Alice in Switzerland: Interlaken, Switzerland

View from the train station in Interlaken!

Just as the rest of my trips have started, I took my International Finance midterm on Friday and then got on a train to Interlaken. We left around 12:45 in the afternoon, so it was nice to have some time to get ready for the weekend after the midterm was over. The train ride was over five hours which put us in Interlaken around 6:30pm. Once we got there, we walked straight to our Hostel. That weekend we stayed at Balmers, which is one of Europe’s Famous Hostels. The reservation was under my name and I had booked a room for 10 of the girls. When I was checking in, there was a problem, because someone in our group had emailed them and added people 11 to the booking. I managed to fix it, because I had printed off my reservation confirmation that claimed there were only 10 of us. So needless to say, it was a rough start with Balmers.

Our room!

We got situated in our room and then went to eat dinner at X-port Pizzeria. It was delicious, apart from the fact that Tiffany had a fly baked into her pizza. Apparently at this time of year there is a fly problem in Interlaken, but unfortunately I do not remember the reason why. Everything ended up being okay and Tiffany got a free pizza! After eating, we went to Metro Bar, which is the club underneath Balmers. There was a DJ playing great music and all in all it was a fun night. It was the first time in a while that I have heard American music being played. When we went to the festival in Capalago, they played random techno music instead of the current “hit” songs.

In the morning, I woke up to a wonderful notice on our door from Balmers Management. The previous night, the night manager had knocked on our door and asked us to be quiet three times. Each time there was a different group on people in the room, so everyone had only thought we had been asked once. The people at reception lectured me a little bit, but I promised we would be quiet the next night. This just goes to show that when we travel in big groups, we really do need to be more conscientious of our voice.

Breakfast at Balmers was free, but I felt as though I was in prison or something. It was two slices of plain bread, a piece of cheese, and some jam. At the same time, I was grateful that I did not have to pay for something, because I knew Interlaken would be an expensive weekend anyway. We met up with the boys later that morning and went to walk around Interlaken. I bought a few souvenirs including a little cow bell keychain. After a little bit of shopping, we headed over to a little train station that had trains running every 30 minutes and takes you to Harder Kulm. Harder Kulm is a Swiss mountain that is part of the Bernese Alps. At the top there was a phenomenal view of Interlaken and a very cool look out called the Two Lakes Bridge. There was also a restaurant that sold delicious ice cream! It was just what I wanted, because it ended up being a very warm day. The view was unbelievable; there are no pictures that can even do it justice. Interlaken is by far the most beautiful place I have seen since being here. Also while on top of the mountain, some of the boys met a guy, Bobby, who used to work for Facebook. He was a product designer and was extremely high up in the company. One of the boys was wearing a Virginia Tech shirt and Bobby introduced himself saying that he is from Roanoke. That night we invited him to meet us at Metro Bar and he came! He is only 26 and he has a very interesting story. After quitting his job at Facebook, he decided to travel the world for 5 months. My favorite part of Saturday, was definitely being on the mountain!

On the Two Lake Bridge

Harder Kulm

Two Lake Bridge

Restaurant at Harder Kulm

Delicious ice cream!

At 5 PM we went to the Schuh chocolate shop, because we wanted to see the chocolate show that they offer. There was a chef who explained to us how chocolate is made out of the cocoa beans and then what ingredients go into the three basic types of chocolate: white, milk, and dark. He explained how to make caramel filled chocolates as well as a cow shaped chocolate. The process was interesting, because I never knew how they were able to make the chocolate hollow. While in the show room we got samples of truffles, white chocolate, milk chocolate, dark chocolate, 100% cocoa chocolate, and roasted cocoa beans. With our ticket for the show, we got an 8 Franc coupon to buy what we wanted at the front of the shop. I bought a few truffles and they were delicious!

Outside of the Schuh shop!

Chocolate samples

Truffle samples

The Chef

Making the caramel chocolates

I went to sleep fairly early on Saturday night, because we had to wake up at 7am on Sunday to go canyoning. In the morning, we ate the free breakfast again, checked out and then headed over to the Outdoor Interlaken building. Once everyone was there, we got all of our gear for the day: wetsuit, shoes, wetsuit jacket, and a helmet. My helmet name was Mr. Kim! After a short description of what we were doing that day, we split into groups and started the hour drive to the canyon. There were 11 people in my group, all of which were from Riva. Our guides’ names were Timmay and Matt. They were from Australia and New Zealand, respectively, so it was so fun listening to them. When we reached the drop off location, we put all of our gear on and hiked for about 20 minutes to get to the canyon. The canyon that we went in was called Chli Schliere. To be honest, I was extremely nervous at first. We were doing the “advanced” level of canyoning, so I knew there would be some scary jumps and slides. There was no time to let yourself get acclimated. The first jump we did was huge! It was definitely the most extreme thing I have ever done. After a few big jumps and slides, I was a lot more comfortable. The whole day was filled with adrenaline and I felt like I was on such a high! I would 100% go canyoning again. We ended up being in the canyon for about four and a half hours. At the end, we had a light lunch with sandwiches and beer. I slept the entire ride back to Interlaken; it was such an exhausting day. When we got back to Outdoor Interlaken, we did not have much time until our train left, so we got food and headed to the station. The train ride home was amazing, because the sun was setting over the mountains and lakes.