and closer to the most terrifying thing i'd ever done.
  At the top Mary Clare and I got harnessed up and were read our last rites.  Haha just kidding. But we did sign our lives away. Then it was time to jump. Basically we were jumping off a cliff and then accelerating in freefall for 250 feet before the rope smoothly swings us at high speed through the narrow glacial canyon.... :) :)

    Let me just tell you, skydiving was unbelievable. But this... this was TERRIFYING. It was so scary took my breath away made me scream like a little girl and it was amazing. The video is priceless. I got onto the platform ran and jumped, and immediately my body panicked and i started kicking my feet and flailing my arms.  My face probably looked hilarious. And then you got to the bottom and swung through the canyon. It was exhilarating. Then watching the next person in line go after me, i was like HOLY CRAP i just did that!!!

   After starting our Switzerland trip off perfectly we went back to our hotel for a good 3 hour nap. We then hit the streets for a night on the town. And ended up listening to some live music with friends of ours at their hotel. It was a nice quiet night and we were tired from training the night before so we crashed early and set our alarms for an early 'lofty' goal.
   Finally making it out of our comfy bed and onto the train at 11am we set off to hike what looked good on the map. Pretty much we just looked at the mountains and said 'that one' and started off. The area is clearly marked with trail guides and signs. It's definitely geared for a lot of usage. We made it up pretty far and relaxed at the 'top' with a great view of the alps.

By the time we made it up and down it was already 5pm so we spent another quiet night in relaxing and enjoying some actual lazy time.
    Saturday (our last day) was amazing. We decided to hike from Lauterbrunnen to Murren and then onto Gimmewald. It was an INTENSE hike straight up the mountain for 2 and half hours. We made great time and encouraged eachother to keep pushing. The scenery was gorgeous, tons of water falls and a great view of the mountains and valley below. Up at the top we wandered through the small mountain towns of Murren and Gimmewald. I only had one question. How the HECK do Swiss people get to their houses??? They literally have a house on a mountain with no road or path leading to it.... it's insane. I have concluded they must never leave their houses, or they ride cows.
   Anyways, coming back down the mountain was easier, we took a cable car and a bus! We ended our day at Lake Thun and sat with our feet in the freezing glacier water welcoming the cool relief.

Switzerland was fantastic. I bought some chocolate and some cheese (both of which i enjoyed more than i can express) and I had a great time hiking. I would love to go back sometime, but it is so expensive there! Ah well.. maybe someday!

Oh i almost forgot! The post is titled land of the happy dancing goat because Interlaken's flag is just that... a happy dancing goat