Switzerland Journal Day 11

Saturday May 26, 2007:

While we planned our trip, we had talked about going up to "The Top of Europe" (as the promotional literature called it), the Jungfraujock.
Quoting the literature:

"The arrival on the roof of Europe is a truly unique experience! A high-Alpine tour, a simple stroll, skiing in eternal snow, the breathtaking view of France, Germany, and Italy from the Sphinx..."

Warned that unless it was a sparklingly clear day, it was pointless to go, as the view would be nil once clouds rolled in. Many people leave the area never having a suitable weather day. Our Swiss rail pass would let us go for almost half the regular price per person, 65 CHF instead of the usual 100 CHF so we agreed we would only go if a perfectly clear day presented itself.
We seemed to be in luck. On our first morning in Murren I pulled back the curtains in our room and was greeted with this view:

The white capped Eiger is to the left, next to Monch. The shoulder of Monch rolls into Jungfrau, which is behind closer brown mountain. I couldn't imagine a clearer day! The tour would take us to the shoulder area between Monch and Jungfrau, and onto the Aletsch Glacier.

I was antsy pants getting ready, as the weather could change in a trice. After a fast breakfast of yogurt and granola, we rushed to the train station to catch the first train down the mountain from Murren.

The glacier view as seen from the train station.

We took the cute little orange colored local train down the mountain, past Winteregg, then took the aerial tram down to Grutschalp, where we then took another little train over to Lauterbrunnen. Another train switch, and we caught the train up to Lauberhorn, and then up to Eigergletscher.

I was LOVING the views down in the valleys as we rolled along. It seemed like there were waterfalls everywhere.

One of the train stops was at the foot of a luxurious looking hotel with an amazing view of the valley and the Alps. Maybe we can stay there someday if Marriott ever buys them out? (Don't hold your breath on that idea...)

A sign that would be interesting to ski fanatics. Bernie took it. (I'll bet you already guessed that.)

We could peek at other villages as we went along.

The meadows looked dreamy to me. Full of spring time flowers, SO pretty.

I was envious of people walking. Someday I'd like to walk or bike that path.

The train was getting closer to the glacier now. And sadly the sky was clouding up. The little hole in the middle of the glacier fascinates me. I wished I had binoculars to see it up close, what was causing a hole in that massive river of ice?

I could just make out the fantastic glacial blue around the hole. It was while we flew over a glacier in Alaska that I became a believer that such a magnificent color actually occurred in compressed snow and ice.

Looking the other way, down the valley.

Meadows are still blooming beside the other side of the train.

I see flowers, Bernie sees ski runs.

I am simply thrilled at this point. The mountains, the meadows, the rustic building.

Post card perfect!

How about this for a natural slate roof? How picturesque.

Some one was kind enough to take a picture of the two of us. Notice the guy behind us pointing. That was pretty much all everyone was doing on the train.

It was getting a bit nippy on the train, as we all have dropped the windows so we could take pictures without the glare. It was during this time that we realized that in our "antsy pants" haste to get to the train station before the weather might change, that we had LEFT BEHIND all the cold weather gear that we had hauled all over Switzerland the past ten days.

Bernie was in a short sleeved tee shirt and a Goretex single layer jacket, a rain coat essentially. I had on a short sleeved shirt, and I had brought my green fleece jacket, and at the last moment had thrown my cashmere tissue weight pashima into the day pack.

I can't remember when I got the orange scarf with a silver heart...I know it was somewhere in St. Gallen, because I gave a similar heart to Kate.
(See why I am trying so hard to blog this trip as quickly as I can? The mind is like a sieve these days...)

In Launberhorn everyone had to de-board the train, and wait for a special train that would carry us up through to the top of Jungfrau. We enjoyed this bird with the red orange feet and yellow beak. I guess he was waiting for the train too.

(I'm still trying to find out the bird's official name. I'm calling him "Henri" for now.)

Naturally anywhere tourists have to wait, there will be shopping made available, right? I was curious as to which language calls a sweater a "Windstopper." I'm fine with my fleece jacket, thanks anyway.

I'm not sure if this was a display or if it was for sale. The red pins holding the lace are regular sized sewing pins, and the lace bobbins were adorably tiny.

A great way to recycle skis, no?

And Bernie can now say truthfully that he got up on skis in Switzerland.

Another train was heading back. Nice way to see where we had been.

Pretty soon we were on our way again.

And the clouds had moved in. Darn...we caught the second train up the mountain, but even if we had made the first train it still would have been too late...it was a forty-five minute ride up the mountain from this point.

