The Summer of 2001 was the first summer I did not go back to camp. At this point, I had finished my Masters Degree in Mechanical Engineering and I was to report to Officer Candidate School sometime in the middle of June. I had a few weeks with not much to do, and decided that it would be time for an adventure.
Initially, I was planning to return to my motherland, England, but there was an outbreak of hoof and mouth disease so much of the countryside was off-limits. So, like the way I make most important decisions in my life, I winged it and decided that I would head to Switzerland. I had a full three weeks and figured I would just go from Hostel to Hostel and take each day as it came. Perhaps memory makes everything better with age, but I cannot remember a single thing that went wrong the entire journey.
My first week started off in Interlaken. I snagged a train from the airport in Zermatt and was on my way. The train was clean, punctual to the second and it was a smooth ride. Switzerland is an interesting country, most of the inhabitants speak French, German, Italian and English. This is because the various regions tend to adopt the language of the country that borders them.
As I was nearing Interlaken, a young lady struck up a conversation with me. I quickly learned that if you ask a Swiss person whether they speak English, if they say "a little" it means they are fluent, and if you say "yes" it means that they speak it better than you do! She informed me that I could use the rest of my train ticket to travel via Ferry to Interlaken. It happened to be a beautiful sunny day, just a slight breeze, a perfect day for boating. I had two travel guidebooks with me, and it was easy to find the hostel. It was nothing fancy, but it was very clean and professionally run. A large number of the guests were American, but there were a host of other countries represented as well. Most of the Hostels had little bars attached to them as well, so it made for a very comfortable experience. One thing that I never figured out at this particular hostel were the showers. I think they may have been defective, but without warning your nice steamy shower would alternate to very cold water for a few seconds and then go back to normal. Maybe that is just how they roll in Interlaken, living life on the edge, never wanting to get complacent, not even in the shower.
Switzerland is built for walking. Most of the towns, particularly the touristy ones, have beautiful town centers that are cut off to automobiles. My days were simple, most days I would simply go for a hike. I had a great book about hiking in Switzerland with all sorts of good suggestions and detailed directions on how to reach the trailhead. Almost all the trailheads were accessible by train. Some hiking highlights:
1. Almost every hike could have been right out the Sound of Music in terms of stunning scenery;
2. Most of the time, a hike would cross a town and there was always a nice restaurant to get some good food and beer;
3. Many times, hikes would pass through farmer's fields. Often these fields were full of the farmer's cows. This would never work in the States because people would deliberately try to let the animals escape, but in Switzerland it did work. You opened the gate to enter and closed it behind you. You follow the same procedure to exit.
4. There are lots of natural springs where it is perfectly safe to drink the water without treating it.
After a week or so in Interlaken, I made my way to Zermatt, home of the Matterhorn. I was only intending to stay a week, but stayed closer to 10 days. Zermatt bans cars entirely. All the fancy hotels have souped up golf carts to pick up the wealthy from the train station, but the hostels do not.
When I checked into the Hostel in Zermatt, I used my military ID for identification. For some reason, this impressed the guy running the hostel and he gave me my own room. It had twelve bunks in it, but he never assigned anyone else to the room the entire time I was there. I still ran into plenty of people, so it wasn't lonely, and it was nice not to be disturbed at night.
Zermatt is dominated by the Matterhorn, no matter where you are, you can see it. Like a big tooth rearing upwards from the meadows below. Almost everyday I did hikes right in Zermatt, in the Matterhorn's shadow. I had considered trying to hire a guide to see if I could summit, but was told that it was still too early in the summer for that. But, it was fun hiking up onto the Matterhorn's shoulder, still quite high, but no technical climbing required.
At some point, I paid to go on a day trip of ice-climbing. There were about 5 of us in the group, 4 already knew each other. But they welcomed me into the fold. We met the other half of our party at the site. I think they were polish or czech, but they were starting off the day with some incredibly strong Scnapps or something similar. They were quick to share, and I figured, why the hell not! They did not speak much English though and our guide did not speak their language. They kind of settled on French, which worked well enough for the guide and the group. Our guide was quite a character, he was a professional guide so this was a walk in the park for him. He had a great sense of humor, but made sure we knew when it was time to listen. We did our ice-climbing on a vast glacier. To reach the spot, we all roped up, so that if one of us fell into a crevasses, the others could arrest the fall. As we were hiking across the glacier, you would hear these low rumbles every so often. Our guide pointed to the mountains surrounding the glacier and indicated that those were avalanches. We were nowhere near close enough to be in any danger, but this was the first time I have been in an area where avalanches are going on all around you.
I had gone ice climbing a few times before. Generally, ice-climbing is a bit of an exercise in misery. It is very cold, you have a ton of gear on and belaying is the worst. At least when you are climbing, you are working and staying warm. The belayer, stands at the bottom of the ice climb, freezing and dodging chunks of ice that the climber has dislodged.
Climbing on the glacier was nothing like this. For one, it was probably in the 50s, and the sun reflected off the glacier, so it was extremely pleasant. Also, the belayer stayed on the glacier and lowered the climber into the crevasse. Any ice that was dislodged simply fell to the bottom of the crevasse. I had a blast.
Towards the end of my stay in Zermatt, I was at one of the local bars and recognized a girl from the hostel. We got to chatting and headed back to the hostel. On the way to the hostel you cross over a pedestrian bridge over a river that runs through the town. This bridge is perfectly framed by the Matterhorn. What followed was an awkward exchange. I started talking about how beautiful the spot was and said something along lines of "can I kiss you" to which she responded "I don't think I can say no". I only heard the no. I chalked it up to a classic case of me reading the situation with the ladies wrong. Still it seemed a bit harsh and I didn't know what to do but walk away. Fortunately, she quickly realized that I was an idiot, and clarified her response.
Due to my extended stay in Zermatt, I only had a few days in Lucerne, and one of those was a travel day. Still, it was beautiful and I encountered the Swiss Army! Despite being very peaceful, the Swiss are ready to go to war. My understanding is that all the members of the military keep their weapons at home and are ready to mobilize at a moment's notice. Further, the swiss have placed charges at key border crossings ready to destroy bridges to halt an invasion. My favorite part is that despite being landlocked, the Swiss even have a Navy.
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