​Our last breakfast in Europe! Nooooo!. Mike had four or five croissants and cried as he finished the last one. How will he survive without fresh butter, jam, and delicious, delicious bread? After breakfast, we headed to the train station. We caught the train to Zurich where we changed trains and headed to the airport or flughaffen (one of Mike’s favorite German words along with gemüse and genau). We checked our bags, thought about taking the 4,000 dollars and staying another night since they oversold the flight, but then decided family trumps money. We then headed back down into the flughaffen train station, where we stocked up on Luxembergli, treats at the Migros and Orange / Peach Capri Sun! We drank our Capri Sun on the way to security, breezed through that, Passport control, the Duty-Free shops where we picked up some last-minute gifts, then took the train to the E gates. We waited for our Delta flight knowing that we were leaving croissants, fresh jam, cheese, butter, alpine meadows, and tasty fresh water behind us until the next time we are lucky enough to come back to a land where we can’t understand what people are saying so we are free to enjoy the beautiful world all around us.

​Our last day in the mountains. Breakfast was grand and our Alpine Cosplay friends sat at the table next to ours. After breakfast, we packed up our stuff and caught the train to Spiez, then on to Bern where we switched to our train to Lucerne. Sara was bent on getting Madeline a cute dress from the French kid’s store and Mike just wanted to amble around. Both got their wish, and we even ran into the missionaries along the lakeshore. We ambled, shopped, and ambled. Now part of the mass of tourists trying to milk Lucerne for all its worth. None of them knew that we were not just regular tourists, but bad ass hikers that had conquered the king’s trail! None of them would have cared much anyway as they were all busy trying to buy fancy watches, kitschy knives, and take the perfect selfie. Our goal was to eat treats as we ambled and so we ate chocolate, Luxembergli (The champagne ones are gross btw), breads, and anything that looked tasty. We also were on the hunt for that Orange/Peach Capri sun as we hadn’t found it at any Coop or Migros since the first day.  We tried on clothes, looked in fun stores at unnecessary stuff and just enjoyed a really hot afternoon in Lucerne. After some rest at the hotel watching Big on the British channels, we went out and got Pizza at La Bestia (it was really good) and wandered around town a little more to work off all that pizza. We walked past a concert by the lake, and then the unthinkable happened. Sara got stung by a bee on her toe! This emergency called for ice cream, and we got some tasty Gelato to help calm the nerves. This only helped a little, so we headed back to the hotel and watched Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows part 1 and 2. In all, that’s a perfect way to end the day for us. Lying in bed, watching a good movie as we iced Sara’s poor toe.
 

Griesap to Kandersteg via the Hohturli pass

​The monster day. Yesterday was a beast. Today was the beast’s ugly brother from out of town. Fortunately, it started with breakfast where we had the most wonderful Muesli ever created. It was divine. We packed up our stuff and picked up lunch from the hotel and headed up the path. And up it was from the start. Through beautiful forest, by the river, by waterfalls we hiked past endless spruce trees until we emerged onto the side of the mountain. The sun was high in the sky, and it was hot. With over 4,700 feet of climbing to the highest pass on the Via Alpina, we had a long day ahead of us. We headed up until we came to the first farm and restaurant of the ascent toward Hohtürli / Blümlisalphütte. When we arrived at Oberi Bundalp, we ate some chocolate, used the restrooms, listened to the swine make horrible noises, and then headed on pretty quickly so we could gain the summit by lunch. The hike from the restaurant got real steep, real fast. Fortunately, there were benches along the way which we took advantage of as our legs were tired from the prior day. The last part of the hike was up steep, steep steps, the Swiss incline! Sara decided to strut her stuff and basically ran up the last 250 meters to the summit. Mike just did his best not to fall off the mountain, but still managed to pass people on his way to the summit. After a brutal ascent, the reward was amazing views of the mountain’s glaciers and a cool mountain hut where we had lunch. They had a restaurant there and people were eating sausage, hashbrowns, and drinking beer. I don’t know how the Swiss hike so fast while eating such heavy food. They are a remarkable people in both engineering but also functioning highly while eating food that is clearly not on any diet plan.
 