I admired the orange watch on the woman facing me.

The train went up INSIDE the mountain, through a tunnel, for 45 minutes. Quite an engineering feat building, that. The tunnel was completed back in the 1920's and various styles of trains have carried tourist up to the top. The Jungfrau was originally scaled by the Japanese back in the 1920.

The train was packed with Indians, large groups of older couples, younger couples (brothers?) and their wives, and little children. Each group seemed to consistently have a two year old drama queen, a little girl with gold bracelets encircling her wrists, earrings studs in her ears, heavy ski type jacket, a mop of curly brown hair, and a mouth wide open in an endless shriek.

The dad's usually did a brave job of trying to juggle the DQ, while the little girl's slightly older brother would look on chagrined. Eventually the mom would reach over and pop something in the screamer's mouth, and a few moments later "Be-be" would be snoozing on her mom's chest.

I felt sorry for the kid, (make that kids, there were several), as I presume that the combination of altitude, traveling, bulky jackets and confined dark space was an unsettling mix for a two year old.

I personally found altitude, traveling, people in bulky jackets, confined dark spaces AND a screaming two year old to be pretty unsettling as a 53 year old. I just wasn't sure screaming was an option at my age.

The train stopped once in the middle of the tunnel, about 25 minutes into the 45 minutes of tunnel. It was an option to climb out to look out a hole in the tunnel to see the view. EVERYONE pushed out, I was hoping "Be-be" might be thrown off out of the hole. That was before the "treat" was given. Wonder what was in that candy?

View from the hole in the side of the tunnel, taken by Bernie.

Once we arrived at the top, we got off the train and walked down a long dark tunnel. I kept feeling like I was on a Disneyland ride, it is one of the side effects of growing up in Southern California that any train trip with lots of foreign speaking people that ends in a tunnel feels like a Disney ride.

I had to keep reminding myself: I am walking through the inside of a real Swiss Alp. This is REAL.

At last we made it!

It's kind of hard to walk and breath this high up.

Can we just stand here awhile and catch our breath?

Where to go first? There was an observation deck were we should have been able to see out over all of Europe.

Oh look! It's Henri from the train station! He is here on the observation deck too!

He doesn't look very happy.

Look bird, you take your chances. If the weather closes in, it hides the view. Tough luck!

Deal with it.

Yeah, I know, I feel the same way. It's freezing out here!

From the edge of the platform you could still see down. That is a ladder. It is straight down.

We went back inside and read the signs to find where you could go outside and walk on the glacier and see the sled dogs. Had to say howdy to the pooches, right?

They were pretty stoic. I don't know if they were bummed because they were staked up, or because they weren't allowing dog sled rides that day, or if they were just tired of tourist. Maybe his feet were cold. Shouldn't they have booties or something if they are going to have to just sit outside in the snow like that?

I thought you looked good in your picture. What more can I do to cheer you up?

Dusted with snow, cool at last!

Bell's Palsy reacts to cold, and sure enough, there's the slight paralysis in my smile. Funny to see it in this picture, I hadn't noticed it in a while.

Back inside the building there were various displays.

I, of course, am always interested in fashion. This little hat had lots of details in the back. I wanted to tell them that at the time that women wore the Edwardian fashions, they didn't wear bangs. It was still interesting to see what women back then wore when they hiked around the glaciers. I have a hard time thinking that fur piece would have been enough to keep Madam warm.

I guess they had heard about Hannah Dustin, (my ancestor, look it up!) as this hiker was making do with only one shoe too. You GO, tough girl!

Next we headed to the ice sculpture area. I was still having a hard time remembering this was not Disneyland. I am deep inside a glacier. I have to remember that this is NOT man-made ice!

The tunnel is all ice; the walls, ceiling and floor. Slippery!

To give you an idea how big the ice tunnel is, and how silly guys can be when being photographed, here's Bernie holding up the tunnel.

It was an eerie feeling; I kept thining to myself: "I'm inside of a glacier!"

There were ice sculptures at the end of the ice tunnel. They were kind of interesting, representing various creatures that live in glacier environments. At least that is what I think they were trying to show. Maybe they were showing how the animals hunt. Wonder where we can get lunch?

Aw, an Eskimo sitting by his igloo. Do Eskimos hang out in the Swiss Alps/ Bernese Oberland area too?
Or do all people in the Bernese Oberland make igloos? Click here to find out!

I kept looking at the wall around us, and I could see layers of soil scraped along long ago by the glaciers.

