There is this itch you get when you live in a place like Switzerland. It creeps up on you – at first you dream of days of just sitting in your flat, drinking coffee, relaxing while watching a movie and then it hits you – there is a whole other world out there. The Alps are a few hours away, there are other countries to explore, so you yourselves jumping up, packing your sacks and heading out the door.
That’s how it happened.
One Friday morning as Robert slept, I planned a short trip into the Emmental for a nice, little weekend of snowshoeing. So we arrived in Emmental with the nicest owners (probably in the universe) meeting us at the bus station. We literally jumped off the bus and heard, “Hallo Melinda!” like a long lost friend calling your name after years of missing you!
We love this country!
We quickly made our way to the Berghaus, had our choice of rooms (like we said, the nicest people in the universe) and put down the packs. We then received a great map of the area and a hike that would take about 3.5 hours - we decided to head out.
We quickly made our way to the Berghaus, had our choice of rooms (like we said, the nicest people in the universe) and put down the packs. We then received a great map of the area and a hike that would take about 3.5 hours - we decided to head out.
This is where our Swiss lessons come into play…
Lesson #1: Always, and we mean always, take food with you.
Lesson #1: Always, and we mean always, take food with you.
You never know when food might come in handy.
Lesson #2: though we know water is more essential than food, but we like to eat…Water our friends, is also a good thing to have, even more important than the food.
The start of the hike was great! We made our way uphill - in fact, most of the beautiful hike with commanding views of the Alps was indeed uphill. We took lots of photos, and were anxious to find our way to the Bergrestaurant Erika for a nice warm meal. After hiking about 2.5 hours, we needed a little rest and a bit of a warm-up. This is were the hike, or snowshoeing adventure turned a little south. The restaurant was geschlossen…or for those of you who don’t know 10 words of German like we do, that means closed. Now this doesn’t sound so sad, but let me tell you, in the hiking world, after tredging (this is a word…right?) 2.5 hours uphill, it is downright devastating when you arrive at a restaurant that you know has food in the kitchen and places to sit that is free of those round, big, frozen cow patties and there are no chances of sitting in yellow snow. This is where lesson #1 came into handy – we had packed two Clif Bars – we now LOVE Clif (and if by any chance anyone from CLIF BAR is reading this, yes, we would like a free year supply of your delicious and nutritious energy snacks), two apples and water! We munched on our frozen bars, drank our water and pressed on.
As we turned the corner, the snow became quite a bit deeper – about 2 feet of snow – wet, heavy, dense snow. We love to snowshoe, we signed up for snowshoeing, but we have to say, wet snow it like hiking with 30 pound weights strapped to your feet…a very nice workout, but after about 6 hours of this…yes, somehow our 3.5 hour hike turned into about 6 hours of a snowshoeing survival course! We’ll dive into that in a bit.
Lesson #2: though we know water is more essential than food, but we like to eat…Water our friends, is also a good thing to have, even more important than the food.
The start of the hike was great! We made our way uphill - in fact, most of the beautiful hike with commanding views of the Alps was indeed uphill. We took lots of photos, and were anxious to find our way to the Bergrestaurant Erika for a nice warm meal. After hiking about 2.5 hours, we needed a little rest and a bit of a warm-up. This is were the hike, or snowshoeing adventure turned a little south. The restaurant was geschlossen…or for those of you who don’t know 10 words of German like we do, that means closed. Now this doesn’t sound so sad, but let me tell you, in the hiking world, after tredging (this is a word…right?) 2.5 hours uphill, it is downright devastating when you arrive at a restaurant that you know has food in the kitchen and places to sit that is free of those round, big, frozen cow patties and there are no chances of sitting in yellow snow. This is where lesson #1 came into handy – we had packed two Clif Bars – we now LOVE Clif (and if by any chance anyone from CLIF BAR is reading this, yes, we would like a free year supply of your delicious and nutritious energy snacks), two apples and water! We munched on our frozen bars, drank our water and pressed on.
As we turned the corner, the snow became quite a bit deeper – about 2 feet of snow – wet, heavy, dense snow. We love to snowshoe, we signed up for snowshoeing, but we have to say, wet snow it like hiking with 30 pound weights strapped to your feet…a very nice workout, but after about 6 hours of this…yes, somehow our 3.5 hour hike turned into about 6 hours of a snowshoeing survival course! We’ll dive into that in a bit.
