Even though we had spent the night in Interlaken, we actually were just passing through. We did some grocery shopping on the way to the train station, grabbing lunch and a few more snacks (of course, including bread and pastries). We took a train, a bus, and a funicular up the mountain to our hostel in Gimmelwald. Of course, since these are the Swiss Alps, there were some incredible views along the way. The town we stayed in—Gimmelwald, was an incredibly beautiful town of about 200 people, which has been saved from development because the people in the town managed to have their town labeled an Avalanche zone. We stayed at the Mountain Hostel, which was really friendly. Both the staff and the guests were all really social. Unfortunately, we were in about 20 bed dorms (there was one girls dorm, one boys dorm, one lovers dorm (with about 20 beds as well), and a family room).
After dropping off our stuff, we took a funicular up to the next town, where we started a really easy hike (practically no elevation loss or gain) with amazing views of the mountains and the valley below. We had an intense discussion about the morals of eating meat and vegetarianism. In fact, at one point, Lee got really into his example as we just happened to be passing a couple. He just happened to be saying “…and ripped their throats out.” The man whipped his head to look at Lee, who still was really into his example, didn’t notice, and kept walking. When we arrived at the funicular station, we took the funicular down into the valley losing about an 800 m difference and started hiking back in the direction of Gimmelwald. This hike also didn’t have elevation gain or loss, but still had some incredible views. We also passed by 4 or 5 waterfalls. Our hike ended in Stechelberg where the funicular up to Gimmelwald was. We decided that Stechelberg would probably have fondue. So we ate dinner in a hotel-restaurant in Stechelberg (I just like saying Stechelberg, but I guess that completely doesn’t explain why I keep writing it). We had fondue with tomatoes in it as well as a vegetable cream soup. Both were incredibly delicious.
After dinner, we headed back to our hostel, where we just hung out for the evening. Even though we were in such a small out-of-the-way town, we had a really great internet connection. We caught up on emails and socialized with the other guests. It turns out that there were plenty of people from North Carolina at the hostel. One couple was actually from Chapel Hill. They live about 10 minutes from my favorite ice cream place! There was another couple from NC and they lived in Greensboro, which is about an hour from Chapel Hill. Another guest who wasn’t from NC, had a girlfriend who was and had been to my favorite barbeque place in NC and it was the first thing he mentioned!
Since most of the day was about all the fantastic views, I’m going to post a bunch of pictures about the Swiss Alps.
Love,
Rosalie
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