Another ice sculpture, this time lit up in blue. Ice crystals are that shaped? Looks more like the shape of tourmaline or emerald crystals to me.

I could rub my finger on this bit of exposed wood embedded in glacier wall. How long ago had it been captured by the glacier's movements?

Layers and layers of compressed snow.

Penguins in Switzerland?

Really? Who knew?

Aww...kissing penguins!

In case you have forgotten where we are...

Another cheesy tourist photo op.

The ceiling looked like cauliflower, as the visitor's breath froze overhead.

A happy couple visiting from India.

And a rambunctious couple of kids having fun with their Mom in the ice tunnels.

Lunch time!

We had a choice: The sit down fine restaurant, the serve yourself cafeteria restaurant, or "Bollywood." Bollywood???? The tourist groups from India had their own restaurant, presumably vegetarian, and with their national dishes. It spoke volumes to me about how important Indian tourism is to the region.

And where exactly were we having lunch?
Dead center of Switzerland.
In a building as seen here in a poster picture that was taken on a perfect sunny day:

Had it been a sunny day, and we could have been flying over the building, this is what would have been seen. It was hard to imagine, as we looked out into total whiteness, with grainy snow whisking by the restaurant window.

Goulash and rice for Bernie (the Swiss seem to really enjoy goulash, it showed up on a lot of menus.)

Veal with mushroom sauce and noodles for me. Delicious.

Had it been a sunny day, and we could have been flying over the building, this is what would have been seen. It is still hard for me to imagine.

If you look really close, you can see us having our lunch and waving from the window, third row second from the right.

(Just kidding...)

Futher into the restaurant was a big group of hikers, men who were singing lustily, and laughing heartily. One by two they finished eating and left the restaurant, loudly saying their farewells and jesting as they went. It was good to see a group of men enjoying each others company.

Once we finished lunch we waded back into the crowds. The entire building seemed populated by Indians everwhere I looked. The brightly colored silk saris seemed as out of place as a spring time butterfly in a snow storm. Someone later explained to us that Switzerland is currently the most popular honeymoon destination for Indians, and that a large percentage of the Bollywood romance movies are filmed in the Alps, so people from India really want to come see the exotic country in person.

I found it difficult to take in such large tight-knit groups, especially since they always seemed to be heading for the restroom at the same time I was!

There was one room with a series of posters showing what the view outside would look like on a clear day. This picture is of one of the posters.

a picture of the mountain top ski run that Bernie could have skiied if it had been a decent day and June 1st. The option wasn't available while we were there.

And if it had been clear, we could have had a real picture of me standing out there on the ski slope, instead of in front of the picture of the ski slope.

And another poster. It reminded me of the scripture about seeing through a glass darkly, the scripture that inspired the artist who painted the cathedral ceiling in St. Gallen. When I looked out the window, all I could see what white, and an occasional vague form. How sad it would have been to not have at least seen these posters, to know how splendid it was outside, even though the scene was obscured by foggy snow.

On our way out we noticed this weather station report. It was an option to go into the weather labs up in the Sphinx's area, the silo looking part of the building. We probably should have, but decided to pass. The crowds and the altitude were getting to me.

The train ride down seemed really long, and everyone was really, really drowsy or fast asleep within minutes of the begining of our descent into the tunnel. We had noticed on the way up that the trains coming down seemed to hold unconcious people, now we were the ones stuggling to stay awake. Why, I have no idea.

We sat across from a Korean woman who was living in London, and accompany her mother on a vacation. Mom spoke no English, but the younger woman was quite interesting to talk to, and that helped us stay awake.
In Lauderbraun, in the picture above, the place was packed with tourist as far as the eye could see. We decided to skip visiting the town, and instead took the long way home, making our day's journey into a large circle through the central Switzerland area.

As we rode trains around the Bernese Oberland area down to Wilderswil there were red poppies blooming everywhere, even in field planted with crops. From Wilderswil we rode the train, and the tram and another train to get home, about an hour long delightful journey.

I kept looking at this sweet young girl, reading Seventeen magazine (in an orange shirt, of course!) It made me feel so sad that Seventeen was bleating "Sexy Sports Clothes" on the cover. Why should a teen age girl have to worry about looking sexy while participating in sports? Aaggghh...stupid magazine.

Our adventure had taken all day. We had enjoyed our mountain top time, and our train sightseeing time as well. Once we got back to our room I looked out our window just in time to see a rainbow appear between us and the mountains.

And a fog beginning to creep down the mountains as the sun set. We ate in the restaurant downstairs and called it a very good day.