After taking in the amazing views, we started out on the long (and I mean really long) steep descent from the pass to lake Oeschinesse. The descent was long, steep, and rocky with crazy steep grades. So naturally, there was some lunatic mountain biking down it. He had mad skills, because we could barely walk down it. 
 
By the time we got to the lake, we were pretty exhausted. None the less, Mike stripped down and jumped in the water and Sara soaked her feet. It was a nice moment to regroup for the long descent to Kandersteg. The lake was beautiful and the cliffs staggering. However, our favorite part was the ice cream. Without it, we would not have made it down the final steep descent to town.  We skipped the gondola to show how bad ass we were and wandered into Kandersteg exhausted but thrilled we made it. We never did see that other American family. For all we know, they are still trying to find Griesalp. 
 
Kandersteg was gorgeous. The views of the mountain pristine. Our hotel was delightful and the dinner perfect on the patio. The lamb was exquisite, there were some people in old school Swiss outfits (like Cosplay for Alpine folk), and the guy sitting next to us just enjoying life. No phones, no distractions, just the perfect Alpine air, beautiful views, and delightful food. Our view from our room’s balcony was probably the best of the trip in many ways. Not as grand as the Eiger, but just perfect. The little church in the field had a light go on as the night settled into the valley. In our minds, a little Swiss lady was playing the organ as people sang hymns in that little church thanking God for this wonderful place.

Wengen to Lauterbrunnen to Murren via train and cableway
Murren to Sefinenfurgge to Griesalp via Via Alpina route 

​The big days begin. From the moment Mike planned this trip, he has been dreading today and the next day.  These were the big ones. Wengen to Lauterbrunnen to Murren to the pass and down to Griesalp was our adventure for the day. We ate breakfast, probably the most meager one of the trip, and then headed out early to catch the train down to the valley. There were no clouds in the sky.  It was a perfect day for what is commonly known as the most beautiful segment of the Via Alpina. It did not disappoint. The views of the valley from the train were spectacular. Having already done Lauterbrunnen the day before, we headed directly to the gondola, bought our tickets, and headed up the mountain. What a blessing it was to go up to Murren by gondola and train. We met a man on the train who had been hiking in Switzerland but didn’t invest in good socks. Good socks are where it’s at when you’re hiking, but especially in the Swiss Alps. From Murren we headed out into the forest and began our steep ascent up to the pass, the Sefinenfurgge. The views were absolutely amazing. The Eiger, the Monch, and Jungfrau loomed large the whole trip and were soon joined by other mountains, more glaciers, and more peaks. It was staggering in the bright sun with alpine flowers blossoming everywhere. Truly, this was a heavenly place! As we climbed, we ran into a family from America that was not prepared for this hike and clearly had no idea what they were getting into. You could tell the dad didn’t think it through very well before he planned this hike. It was as brutal as it was breathtaking, and they had a long way to go to get to the hotels in the Kiental valley. Half way up, we stopped at a little farm (after busting our way through the herd) and ate some lunch on the bench in the shade. We saw a cowgirl walking with a big stick to go beat the crap out of a cow, or maybe the Americans, but either way, she was a little intimidating. So, we ate lunch, and headed back out on the trail that was now fully exposed in the sun as we crested the peak to the pass. The views from the pass were second to none and we celebrated our summit with selfies and chocolate. From there, we started the long and grueling descent to Griesalp (actually our mountain hotel was past Griesalp, so bonus hiking for us). In all, it was a beautiful hike, but a brutal descent. In stark contrast to the American family, was an old Swiss lady we saw hiking up the mountain at a perfectly steady pace. She caught us on the descent as we were filling up water at one of the randomly placed water spickets that dot Switzerland’s mountains. She told us which way to go, and we descended into the woods toward our hotel. We did finally see some goats, one of which was desperately in need of a good milking. After a long descent, we arrived at the hotel Waldrand, a historic hotel where we got to share a bathroom with two other couples. Dinner was wonderful and we sat outside looking at the mountains and giant waterfalls in the cool summer evening. It was a wonderful meal, and the people were super nice. The menu was all in German and we asked the hostess what one of the dishes was, and she thought for a moment and said, “little moo”. Perfect, we’ll have the little moo and the pork cordon bleu. It was a great meal and a wonderful end to a long and tiring day. With memories of beautiful mountain peaks, we fell asleep listening to the Germans next to us laugh and make commentary that we could not understand at all as we snuggled under our fluffy Swiss comforters. It was bliss.
 

