MICHELE'S MUSINGS

Switzerland

A country so beautiful we had to stay a little longer. We had bad luck with weather while visiting the tiny alpine town of Gimmelwald which we got to by taking a train to Interlaken, then a bus, then a cable car! Drizzling rain couldn’t even mar the beauty of this place. Heavy snows this year caused tremendous avalanche damage like I’ve never before seen, which prevented us from hiking on certain trails. The snow lime was still very high as well. We stayed in a wonderful hostel and had the luxury of preparing our own meals- a very economical way to visit Switzerland. I have a picture of “Heidi’s grandfather” - a white bearded octogenarian with pipe, goat, and one of those cool Swiss hats. We visited Bern, Montreaux, Lausanne and Sion all by train. These are some of the most scenic routes in all of Europe. Bern is a pretty little town troubled by severe flooding. We were prevented from taking boat trips that would have been free with our Eurail pass due to the high flood waters. Rivers raged, and the waterfalls were phenomenal and abundant. I counted at least a dozen from the cable car at one point. We had a funny 2 days at a hostel in Bern. In a 4 bed room the first night we had the quiniessential roommate Klaus. We laughed, had great conversation, he gave us a bottle of wine, and we had breakfast and photos together the next morning before saying our good-byes. The next evening we met our new roommate, the “anti-Klaus”. He was a young local guy displaced by the flooding. He decided we were on his turf. As we quietly slipped into the darkened room at 10 PM after a day of sightseeing, careful not to turn on lights or make noise, he started yelling us angrily in a Swiss dialect. After 5 minutes of raving, I said I didn’t understand. He got up once to scream and pound on the neighbors door...it was weird and even a little scary. The next am he was up early making lots of noise, unconcerned about anyone else, then went back to bed. I didn’t trust the guy and told Drew to shower and I’d pack ( I didn’t want to leave our stuff unattended). As soon as Drew left, this weirdo shot up in bed, and pointed his finger in my face and screamed at me in English that I had used HIS hanger to hang up my shirt, and I had better not do it again...on and on he raved. This guy obviously thought himself quite intimidating with his tattooed, and punctured and be-studded body. He pissed me off, and I snapped. I pointed and screamed back at him...I threw his hanger hard in front of him and enjoyed seeing them ricochet off the floor at his feet. He jumped under the covers and put his had over his face. I pulled my pack up hard and threw it on the floor----zipping and unzipping as loudly as I could, crinkling plastic bags (even when I didn’t need to---I’m evil). He would suffer for his meanness. Drew came back after his shower, looking at me quizzically, feeling the negative vibes spewing from me and the weirdo. We were enemies. I left for my shower without a word to Drew. I was 2 steps down the hall when I hear the weirdo scream at my polite husband...I did an about face, whipped the door open and scowled at the weirdo...I wasn’t going to let him “get Drew”. Under the covers he went, had over his growling face. I won the war-satisfied, I had a wonderful shower feeling powerful and self-righteous. “The meek shall inherit the earth”...I’m not so sure. The Scenery on lake Geneva was truly beautiful, though Gimmelwald in the interlaken are still gets my first place award. We were passing through Sion, on our way to Italy, and were so impressed by the scenery that we off the train with a second or 2 to spare.(when you have just a back pack you can be spontaneous...”go light” is our mantra). Sion is surrounded by snowy peaks, vinyards, and sports a castle and an Abby. It is vying for a go at hosting the winter Olympics. It was a good call to bail...we enjoyed Sion, and found another wonderful Swiss hostel. We explored the vineyards and town...wishing we had an extra day...time to move on to Italy, we had already stayed much longer in Switzerland than we had planned.

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