INTERLAKEN

Albeit a costly exercise, the GoldenPass train ride was remarkable.  Starting with the Mediterranean vibe of Montreux, the train climbed above the lake and passed through the Jaman tunnel.  Coming out at the other end, we found ourselves in a green wonderland of alpine forests, mountain springs, picturesque mountain villages, lots of farm animals and of course the Swiss alps all around us.

The special thing about the GoldenPass trains is that the windows are super large and even have panoramic windows on the roof to allow passengers to get the best views possible.

The names of the villages we passed through suddenly changed from French into German, which meant we had entered the Saanenland region, which is known throughout the world thanks to the fashionable town of Gstaad.

The train stopped at Zweismmen and we had to hop off and board another GoldenPass train to Interlaken.  As we headed into Bernese Oberland territory, the scenery again started to change.  The valley narrowed and the trees got darker and beautiful cottages with typical facades richly painted and sculpted started popping up everywhere.  We were then treated to 15 minutes of train riding bliss as we scaled along the glass-like Lake Thun that appeared almost green in colour!

Soon thereafter we had arrived at backpacking Royalty, Balmers Herberge, the oldest hostel in Switzerland and ranked in the top 10 hostels in Europe for as long as the ranking system has been in place.

Balmers Herberge - number 1 in my book

Interlaken is known throughout the world as an adventure sports hub.  Sky-diving, bunjy-jumping, white water rafting, canyoning, sorbing, base jumping, para-gliding and of course skiing in winter, just to name a few.

Jane & Tarzan

Once we had unpacked, we still had an afternoon free and decided to give the high ropes course a go.  I remembered it from 4 years ago when Kenny and I had jumped from tree to tree like monkeys and I was sure that it would be right up Anna's alley.

We started off with a brief lesson from the instructor on how to use the safety equipment and got some advice on the five different courses available.

Five courses of varying difficulty and height lead us on a tree top adventure through a really beautiful forest.  We were seriously challenged as we travelled from platform to platform along a maze of rope bridges and zip lines, some set as high as 20m up in the trees.

Anna about to commence her first flying fox of the arvo

a fairly small one to begin with

but they got bigger and bigger!

and bigger and bigger!

We knocked over the first few courses with relative ease, although the first second of the flying fox when you let yourself go and are 20m above ground is a little nerve racking.  As we climbed up to the "squirrel" course, we realised that it was going to get a lot harder, both physically and mentally!

There were times when Anna was pretty scared, but I had to remain calm and tell her it was all good, even though I was shitting myself as well haha! She did an amazing job though, I think she must have been a monkey in a different life!

one of the highest points above ground, about 20m

The Squirrel course was just aver 240m in length and took us a solid hour to complete.  By this stage it was 5:30 and they were about to start packing up so we unfortunately didn't have enough time to start the next course, the woodpecker.  Probably a good thing as this was a further step up in difficulty!

                                                    

It had been a pretty demanding few hours, so it was great to get back to the hostel and drink from their tap which they claim is the best spring water in the world haha.  It was so cold and so fresh, it really was probably the best water we had ever had, it felt like you were drinking straight from the melting glaciers up in the mountains (we probably were!).

We met some really nice guys that evening from Perth who also happened to be staying in our room, so we had a couple of beers and ended up staying in for the night.  When I say staying in for the night, at Balmers, this is what everyone does because they have such awesome facilities.  They have a huge kitchen to cook your own meals, but they also have a bar and restaurant and an underground nightclub, why would you want to leave!!

                                      

I went down to the nightclub that night with Matt for a few beers, but didn't have a large one as I had to be up at the crack of dawn the next morning for a day I had been looking forward to ever since we started planning our trip, canyoning!!

Canyoning is basically travelling down a canyon using a variety of techniques that can include walking, scrambling, climbing, jumping, sliding, swimming and abseiling, but there is one common factor in all of it, its plenty scary and heaps of fun!!!!

There were three different canyoning trips available, the all day one being the most challenging, but as our guide told us, also the one with the most "fun factor".  It was pretty expensive (1 CHF = roughly 1 AUD), but I knew it would be worth every cent.

From 8:30-9am we got briefed and fitted into our wetsuits and safety gear at the Outdoor Interlaken headquarters and then we jumped on the mini-bus, bound for the Chli Schlieren canyon, about an hours drive away.

