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Sunday, June 9, 2013

TheJesses and Co. vs. a 10,000 ft Mountain


Okay I think I'm sufficiently recovered from saying goodbye to Bethany to finish up posting about the mountain adventure!  Where was I?  So we had a fun little evening excursion in Zurich and then we traveled by car and boat the next morning to get to the mountains.

You could seriously get by with just driving around in Switzerland.  The scenery from the car made me want to pee my pants!


Speaking of wanting to pee my pants... I didn't realize how scared of heights I am until I got into a rickety cable car with my family.  I mean, surely it's safe, and I think my brain knew that.  But my heart was definitely skipping a few beats as we took our ride up the mountain.

There are three stages of cable cars to "climb" Mt. Titlis.  The first two are more like glorified ski lifts.  But they're nice because it's just your small group so you get to enjoy the view without being crowded... like in the big huge cable car that you take all the way to the top.

Funny story... the huge cable cars rotate.  So you get a chance to see a panoramic view, I suppose.  But what's creepy is that only the floor of the car moves.  The windows (and oh crap handles) stay put.  And what's funny is that at one point the guy next to Bethany was trying desperately hard to stay near his favorite window or something and kept moving his feet instead of just sitting still and rotating around the car like the rest of us normal people.  Meaning he was basically sitting in Bethany's back pocket by the end of our ride up.  

The cable car windows are all scratched up and it's definitely crowded as you "climb"... but I have to say it was pretty nice to get to the top of a 10,000 ft mountain in less than an hour.  Contrast that with my first hike up a mountain half that size last summer and all I have to say is THANK GOD FOR CABLE CARS!  Because we inexperienced hikers would never be able to get that high...

Maybe mountain-loving-Bethany could, but not with two small children!  And not in an hour!


The view from the top was AMAZING!  If it wasn't for the whiny children at my ankles, I could have stayed up there for hours.  You don't really get a feel for how massive the Alps are when you're driving through the valleys... but when you get high enough to see how far the ranges really go it takes your breath away.

The clouds would just sweep through and you'd have white out for a few minutes and then POOF back to amazing views again.  It was so cool.  We checked out this tunnel inside the glacier at the top, had a snack in the corner of the "picnic room", and wandered around outside a little.  It was so beautiful.  And also cold.  Go figure.


Then we came back down to the real world and took an enjoyable ride through the countryside where I forced myself to just look, not take pictures.  Though I kind of regret that, of course.  

I will tell you that if I had been taking pictures I would have photographed the adorable farm houses and the herds of cows and goats that all have bells around their necks!  I loved it cause we would pass a field and you could hear them cling-a-ling-ing.  So fun!  Switzerland is absolutely beautiful.  Jesse said it might be his favorite place in Europe so far. I have way too many favorites to make a statement like that, but it was definitely a magical trip.

Our last stop before heading back to Zurich for bed was dinner in Lucerne.  We walked across Chapel Bridge, which is older than our country.  And we had a simple cheeseburger dinner because we were eating on a budget and Switzerland is definitely not an easy place to find food on the cheap.  We didn't stay long because a storm came through and everyone was ready for bed... but the city was adorable and the views of the mountains and lake were a perfect end to the day.

And that, my friends, is our Swiss Adventure!

3 comments:

  1. BEAUTIFUL BEAUTIFUL BEAUTIFUL!!!

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  2. OHMYGOD. WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOW. I want to go to this mountain ASAP!!!!! I cannot believe you got to see this in real life!!! It would rank as one of my all time favorite moments for sure. I can only imagine how much Bethany enjoyed it!!!! So freaking fantastic. I can't get over the colors and the snow and the magnitude of it all! Nice work friend. Go on more vacations so I can live through you guys and know where to go next. (:

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    1. Haha "go on more vacations so I can live through you guys" LOL! I'll try to oblige ;o) Yeah it was amazing... you should totally go - it made me want to pee my pants. And now when I look at the pictures I can still remember... especially driving through the mountains like that was just so amazing!

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