Grindelwald - Eigergletscher - Jungfraujoch 

​Goodbye Belvedere, Hello trail! One more amazing breakfast and then back out into the wild, well sort of.  Because the weather was decent, we decided to go to the top of Europe (or at least the highest train station in Europe), the Jungfraujoch. We took the Eiger Express gondola from Grindelwald and then hoped on the train that goes through the mountain (literally for 20 minutes) in a tunnel dug over 100 years ago. When the Swiss get bored or have a problem, they did a tunnel. The top was cooler than I thought it would be. The views of the glaciers and the three main peaks (the Eiger, the Monch, and the Jungfrau) were staggering. We could have done without the annoying Chinese tourists (not being racist here, but Chinese tourists are the worst since they have no sense of personal space, how to wait in line, or be politely quiet). It was pretty obvious that even the Swiss were constantly annoyed. 
 
Undeterred, we enjoyed our tour of the summit, the ice caves, the freezing cold, and the grand vistas. From there, we headed back down to the mountain in the train to a different stop where we had lunch looking back up at the mountains. We then made a critical error. Instead of hiking up the mountain and taking the gondola down to Wengen (or the train for that matter), we then hiked down to Wengen. While there were some good views, this was a rather forgettable hike on a gravel road and our feet were not happy to be going down for many, many, steep, steep miles. Oh well, we made it to the hotel with sad feet.
 
Our hotel that night was quaint (a far cry from the Belvedere), but pleasant. Thomas, the inn keeper was very nice and helpful. Since it was so early in the day, we decided to take the train down to Lauterbrunnen (our second mistake of the day). Where Wengen has amazing views of the valley and is very quiet, Lauterbrunnen was overrun with more tourists. Having already had our fill of tourists at the Jungfraujoch, we weren’t impressed and didn’t stay long. We headed back up to Wengen for dinner to escape the hoards or humanity. Our third mistake was not making a dinner reservation before we left, so we got turned away from the restaurant nearest our hotel.  We then wandered deeper into Wengen and stopped at a pasta place that smelled like ass, so we went to a traditional Swiss restaurant (finally not a mistake)! The food was excellent and the couples around us chatty and fun. We sat next to an Anglican pastor and his wife of one year who were very chatty and full of commentary. He runs a church outside of London, but in the summer comes to Switzerland to run the church there. What a gig! Then there was a couple from Greece with their little kiddos. Everyone was quite jovial, so the day ended on a very positive note, especially when the ice cream and apple strudel came out. We gave our unused train tickets to the Greek family, so they didn’t have to walk down the trail to Lauterbrunnen in the dark and returned to our little hotel full, exhausted, and laughing about our conversations with our dinner friends. 

Grindelwald - Grosse Scheidegg Summit - First - Grindelwald

​Breakfast! Every morning it’s so exciting to get up and have a crazy awesome breakfast. Today was no different and Mike has now eaten his weight in croissants and jam. After breakfast, we headed out on an e-bike adventure! It was a beautiful day, so we headed back up to the pass and then over to First. We absolutely loved the e-bikes, until Mike’s ran out of power. Then it wasn’t so much love as it was suffering, but it was worth it. The views were grand and the suffering worth it. We ate lunch at First after unsuccessfully trying to find some way to charge Mike’s bike. The hotel was gracious when we called to tell us they wouldn’t charge us, so that was nice. The people at the bike shop at First were super nice, but in the end unsuccessful. We ate lunch, Mike hit his head on a ski rack and made a nice bruise, and then decided to go even further up the mountain to the lake. From there, we would take the downhill trail back to town. Little did we know that the downhill trail was this psycho double black mountain bike course with death looming at every turn. Sara, of course, rode it to show up the Swiss people watching, but it was pretty crazy. Fortunately, that turned into a road later on and most of the trip down was super flowy and fun. It would have been a quick trip down, but we had two cow related delays. The cows were on the move and being taken back to the barn, so the whole village showed up to move them. It was quite fun to see and probably the first time we have ever had to wait for cows when we were biking. All in all, it was a wonderfully fun day, with crazy views, fun adventures, and it all ended with a delightful dinner back at the Belvedere. The evening weather was wonderful and the views of the Eiger just staggering. Truly, this is a beautiful place. 
 