We had two guides for our 8 person party.  Stan was a huge crazy South African who was a really nice bloke and the other guide was Steve and he was a local from Interlaken.  Stan was the one with the camera on his helmet filming the whole thing and did some absolutely amazing things, such as doing a front flip off a cliff that we were all petrified of jumping off!

fantastic views on our way to the canyon

so pumped!

It was a really beautiful drive, passing by the lakes of Thun and Briez and then up into the mountains to our drop off point.  There was heavy metal music playing in the bus, trying to get us all pumped up, but  I didn't need it, I was already wired to go!

the group, just before we left the parking sight and walked into the forest

It took a bit of time getting our wetsuit on, then another wetsuit jacket over the top, then our special boots, then our abseiling harness, then our life-jacket and finally the helmet.  As the photo's will show, all the helmets had names on them and when I saw the one with a big gold "Gladiator" written on the front of it, no one was getting it but me!

the group, just before we entered the "point of no return"

We then had to walk off the beaten track, through trees, mud, rocks, fallen down trees, spiderwebs and even giant sized slugs before we reached the water.  The sound of the waterfalls echoing around the canyon was amazing and it was such a pretty spot, what a day it was going to be!!!!

Hopping into the water for the first time was a real shock.  We knew it was going to be cold, but we all thought the two layers of wetsuits would make it really warm.....it didn't, it was bloody freezing!

Stan gave us our final instructions and told us that the first waterfall was "the point of no return" and once we jumped off the first waterfall, there were only two ways out - to get to the bottom, or get winched out by helicopter - this caused a few moans and groans from a few people in the group who had never been canyoning before, but it was all good.

The first jump was a huge 10m drop off a waterfall into a pool at the bottom.  The water was pretty deep but Stan told us to make sure we entered the water with bent knees because if you entered like a pin drop there was a fair chance you would hit the bottom.

each time you came up to the surface of the water you had to look up and give an a-ok signal

What followed after that was a day that I will never forget, words can't express how much fun I had, but I have put the video on youtube so that I and anyone else can watch it over and over and over and over again until the next opportunity presents itself (theres canyoning in Tasmania!!).

this jump you actually had to aim for the wall on the right and then slide down into the freezing water

getting lowered down a 30m waterfall - the first 2m they drop you in free fall to scare you - it worked.

About half way through we came to an area where you had the choice of either sliding down the chute, or taking the jump.  As much fun as the sliding is, the jumping is where the real rush is and everyone ended up going for the jumping option.  The problem was that the landing area was really small and you couldn't actually see it from where you were standing, you just had to trust the guide who told you where to jump.  It was about 12m high and really really scary, even more so as I was going off first......

gathering my thoughts

After what seemed like an eternity of gathering up the required courage, I took the leap of faith Indiana Jones style, and although I didn't quite land in the right spot and ended up hitting my hip on the right hand side wall, it was still awesome!!!

The best bit was then sitting in the pool at the bottom and getting to watch everyone else come down.  If I was a little hesitant in my jump, then everyone else was sitting themselves because they all took forever, including the other Aussie guy in the group who kept letting everyone thorough until he was the last one left and had to jump haha.

Amazingly, Stan our guide then followed and instead of just jumping off like the rest of us, he did a front flip, what a crazy bastard!!!

The next 15-20 minutes were a little less crazy as we trudged through the water, admiring the scenery and letting our freezing fingers get a bit of warmth and fresh air.

It wasn't long however before we came to the next jump sight and clearly the most frightening one of the day.  Again we couldn't see the landing area and just had to trust Stan who told us where to aim.  Alarmingly though, the scariest bit was that as soon as you surfaced you had to reach out and grab Stan's arm (or in my case, Stan grabbed my life-jacket) or risk falling down the next huge waterfall.

We then had to repell down the next bit as the waterfall was just too big an dangerous to jump off.  Repelling is not my strong suit as I find it really difficult to trust the rope while you just walk down the side of a cliff, but nevertheless I eventually made it down and was ready for the next challenge.

it was amazing to look up and see where we had come from!

We came to the last big slide, and big it was!  We had to carefully lower ourselves down to an area where we could then launch ourselves on to the face of the rock and and slide all the way down into the water.  We were told to keep our hands and legs locked in as tight as possible because we would be shooting down like a missile.

We had a couple more little slides and a few more jumps, before we neared the end and Stan got us to say something to the camera as we took our final plunge.  I was more focused on saying something intelligent (which didn't happen), then thinking about the jump and I ended up landing flat on my back. Lucky I was wearing so much padding through and I didn't feel a thing!

After about 3-4 hours of excitement, terror and spine tingling fun and elatedness, the canyoning adventure was over.

