The smallest of city on our way through Europe, and what a great stay. In two days we had a real thrill! From friendly people, to amazing lifetime experiences.
Between the two lakes of Thunersee and Briezensee is the small town of Interlaken. It's famous for being a backpacker's mecca with it's access to extreme sports, mountain hiking, and good parties at the huge hostels. We stayed at a guesthouse called Rugenpark Hotel, and the people there were super nice and helpful. Their tips and advice made our Interlaken experience truly great, and they were very friendly and talkative as well.
Aiming for Gemmenalpenhorn
We drove up to a small mountain town called Beatenberg. From there we took a cable car up to the peak of Niederhorn. After a quick meal we started walking towards along the ridge towards another peak called Gemmenalpenhorn. The nature sights were stunning! On one side of the trail we had cliffs and crazy rockformations. On the other we had green swiss alplandscape.
Fire climbed out on the edge of one cliff, to have a closer look at the amazing rock formations below.
At some places we walked, or crawled to the edges of the cliffs and peeked into the valley below. We had to fight our own fears sometimes, but the views and sceneries we saw were really worth the climbing. The valley below held some small tirolhouses and a narrow dirt road between them. At most we were about 500 meters over the valley.
Lizards and fog
Suddenly the keen eyes of Mr. Dice saw a movement under a rock. Soon a small lizard appeared from under the rock. We chased it around a bit, and watched how it would try and hide from us beneath small rocks and in the grass. Playing with animals is good fun! Right after the lizard, fog poured over the ridge we were walking on. It was quite intimidating, and we considered going back, but in the end we decided to go through it because we still had some visibility.
Dice on one of the rock formations. He struggled with his fear of heights a bit, but finally got to the top of it!
We didn't see the Gemmealpenhorn before we suddenly were right on top of it, because of the heavy fog. 2063 meter over the sea was a record for both Dice and Fire, so we were quite pleased. And what we saw beneath us was more interesting. A narrow trail leading down to one of the special rock formations. We climbed down there and a bit out on the rock. Again we had to overcome our own fears a bit, but it was well worth the effort.
3 capricorn goats up ahead. Right after this picture, they ran down the mountain side below us. It's amazing how they can move in these steep slopes!The capricorn goats
Right after the rock, Dice activated his incredible supersight powers again. This time he saw three capricorns in the mountain side directly above us. The animals looked really great standing there in their own inhabitat. Much better than any zoo. Before we got to the top we saw a total of 10 capricorns. The closest we got to them was 6 meters. It was really cool to watch them jump and run down the insanely steep mountainside.
The beautiful capricorn goats were not afraid of us at all, probably because of Dice's friendly charms.
On the way down we saw some deertracks, pigs, rabbits and a fine fox. We went to another restaurant along the cablecartline. There we had a terrible meal before going home. When we got back home to the megane, it had been an awesome day and we were very excited.
Whitewater rafting
What could we do to match the day before? We had a choice between canyoning and rafting. After advice from the staff at the hotel, we ended up with rafting. We thought we looked really hot in those tight wetsuits, and was excited to conquer the river!
Captain Carol, the two of us, two from Scotland, two from Australia and two from Canada made the rafting group. Only the Canadians had done this before, so they had to get in front, poor guys! We all promised each others to try and save each others lives in emergency situations. And with that and some safety precautions we set sail on the gray river. Dice got a special task from Carol, to use his booming voice and repeat her orders so the guys in front could hear.
To the left, Fire is paddling for all he's worth. Meanwhile on the right, Dice is paddling and yelling commands.
Crashing down the river
The river immediately took a grip of the boat and sent us crashing down the rapids. The group was a bit poorly distributed in the boat, with two girls and two guys on one side, and four guys on the other side. This made the boat turn around when we paddled, so suddenly our behinds went down the river first! Going down the river backwards was kinda scary, so Carol had us stop in a quiet area to make a few switches. Then we went back into the rapids.
Carol kept screaming 'forward', And further ahead Dice yelled 'FOOORWAAAARRDD!'. We almost hit a bridge at one point, but with Dice's creaming in everyone's ears, we paddled all we could an just steered clear of it. Right after that the scariest words we knew were yelled out: "HOLD ON! GET DOWN!" We jumped down into the boat and held on as tight as we could. The river seemed like it would eat us alive at these occations, but we managed to get through it without anyone falling out, or the boat flipping over.
HOLD ON! Finally we steered clear of the bridge, and was heading down through the waves.
We soon got the hang of it and started to work as a real group. The Australian girl had a couple of close calls down the river, she almost fell into the water when some big waves crashed into the boat on her side. Both Fire and Dice lost their grips somewhere, but luckily they fell into the boat, not out of it. Still the Canadians in front had the hardest time, in the fastest part if the rapids, they were instructed to not stop paddling, even when the biggest waves crashed over the front of the boat. We saw them bowing their heads and not seeing anything ahead, but they always kept on paddling when told to. Brave Canadians!
HOLD ON! GET DOWN! In the worst parts of the river, we had to focus on staying inside the boat!
All the time water was splashing into our faces. The water was only about 4 degrees because it came from the glaciers by the Jungfrauhorn at 4000 meters height. The wetsuits took away most of the coldness, but it still was breathtaking getting soaked on the way down. Despite this we decided to jump into a calm part of the river and just stay in the water for a bit, floating along the boat. It felt good just letting yourself float there.
About Interlaken:
The Place:
There are only 13000 inhabitants in Interlaken. It lays between two huge lakes and many gigantic mountains, so there aren't any room for many more houses. Green rivers run through the center of the city. At one plave, they had built a parkinghouse on top of the river. Looked quite nice. The center is filled with touriststores, selling watches, painted cows and swiss army knives. The scenery around this city is stunning. Really beautiful. Words cannot describe it. You have to see it yourself.
The food:
We had some terrible meals in Interlaken. To much melted cheese! They had cheese on everything. Some places you could only order stuff that had cheese in it. Last day we found a restaurant that sold ostrich meat served on searing hot stones, so we could decide for ourself how long it should cook. This was an awesome meal that almost made us forget all the other ones.
The people:
This place mostly had backpackers in it. Lot's of Koreans, Australians and Americans. All locals spoke good English, which is a huge plus, and they were all very friendly. The couple who owned the Hotel was the most friendly hotel staff we've ever met. They were talkative and helpful with everything.
The girls:
Lot's of difference here. Most girls we saw were backpackers. So telling to much about the local girls will be unfair to them. The backpacker girls were as usual very beautiful.
Dice's tip number 1:
Order a place to sleep at least two days beforehand. If you do this, you won't have to change rooms all three nights at a hotel.
Dice's tip number 2:
Put your keys somewhere you'll remember! The hotelstaff actually needs them when you are done with your room. Forgetting where you put your keys every single day of a three-day stay will make evil travel mates laugh and and make fun of you!
Posted 21. jul 2007