Meiringen to Grindelwald via Grosse Scheidegg Summit ​

​After such a wonderful dinner, and with a full day of hiking ahead of us, we were eager for our Swiss breakfast. It did not disappoint. There was so much wonderful food in the morning to fuel our day. The chef asked us what our plans were for the day and gave us some hiking advice, which we followed and ended up making the day awesome. He told us there was no rush since the clouds wouldn’t start clearing until nine o’clock, so we took our time then headed out into the rain to take the funicular up to Reichenbach falls. These are the famous falls where Sherlock Holmes met his end. Of course, none of that is real, but the town really markets it like it was a real thing. The funicular was awesome and saved us about 1,000 feet of steep vertical ascent, which was great because we still climbed over 4,000 feet later on. When we got to the top, we got to talk to Peter on FB messenger! What fun it was to talk with him. It always makes our day better. After using half Mike’s phone battery on that call, we headed up the steep trail away from the falls and toward the Grosse Scheidegg pass. 
 
The chef was right, and the hike was staggeringly beautiful along a soft dirt alpine trail, slowly rising toward the pass through lush forests. It was truly magical and didn’t feel like we were climbing as much as we really were. About half way up, the clouds cleared, and we got our first glimpse of the Wetterhorn and were completely blown away. It’s so big and grand that it’s hard to take in. We ate lunch at Rosli by a little hotel on a little green bench. Sara discovered the joy of Orange/Peach Capri Sun and Europe’s version of Sun Chips.
 
From the lunch spot, the trail got more and more Alpine with less trees and more staggering views. We made it to the top, exhausted, but exhilarated by the amazing climb and the views of the mountains. We were so grateful that the clouds cleared up enough for us to see the mountains in their grandeur. With it being late, we decided not to head over to First and take the gondola down, rather we took the Post Bus down to Grindelwald. This proved fun because the bus plays this wonky little horn medley when it comes around the corner, so you know the Post bus is coming. It was entertaining. 
 
We walked over to our hotel, the Belvedere, which would be our home for the next two days. We checked into our room, then headed to the hot tub and just soaked away our sore legs and feet. Both of us were sore! We weren’t used to hiking 12 miles a day, so it felt good to sit in the hot tub, listen to loud annoying Americans be loud and annoying, and then be grateful when they left. 
 
The Belvedere is a fairly swanky little establishment so for dinner we had another five-course meal.  However, there was a problem in the kitchen and the main course took a long time to come out. In all, it was like a three-hour dinner. The main course was pretty forgettable, but we were just glad to be warm, cozy, and looking at the magnificent peaks of the Eiger, the Monch, and the Jungfrau looming large over the village. It was quite a sight to behold. 

