Wonderful Interlaken

Oct. 5, 2008

I never thought I would repeat the overused, tired Will Ferrell, Christopher Walkin Saturday Night Live joke, but one visit to Switzerland has convinced me that the world really could use more cowbell.

I arrived in Interlaken on Sept. 25th or 26th, I can't remember now. Several days and nights bled into one in the quest to get to the mountains. After three uncomfortable train rides following an all-night romp through Rome, I, along with Americans Ian and Justin and Aussie Luke, arrived at the foothills of the Alps.

The town of Interlaken is located in the heart of the Alps situated between the Lakes of Thun and Brienz and at the foot the Eiger, the Mönch and the Jungfrau peaks. The lakes are an icy, green-blue color and look fresher than any water I've ever seen. The town is known for its adventure sports and many backpackers on tight budgets blow apart their wallets to go canyoning, sky diving, rafting, or participate in other high adreniline sports. The sky over the town is filled with paragliders drifting down from the peaks.

As I have to live off two years of savings for the next eight months, I shied away from the more expensive activities. Instead, the boys and I headed into the forest one day to do a high ropes course.

It was a little frightening how little training we received to do the courses which took us into trees at heights upwards of 50 feet. A Canadian girl gave us a five minute lesson in how to attach and reattach our click clacking carabeaners as we made our way from obstacle to obstacle.

"Don't remove both your carabeaners at once," she warned me as I dangled a dangerous four feet above the ground on the training course. But that little warning was it and we were off.

"Have fun," she said.

And we did.

The four of us spent seven hours hanging out in the trees, climbing and swinging and ziplining through the canopy. It was a playground high above the rocky forest floor. The jangle of bells from the cows grazing in a nearby field was occasionally drowned out by a "Wahhhooo" or "Weeeeeeee" as we flew through the trees.

After conquering our fear of heights, several of us spent the next few days hiking through the mountains. I would say goodbye first to Luke, who was returning to Melbourne, and then to the American boys who were heading to Nice and then Cinque Terra. I made new friends though in Intelaken, all Australians. They really are everywhere in the world those Ozzies. One wonders how the country keeps functioning when most of their population seems to be away from home.

I went on a seven hour hike one day with Matt from Melbourne, and Butch from Perth. We took a train up to Lauterbrunnen, village of waterfalls, and then hiked all day. We played categories and 20 questions for most of the hike. I think the high altitude had some effect on our minds because Butch stumped us with "iron" as a thing. How boring and obvious is iron?

On the walk down from the peaks, a kindly old Swiss woman gave us each an apple she picked right from the tree.

I left Interlaken sooner than I probably should have. Our hostel, Balmers, is the best at which I have yet stayed and all the people I met were all fun and down-to-earth. I plan to meet two girls Natalie and Naomi in Florence in a few days. I didn't want to say goodbye to everyone, but I really just couldn't pass up a free ride to Oktoberfest.