Europe, part III: Swiss Alps

If we were to do this trip again, we would have spent another day here instead of going to London. We LOVED Switzerland. It was probably because we were in the most beautiful part (Interlaken) and the weather was warm and the skies were clear and blue.

After being in Schwangau, we once again took back roads to get to our next destination. It was beautiful countryside, though; it was probably the most picturesque drive of our entire trip. We also barely drove through a portion of Liechtenstein. We passed the most beautiful lake - Wolensee (sp?) and once again, pulled in to our destination at about 8 pm. Interlaken is super expensive, and we had found a hotel for the night before we'd gone on our castle tours. We ate dinner at a really yummy Italian place (sidenote: Switzerland has a great mix of German, French, and Italian people and food.). Spencer had done a lot of research about Switzerland and we were excited to take cable cars up into the Alps the next day.

Well, we quickly found out that there is a 4-day period every year when all the cable cars are shut down for maintenance. And, what are the chances - it was the exact week we were there! Spencer was so devastated, and we were all sad we wouldn't get to go up to Gimmelwald. Spencer did some more research and found that there was a train that could take you up to Jungfrau (the "top of Europe"). It was about $200 a person though. And it would take about 7 hours roundtrip. We had to fly out of Zurich that night so we didn't think we would have the time. We decided to drive up to Lauterbrunnen (the furthest into the Alps you can actually drive your car) and see if there were any other options.

Well, Spencer's mom must sure love him because she threw out a wild suggestion - why didn't we try to find a helicopter tour of the Alps?? We started looking into it and found that taking an airplane tour was a little bit cheaper (and maybe safer?). After calling the company we realized it would cost a small fortune. But Spencer was still SO bummed about missing out on doing cool stuff in the Alps, so he managed to talk us all into doing it. The next thing I knew, we were ALL signed up for a 1 hour scenic tour out to the Matterhorn!! Kathy and I were a little hesitant, and there were several times I told Spencer I would LOVE to sit on the ground and send him up and then hear all about it after. But the weather could not have been better (rare for that area in April) and I knew I would be missing out.

While we waited for 11:30 for our time slot, we drove to Lauterbrunnen. Gorgeous! There was ONE cable car running but it looked pretty dinky, especially compared to what we were about to do. Besides, we suddenly felt like our wallets were pretty tight...

I loved the red shutters on the houses!


We pulled up to the air field and met our pilots. They were jovial and super friendly. I not-so-jokingly (a few times) said I would really like to see some credentials! Somehow they got me on the plane, AND got me to smile!

We took off and were over the lakes surrounding Interlaken (Thun and Brienz) in a few minutes. I don't know how they are so emerald blue, but that was a remarkable sight. And my pictures are still pretty darn good for being taken through those thick plastic windows.



Love the reflection!

Then we turned and headed up into the Alps. We were over Eiger and Jungfrau within minutes, and I was glad we didn't try to take that train there, which would have taken 7 hours of our day (especially since we could actually see the train from 20,000 feet up). One of the coolest parts was seeing some mountaineers standing on a peak, waving to us! It was like being in a National Geographic IMAX movie! (And, you can see the Matterhorn in the background.)


Spencer and his dad looked like kids on Christmas. I knew the rest of our trip would pale in comparison... From a distance our pilots pointed out the Matterhorn and two other peaks. He showed us how close we were to Italy (oh so close!) and we headed toward the Matterhorn. That really is a distinct peak, and even seeing Mont Blanc was nothing compared to the Matterhorn. And the Matterhorn at Disneyland is nothing compared to the real thing! :) As we got closer and realized what amazing views we had, I was actually kind of glad we had chosen to spend our kids' entire college funds to see it. You only live once, right?



We almost felt like we could touch the Matterhorn, we were so close. And though you can't really see it well in the picture, the pilots showed us that there was a cross on the very top of the peak.


We headed back to the airport. Beautiful.


Here we are once we were safely landed. (I was really happy...)

After we were on the ground the pilots took the seats out of the plane and took a group of skydivers up. I really thought Joe and Spencer just might be persuaded to go do that next. I even said, "Well, what's another thousand dollars??" Instead, we just watched the group fall out of the sky.

We left, got some food, stocked up on some Swiss chocolate, and headed for the airport in Zurich. I, of course, had to have another Magnum ice cream bar.

A really bad traffic accident stopped us for about 40 minutes and we were nervous about missing our flight. Thankfully (?), airports in Europe aren't nearly as thorough with security checks as the U.S. (unless you're flying to the U.S.) and we had plenty of time once we got to the gate. And we kissed Switzerland (and our super fun travel partners) goodbye...