Engelberg to Meiringen via Alpina Route 1 and then took Route 40

​With the closest church being hours away, Sunday saw the start of our hiking excursion rather early. We got up, enjoyed a wonderful breakfast with our hotel mates from yesterday (the happy coupe with a baby and the grumpy couple from the Middle East). We checked out, left our bags for the delivery service (Eurotrek) and headed across the street to the Coop to get some lunch supplies. From there, we walked over to the gondola and rode up to lake Trubsee. This would cut off quite a bit of the hike in the rain, which was the right thing to do. At the lake, we found Schmuggli! It was probably the highlight of that part of the trip. We then walked around the lake in the cold rain to the chair lift that would take us up to the pass. Fortunately, the chair lifts had plastic covers, otherwise, we would have been even more cold and wet. It was a fairly mixed sky at the top and it was clearly snowing just a few hundred feet up from our location. Fortunately, we were headed down. Sara wanted to take some quick shots with her camera and promptly dropped her hiking stick in cow crap without realizing it. She then proceeded to smear the cow crap all over her jacket, hat, and hood. I turned around and she was covered in crap, it was raining, it was windy and cold. Not a great start to our long hiking adventure! Fortunately, we recovered from this moment and started hiking down the mountain. The skies would clear from time to time, but overall, it was a rainy day. By the time we reached the halfway point, the hotel at Engstlenalp, we were wet and tired. We stopped to use the restroom, ate some overpriced carrot cake, and met a young couple from the states. They were camping their way through the Alps and looked wet and stinky. She was from Vail, and he was from southern California. It’s good to be young and stinky!
 
We headed out from our latest Wes Anderson hotel and decided to change plans and follow the lower route to our destination instead of the higher route. This was probably a good decision and saved us from hiking in the snow. We also got to hike down this ravine with amazing waterfalls and followed Gandalf for a while until we found Rivendale. It was such a lush and beautiful canyon that the time passed quickly, until it didn’t. Going downhill for 12 miles gets a little rough on the feet and we were starting to get tired and needed a bathroom. There was a farm selling Alpine cheese and butter. So, we rang the doorbell and discovered that the young girl didn’t speak English, and as our kids will tell you, we don’t speak German. Fortunately, she spoke French so Mike negotiated the purchase of some Alpine butter and Sara got to use the bathroom in the barn. We then continued hiking briskly until we got to the Meiringen gondola. Oh, blessed gondola that took us down the last 1,000 feet to the town. I think we would have been found dead on the trail if we had to go down another 2 miles of steep rocky trails. In all, the first day saw us traveling 18 miles, so we didn’t feel bad taking the gondola down. We arrived at our boutique hotel and gave great thanks for the abundant hot water in Switzerland and their awesome water pressure. 
 
After returning ourselves to human form, we headed downstairs for dinner. It was quite amazing. The chef prepared a five-course meal, and we enjoyed every inch of it. From the ceviche (yes ceviche in Switzerland) to the perfectly cooked steak, it was quite the treat after our long, long cold hike in the rain. After dinner, we promptly fell into a food coma. Someone must have taken us upstairs because we woke up the next day in our room.
 

​It’s 3 AM and time to get up! At least that’s what our bodies and minds did. Get up, get up, get up! It was still dark, so we laid in bed and probably fell back asleep, but then were fully wake again by six or so. The plan was to go up the gondolas into the mountains and hang out on Mount Titlis, but the day was cloudy and rainy, and you couldn’t see the mountains at all in the morning. The webcams at the summit were totally greyed out, so we decided to head back to Lucerne for a day in the city. But, not before we had a tasty breakfast! Oh, the joys of European hotels where they have amazing food for breakfast. Fresh bread, fresh jam, fresh yoghurt and granola, croissants aplenty, cheese for days, fresh juices, eggs, sausage and of course gemüse! There is nothing like stewed vegetables for breakfast. Europeans really take their time eating in the morning, for lunch and for dinner. It’s a nice way to live. Not a nice way to live was the Muslim couple behind us. The wife was all bundled up and the husband was a douche bag. It made everyone very uncomfortable. I think Sara felt like she had to go liberate this lady from her and take her out on the town, go watch Pitch Perfect 2 and have a girl’s day at the spa, because they were pretty hard core. Obviously, we saw plenty of happy Muslim couples on our trip, but this was a bit hard to see. So, we stopped seeing it and left for Lucerne.
 