Our other guide Steve had left us half way through and had rock-climbed out of the canyon to go and get the bus and bring it down to the bottom of the canyon and even had lunch and beers waiting for us when we arrived.

I arrived back at blamers at about 4:30pm with a huge smile on my face and chaffing at the bit for the next morning when I could go and pick up my edited movie, which is now on youtube at the following address:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LNeMCwUUsZg&feature=plcp

I found Anna reading her book and interrupted her to tell her all about my adventure.  She had a great day as well as she had hired a bike and had ridden all around the town of Interlaken and the majestic Lake Thun.

The town of Interlaken was abuzz as it was the night before the 20th anniversary of the famous Jungfrau Marathon.  There were people everywhere and there was even some sort of fun run on for those who weren't running in the big race on the weekend.

The Jungfrao Marathon is only open to 4,000 competitors, but there are strict guidelines on entering as it is no ordinary marathon.  Although Interlaken is quite flat, as soon as you leave and head for Lauterbrunnen and then onto the Jungfrau mountain, it is all uphill.  So hard is it in fact that the last 20km is at something like a 20% incline, that would make even the best runner sick in the guts!

walking through beautiful lush green grass, Anna was afraid of snakes (haha) and made a run for it

We got back to our hostel just in time for happy hour and enjoyed a few beers with our room-mates Megan and Matt.

The local beer, Rugenbrau, was a fine drop and we had plenty, along with a  few ciders as well.

With all the money we were spending on expensive fun activities, we decided to have a home cooked meal of spaghetti bol.  I was absolutely knackered after a huge day and after dinner I was walking around like a zombie and ready to hit the sack.

The next day we got up and sussed out the cheapest bike hire options, but when we realised that pretty much everyone was charging the same amount, we just had to cop the ridiculous price and cough up the cash.

everything about Switzerland is perfect, even their chopped up wood is stacked up neatly

We left Interlaken around 11am and started following the marathon course towards Lauterbrunnen.  We hoped that the 2 hours headstart we had given the runners would be enough for them to not get in our way.  It was a tough ride for a large portion of the journey, but we stopped many times to take photo's and take a drink out of the river that flowed right along side us almost the whole way.

Words and photo's just do not do this place any justice, it is so unbelievably beautiful.  The lush green grass, the huge pine trees, the flowing river, the cute Swiss alpine cottages, the unmistakable sound of cow bells ringing away, the fresh air and of course you can't forget the sight of Europe's 3rd tallest mountain, the Jungfrau in the background.

not sure who was walking who, this dog was a giant!

2 hours or so after we left, we arrived in Lauterbrunnen, which can only be described as a fairytale.  Situated in the middle of a huge valley, this stunning village is like a giant postcard.  Huge rocky cliffs with massive waterfalls surrounding you on both sides and gingerbread-like houses and shops everywhere, it is hard not to fall in love with this place.

I had been here 4 years ago with the lads and 4 years later, everything was the same.  The shops in the main street, the Swiss flags hanging up everywhere, the church with the pointy spire, the house with the grass covered roof, the Staubbachfall waterfall, the sky full of para-gliders, everything was the same!

The 297m high Staubbachfall flows off the side of the cliff and down into the Lauterbrunnen valley all year round and is a really great sight.  Anna was understandably buggered after our ride, but I was keen to get a closer look at the waterfall, so I left her resting at the bottom in the shade.

you can just make out the water falling on the right

There was a steep climb up to a walkway that took you along the face of the cliff to the point where you were actually standing in the cliff and had the water falling down in front of you, it was really cool.  

the views out over Lauterbrunnen were special

Lauterbrunnen is one of the most popular spots in the world for base-jumping and that new craze where people jump off cliffs in special fly suits and fly right beside the cliff.  I remembered the Airtime Cafe from last time which is where all these crazy people hang out and tell stories from their latest death defying act.  We had a super lunch there, especially the chicken curry pie which would almost rival Grandmother's!

We had another 20 minute ride further up the valley until we reached the Trumelbachfalle.

The Trumelbachfalle is a real sight to behold.  Ten glacier-waterfalls inside the mountain made accessible by a tunnel and lift are the only ones in Europe.

The Trumelbach alone drains the mighty glacier defiles of the Eiger (3,970m), the monch (4,099m) and the Jungfrau (4,158m) and drains upto 20,000 litres of water per second (!!!!) from a drainage area of 24km sq.

The noise generated by these waterfalls was so deafening that we literally had to scream to hear each other and when we eventually got back out at the bottom, it took us a while to acclimatise back to the norm.

