Interlaken is the extreme sports capital of Europe. Whether you want to jump out of a plane, run off a mountain, bungee into a canyon or just spend the day skiing on one of the world’s most beautiful Alps, Interlaken is the place to go. It’s impossible to describe my first impression of Switzerland. The Alps were covered in snow and so much more amazingly beautiful than anything I’ve ever seen before. The temperature was below freezing but I had 6 layers of clothes and enough adrenalin to keep my blood moving.
We didn’t waste any time. My friends and I headed straight to the Outdoor Interlaken center- that was conveniently next door to our hostel- to book something crazy. I signed up for paragliding for later that day with my roommate, the rest of my friends decided on canyon jumping, and we all signed up for night sledding. I had about an hour to kill before my activity, so my roommate and I walked around the town and took pictures for a while. We turned around when we got too cold, and were back just in time to meet a guy in a van and head up to the top of the mountain. We stopped to pick up two other girls, change into snow pants and snow shoes, and meet our paragliding “pilots.” Then we headed right up to the top of the Swiss Alps, got suited up in a harness, attached ourselves to the parachute and waited for the fog to clear. After about 20 minutes of foggy sky, we decided to try the other side of the mountain. This new location was right over the lake and had amazing views. So after getting suited up again, we all took off one by one. Literally, you run off the mountain until your parachute picks up and you can’t run anymore. It’s like skydiving without the free fall- but nevertheless amazing. When it was my turn to start running, my first take off doesn’t go so smoothly. Apparently the lines were knotted and I winded up sliding down the side of a mountain for a few feet. I thought I was going to end up in the river without a parachute! We tried again- I crossed my fingers and started running- next thing I know I’m 2500 feet in the air flying over the Swiss Alps. It was such a cool feeling, but freezing cold up there! The views were beautiful, I took some pictures with my camera and my pilot took ones of us flying with his camera stick. It took about 15-20 minutes to get down. As we were landing, my pilot wanted to do some flips and spins. So we spiraled all the way down to the landing zone. It felt like being in a whirlpool. Seriously, it was the coolest thing I’ve ever done.
After our adventure, we met back up with the rest of our group and headed to lunch with our friends. We were looking for something traditionally Swiss, but winded up getting fast food instead. Then we went back to our hostel, took a short nap and then got suited up for night sledding around 6. Literally, I had so many layers of clothing on, I felt like I was 300 pounds. It was alright though because it dropped to negative 8 degrees Celsius at night- and we were heading back up to the top of the mountain. My friends and I met our guide and took the drive as far as you can go on the mountain. Then we got into a “gondola” and went even further to the very top. It was completely dark up there; you could barely see your hand in front of your face. But you saw EVERY star in the sky. It was so amazing, I’ve never seen so many stars before and they were flooding the night sky. You could make out constellations and even see the Milky Way galaxy. I was seriously in shock and awe. I’m not exaggerating when I say there were more twinkly lights than the world’s population. The stars were also the only other light to guide us down the mountain. The was a trail for the sleds, but no barriers and no lights at all- so if you don’t see where the path turns, you pretty much fall off the mountain. They gave us little glow sticks too, which were wore on our back. So all you saw were little green lights that you needed to follow. It was really so much fun. It took us over an hour to sled all the way down. It was cold at first but you warmed up a lot as we were going. At the bottom, we got rewarded with a cheese fondue dinner- traditional Swiss style. It was so delicious. After dinner we were really exhausted. We decided to rest up for the next day and just go to bed shortly after we got home.
On Saturday, we took a day trip to Zurich. It was about a 2 hour drive from Interlaken and we actually went with the owner of Bus2apls as our guide. He was really nice and gave us some good directions around the city. Zurich was beautiful too, but you couldn’t see the Alps like you can from Interlaken. But there was still snow on the ground, and it was an adorable European city all decked out with Christmas decorations. We walked around the town a little, stepping in and out of stores and chocolate shops just to stay warm. We bought some yummy Swiss chocolate from one of the most famous shops there- and I got to buy my favorite Lindt chocolate! We met our guide for lunch at a beer garden type restaurant. I had some amazing Schnitzel (I think) and we all really enjoyed our meals. After lunch we walked around a little more, ran into Santa and his donkey, and took lots of pictures with the huge Christmas decorations around the city. Before meeting back up with the guide to head back to Interlaken, we checked out the biggest indoor Christmas market in all of Europe. Seriously, it was huge. They sold everything from food to wood carvings to jewelry. The huge tree in the middle was made entirely out of Swarovski crystals. I didn’t buy anything other than chocolate, obviously, but it was such a cool day.
When we got back to Interlaken, we had dinner at our hostel and watched a movie by the fireplace. Later that night, we went out to the metro club that was literally down below the hostel. It was fun, danced a lot but eventually got too tired and went to bed.
Sunday was our last day in Switzerland and I really didn’t want to leave. We woke up and headed into town after breakfast. There were more Christmas markets going on in the streets so we just spent the day shopping and checking out the views. We had lunch in another Swiss restaurant. For some reason I ended up with a plate of melted cheese as my meal. We left to catch the bus back to Rome at 3:30. BUT we didn’t actually wind up leaving until around 5pm. That was the worst part. There were no movies on the bus home either, so it was a really boring 12 hour ride. We got to Rome at 5am and were so disoriented. We got home as fast as we could but I didn’t wind up going to bed until after 6. I had a presentation in class on Monday, and I thought it would be a good idea to work on it half asleep. I passed out for a few hours, but woke up at 9am Monday morning to get a start on my day.
Switzerland was really amazing and despite the sleeplessness from the last day, it really was one of my favorite weekends in Europe.