So for now, we are still smiling and not moaning too much. At this point, civilization is nowhere in sight and for those of you who are not familiar with winters in Switzy, the sun comes up at about 8:30 and goes down around 4:30….Lesson #3 now comes into play…if you are hiking in unknown territories and you know it will be getting dark, either carry a BIG flashlight with you, (OK, make that rescues flairs) or get yourself back to shelter before dark.
We had the flashlight, and our “shelter” was nowhere in sight.
Still snapping pictures as if we were on location for National Geographic, the sun begins to set, which means without the sun, the temperature drops. So, this is what it looks like: the temperature drops, our stomachs are still hungry (this is why we need the year free supply of Clif Bars, we need to eat more than one bar on a 6 hour snowshoeing adventure….if you want our address, just ask Mr. Clif) and the obstacle course begins.
Obstacle #1:
Still snapping pictures as if we were on location for National Geographic, the sun begins to set, which means without the sun, the temperature drops. So, this is what it looks like: the temperature drops, our stomachs are still hungry (this is why we need the year free supply of Clif Bars, we need to eat more than one bar on a 6 hour snowshoeing adventure….if you want our address, just ask Mr. Clif) and the obstacle course begins.
Obstacle #1:
Frozen, snowed in gate….Must cross.
Picture this, when hiking in Switzerland, there are typically gates, or electric fences scattered all over the terrain. The purpose of this is to keep the animals (pigs, goats, sheep, and cow) from roaming freely, not necessarily to keep the people out. This gate was encrusted with barbed wire and on either side was an electric fence. Robert had enough crotch (yes, I said crotch) clearance to hop over the fence. Now, this is where being vertically challenged gets difficult. I on the other hand, did not have the crotch clearance to make a clean jump over the fence and therefore, still hoping to protect my fertility, decided I must hop the fence. I can hop a fence, I have done it before, I will do it again, but with two big, clumsy snowshoes on, hoping a fence is no picnic, especially when encrusted in barbed wire. After contemplating for awhile, and deciding taking off the snowshoes (yes, this would have been the easiest and safest way to go, but I like adventure and am a bit lazy…. it takes a good 10 minutes to get in and out of snowshoes) I mastered that fence, I mean I took it in Taylor style. My family would have been proud.
Obstacle #1 = Mastered
Obstacle #2:
Picture this, when hiking in Switzerland, there are typically gates, or electric fences scattered all over the terrain. The purpose of this is to keep the animals (pigs, goats, sheep, and cow) from roaming freely, not necessarily to keep the people out. This gate was encrusted with barbed wire and on either side was an electric fence. Robert had enough crotch (yes, I said crotch) clearance to hop over the fence. Now, this is where being vertically challenged gets difficult. I on the other hand, did not have the crotch clearance to make a clean jump over the fence and therefore, still hoping to protect my fertility, decided I must hop the fence. I can hop a fence, I have done it before, I will do it again, but with two big, clumsy snowshoes on, hoping a fence is no picnic, especially when encrusted in barbed wire. After contemplating for awhile, and deciding taking off the snowshoes (yes, this would have been the easiest and safest way to go, but I like adventure and am a bit lazy…. it takes a good 10 minutes to get in and out of snowshoes) I mastered that fence, I mean I took it in Taylor style. My family would have been proud.
Obstacle #1 = Mastered
Obstacle #2:
So soon….we just mastered obstacle #1...Down trees on trail…Must scale mountain.
With frostbite setting in…(Robert can no longer feel his toes – Note to self: Target does not make the best hiking boots) we picked up the snowshoeing pace to avoid the whole black, Popsicle toe escapade we have seen too often in those high adventure, Everest trekking films. We are moving along when what to our wondering eyes should appear (it was close to Christmas, what can you expect?) but a shit load of trees and not a single frickin’ reindeer. Not even a frickin’ sled to carry us out of this mess. Dark, cold and completely no longer charmed by the snowshoeing adventure, in fact, at this point I was ready, OK, we were ready, to tear off the snowshoes and start to burn them for what little warmth they had and vow never to do this type of adventurous, no brained activity again. We tredged (is this a word yet?) uphill trying to avoid the downed trees, made our way out and didn’t say a word. You know those moments when it is best to remain silent in fear of what might come out of your mouth…what might have come out of my mouth at that point was certain to scare me, so I bit my tongue and cried frozen tears instead. Not really, (who cries in subzero weather?) but it makes for a good story…right?