It was so interesting that all this water that was spurting out at such intensity turned into a tiny stream at the bottom.

Riding back towards Lauterbrunnen, we stopped in this beautiful green field to take a few photo's.

you can just see my head popping out of the grass!

We knew the ride back to Interlaken would be relatively easy, so we took the opportunity to zoom down the hills where we could and then stop off at certain places to talk to the animals Dr. Harry style.

the cows didn't want a bar of the grass Anna was offering

It was nearing 6pm as we arrived back at the hostel, just in time for happy hour!  As I mentioned before, the Rugenbrau (brewed in Interlaken) was a fine drop and with happy hour only lasting the traditional one hour, I made the most of it!

our hostel "biergarten"

We continued boozing and ended up eating our left over pasta from the night before, accompanied by wayyyy too much of Switzerland's finest chocolate!

Anna and Megan had had enough as Matt and I started to slur our words, so they went off to bed, whilst we went downstairs to the "metro" nightclub to continue having fun.

It's pretty much unheard of for a hostel to have something like this going on, so we counted ourselves pretty fortunate and made sure we had a lot of fun.

Next morning Anna rose bright and chirpy and I rose not so bright, but still pretty chirpy as we had another fun-fuelled day ahead of us.

We caught the train from Interlaken to Gundlischwand and then instead of continuing on up the right hand valley to Lauterbrunnen, we took the left hand side valley to Grindlewald.  We then had to hop on a cable-car which took us up and up and up and up, until we reached a place called First, at an altitude of 2,200m.

The cable car ride was quite long, but it gave us the opportunity to look out and admire the massive mountain ranges that surrounded us, plus the many beautiful cottages and farmhouses below.  Even from inside the cable-car we could still hear the dangle of cow bells on all sides.

Once we had reached the top, we walked around for a while and then sat down to watch all the para-gliders take off from the side of the mountain.

It was really interesting to watch them in operation.  They would rock up with backpacks the size of a small human, roll everything out, get changed, attach the clips and then without any hesitation, just start running.

They wouldn't even have to jump, the wind just picked up the parachute and carried them over the edge, amazing!

We walked around for a bit longer and took a few photos and then geed ourselves up for the "First Flyer".

The only one of its kind in Europe, the First Flyer was an exhilarating 800m ride in which we wizzed down from First to Schreckfeld attached to a cable.  Reaching speeds of up to 84km/h, it was a serious adrenalin rush.

Anna watching on nervously 

We waited in line for what seemed like an eternity before finally it was our turn to jump in the seat for a thrilling ride down.

The attendant counted down "drei, zwei, eins" and whiz bang off we went.  That was definitely the most scary part of the experience, but once you realised that you weren't going to fall, it was all good to sit back and enjoy the 50 second ride.

I took an early lead and expected to hold on to it, but before I knew it, Anna had come zooming past with her hair flying behind her like a horses tail haha.

She increased her lead the further we got, but that was perfect because I was able to film her getting snapped up by the blockade at the end.

Your cable latches on to something as you reach the concrete and all of a sudden you are flung back and into the air like some rag doll.  It feels like you have whiplash until they unhook you from the harness and back onto the safety of land.  What great fun!!  We would have done it again if it didn't cost so much!

It was an awesome video and one that I had to put on youtube so that we could send it to Anna's folks. She was pretty chuffed at doing something like this as she had never done anything like it before!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0nSHVmbx4XI&feature=context-cha

It was now about 3 in the arvo and we couldn't tell if the rumbles we were hearing were distant avalanches, or our tummies telling us they were starving!  We stopped at the nearby restaurant which in winter, would be covered in snow and would be one of those places you would stop for a hot meal whilst out skiing for the day.  We did the same thing, only we weren't skiing and it wasn't snowing.  Anna had a delicious potato soup and I couldn't go past the veal schnitzel!

We got the cable-car back down to Grindlewald, walked around town for a bit looking at the many souvenir shops and then boarded the train back to Interlaken.

We had had another fantastic exciting day and unfortunately our time in Interlaken had come to an end. Having eaten in the past few nights, we went next-door to a Thai restaurant that I remembered being pretty tasty from the last time I was here.  Thankfully it was still as tasty and Anna was finally able to have the green chicken curry that she had been wanting for a long time.

We sat up in our room for a while that night chatting with Megan and Matt, I got some blog done and watched a bit of the new tv show I was into (Game of Thrones - sick!!) and then we hit the sack.