The train ride down was pleasant, and we arrived back at the Lucerne train station with no rain and somewhat sunny skies. It was a perfect day for a walk around the town. We saw the Castle bridge first and admired all the pretty flowers. We then admired all the chocolate and bought some Luxembergli. The first taste of these little macaroons are life changing. It was a wonderful moment and we walked from there up to the sad Lion monument that commemorates the lives of Swiss conscripts killed serving French Kings. It was kind of a staggering number in the end. It also seems to be the lion that they based the Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe on because he was a dead ringer for Asland. We then walked through the shopping area and back over to the Castle bridge (and crossed it this time) taking the obligate number of selfies. Then it was shopping time for a few minutes (Sara found Madeline some cute clothes that were more expensive than our last car). In a panic, Mike discovered a distraction: lunch! So, we ate fondue and salad down by the river. Following lunch there was more strolling to other bridges, watching ducks surf the rapids, and then off to the castle wall that sits on a hill overlooking the city. The views from the top were outstanding, but the best part (in Mike’s mind) was that there were two little girls from the UK that sounded 100% exactly like Bluey and Bingo. Mesmerized, we unknowingly followed them down the stairs and out into the courtyard where the parents politely told us to “pop off”. No, actually they were a super nice family, and we enjoyed a quick little convo with them. We popped back up the castle for some more amazing views, and some more Luxembergli. We ate these while sitting at the lake watching the swans swim by and wondering why we don’t live in Switzerland. One of the boats on the lake was even named the Wilhelm Tell, so it seemed like a sign. Tired from our day in Lucerne, we hopped back on the train to Engelberg. By now, the clouds had cleared up and we went for a long walk around the town, up into the canyons and marveled at the beautiful views. It was stunning. So much green, so much water, so may mountains! It really is a beautiful place, and we were grateful to be able to see it without being covered in clouds. After our long walk, we found another Italian style place and got a pizza and some dessert. What struck us the most was that everyone else, after they finished their meals, pulled out card games and started playing them at the tables. It was so fun to see friends and families, just sitting playing games after dinner instead of getting back on their phones. Very refreshing. No games for us, however, we were again exhausted, so it was off to bed. 
 

​It’s off to Switzerland! Our day started with a typical morning of breakfast, making sure Emma had what she needed for camp, and saying goodbye to the kids and then we drove up to Denver to catch our flight to JFK and then to Zurich. We parked the car in the garage and sped through security, grabbed a second breakfast at the Centurion lounge then popped on our Delta flight.  It was a rather nice flight overall with no complaints. At JFK, we went to the Centurion lounge, grabbed some more food, admired the Lego store creations of New York landmarks, then popped on our flight to Zurich. There was sleeping here and there but overall, it’s tough to sleep well when you are sitting up. 
 
As we started our descent into Zurich, we could see lots of clouds covering pretty much all of central Europe, so we knew it would be a bit of a rainy first few days. We landed at the airport about 30 minutes early, but then had to wait a bit for our gate to open up. Once it did, we sped through immigration, customs, and hopped on the train to the main terminal, grabbed our bags and headed to the train station that is basically under the airport.  It reminded us a lot of Japan because there were layers and layers to the train station. Each layer had different shops and then at the very bottom you could catch a train to pretty much anywhere in Europe. Milan? No problem. Berlin? Easy. Engelberg? Of course. So that’s where we headed off to. Mike bought the tickets on his SBB app, and we hopped on the train. It was a mixed cloudy day, but the thing that struck us most was how crazy green everything was in Switzerland. It’s just a lush, lush place. We switched trains in Lucerne, grabbed some tasty pastries there, and then continued our journey into the mountains. On the train, there was a kids compartment that had kid books and kid activities. I can’t even imagine what would happen to something like that in America, but it seems to work in Switzerland. 
 
Engelberg is a quaint little town and the first thing we saw, that made us laugh was the Schmuggli-Bus. The second thing was a bathroom sign that said, “Men to the left, because the women are always right.” Sara liked that a lot. We checked into our Wes Anderson approved hotel (every Swiss mountain hotel looks like it fell out of a Wes Anderson movie) and then immediately laid down for a quick nap. Oh, glorious sleep! We set our alarm for a couple of hours because we had to get on a European schedule. After our nap, we went for a walk up a trail behind our hotel and then circled back because it started to rain. We found a place to eat dinner (an Italian place that was just down the street from our hotel). It was a tasty meal, but we were so delirious at this point, we could have been eating styrofoam. We wandered back to our hotel like drunken sailors and promptly fell asleep.