Obstacle #3:
With frostbite setting in…(Robert can no longer feel his toes – Note to self: Target does not make the best hiking boots) we picked up the snowshoeing pace to avoid the whole black, Popsicle toe escapade we have seen too often in those high adventure, Everest trekking films. We are moving along when what to our wondering eyes should appear (it was close to Christmas, what can you expect?) but a shit load of trees and not a single frickin’ reindeer. Not even a frickin’ sled to carry us out of this mess. Dark, cold and completely no longer charmed by the snowshoeing adventure, in fact, at this point I was ready, OK, we were ready, to tear off the snowshoes and start to burn them for what little warmth they had and vow never to do this type of adventurous, no brained activity again. We tredged (is this a word yet?) uphill trying to avoid the downed trees, made our way out and didn’t say a word. You know those moments when it is best to remain silent in fear of what might come out of your mouth…what might have come out of my mouth at that point was certain to scare me, so I bit my tongue and cried frozen tears instead. Not really, (who cries in subzero weather?) but it makes for a good story…right?
Obstacle #3:
Hiking in the forest over a cliff in the dark…
Not much to say here, but we know, it doesn’t get much dumber than this.
Obstacle #4:
Not much to say here, but we know, it doesn’t get much dumber than this.
Obstacle #4:
Or are you kidding me that not a single place in this town is open?
It is cold, it is dark and all we have at the Berghaus to eat is a small, I mean really small, (like the size of a quarter on steroids) piece of goat cheese, four pieces of Advent bread, two Clementines (not even real oranges….just cute little, low calorie, want –to- be oranges) and tea…does tea even have a single calorie?
It is cold, it is dark and all we have at the Berghaus to eat is a small, I mean really small, (like the size of a quarter on steroids) piece of goat cheese, four pieces of Advent bread, two Clementines (not even real oranges….just cute little, low calorie, want –to- be oranges) and tea…does tea even have a single calorie?
We need calories people…this is where you start to understand how desperate people go south (when I say “south” I mean bad…just to clarify.) When you see a store full of food (at this point it doesn’t even matter what kind of food, in fact, the cat food started to look good, in those neat little colorful shapes, tuna flavored even…mmmm). All we wanted to do was bust into that store, put as much grub as we could into our pockets, leave some money by the register (see it can’t be that bad, we were even willing to pay for the loot – yes we would have broken into the market, but officer, we did pay.) But we couldn’t do it and we wouldn’t do it, even with Robert’s Popsicle toes, we just hobbled back to the house, in the dark to munch away on our tasty treats.
Lesson #4:
I think the last lesson was #3, but at this point who is counting? When all else fails – do it again! No kidding, we have signed up to do it again. January 18 – 20th. Snowshoe adventure part 2…here we come! Believe it or not, we had a great time!
*Parental Warning:
Obstacle #2 contains some colorful language. For 8 months we have published a “family friendly” or “G” rated site – please know, we intend to keep this a family friendly site, but sometimes, “colorful” language helps to really express the mood of the situation. In addition, some of the best works we have read contain some “colorful” language…at times, “colorful” language can be fun and it can even help convey the message and place special emphasis where special emphasis is due. For those of you who might be highly offended by some of the verbiage chosen for this particular piece, we do apologize, however, this year, I have decided it is OK (for the sake of writing of course) to express myself and if that means the occasional use of “colorful” language…well, I am comfortable with that. And if by anychance Clif or someone from a travel magazine wants to hire me, or us to take photos or write articles for you, we are totally up for the challenge....
Enjoy!
The beautiful Emmental Valley
Robert and Melinda at the beginning of the snowshoeing adventure...hence the smiles...
It is very, very cold...
A photo taken on location for National Geographic
Nice snowy valley...
Deep, cold snow...
What? The restaurant is...Closed...Not open for service...Robert
What no grub??? I am only slightly smiling now...
Lots of snow...deep, frosty, snow...
Trail...
Another tree for National Geographic...
Yeah, I mastered obstacle #1...
Down trees on trail....obstacle #2
Trees still on trail...we have not yet mastered obstacle #2
Close up of trees on trail....
Oh look....it is getting dark already...break out the flairs...it is beautiful though...
The moon is rising...where is that flashlight?
Robert thrilled with the selection of dinner options...His toes did defrost!
1 comment:
Sounds like an ordeal! Glad you weren't lost up there!! Maybe some flint and steel next time so you can start a fire if need be! LOL Survivor style!
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