Up into the Alps!

So, I believe the last time I posted we were on the train from Paris to Strasbourg. If that's not the case, we'll just have to work around it. I'm once again writing from the train without wi-fi (so I can't check to see what I posted last). This time we're headed from Bern to Interlocken. From Interlocken we're planning on taking a cable car up into the Alps to a mountain hostel in Gimmelwald.

Right now I'm looking out the window to my left and taking in the breathtaking Swiss scenery. Our view is of a sparkling clear blue lake with tree covered hillsides all around and the snow capped Swiss Alps complementing the backdrop. You're probably wondering how we got to this point, trekking across the Swiss countryside on our way up into the Alps. Well, let me tell you..........

When we arrived in Strasbourg early Wednesday evening, we immediately found a wi-fi hotspot at a McDonald's right next to the train station. Thanks to this stroke of luck (wi-fi is harder to find than Waldo in Europe), Grant was able to pin-point the coordinates of our Strasbourg hostel and provide us with a bearing to walk there. After about a 25 minute trek (complete with backpacks) we arrived at our hostel. It was one of the nicer places we'd stayed at to this point and even had a wi-fi connection in the lobby (prompting Phil and I to declare it to be our favorite hostel thus far).

After getting settled into our 3 bed room at the hostel, we headed back towards the train station to try to track down some dinner. We experimented with taking a different way towards the center of town and ended up getting somewhat lost for about the next hour. Fortunately, we soon found a Turkish restaurant that served a slightly different style of doner kebabs (see the post on Breidenbach, Germany).

This place was nothing short of excellent, and left us full and satisfied as we headed back out into the streets of Strasbourg to make our way back to the hostel. When we got back, Phil immediately dove head first into some work for his Summer classes (the poor guy started a Masters in Business Administration on Monday and has class work he needs to attend to during this last part of our trip). Grant got to work doing some online booking of hostels and trains for the last week of our trip (he's kind of like the dad of the group), and I got busy watching an intense game of Austria versus Germany in team handball that was showing on the lobby television.

We all went to bed fairly early on Wednesday, needing a reprieve from several consecutive late nights. We got a fairly early start Thursday morning, checking out of our hostel and grabbing a quiche at a street bakery on the way to the train station.

After storing our backpacks in lockers at the train station, we decided to spend the afternoon walking around Strasbourg. Our initial plan was to locate the burial site of Samuel Froehlich, the founding father of the AC church, but after what seemed like several hours of fruitless searching we gave up for the time being.

Early in the afternoon we found a Strasbourg museum, which detailed the very interesting history of the city from about the 13th century on. Strasbourg has changed hands between France and Germany several times and has a very rich history from both the French and German side. Phil took a couple thousand pictures at the museum, so I'm sure it will be well documented. As they say, a picture is worth a thousand words.

Once we were finished touring the museum, we still had a bit of time before we had to be back at the station to catch our train. We decided to take another shot at locating Samuel Froehlich's grave and this time our efforts proved successful. It was at the St. Helena's cemetery, on the outskirts of town, that we finally found the final resting place of the great Apostolic patriarch. Grant was overjoyed that we had found it (as were Phil and I, having a lot of AC friends and relatives), and we stopped for a few respectful pictures at the gravesite.

We barely made it back to the train station in time to catch our train to Bern, stepping onto the platform just minutes before departure. After a trip of several hours and a stop to catch a connection in Basel, we finally arrived in Bern, Switzerland!

Our hostel was within very short walking distance from the station, making it one of our best locations of the entire trip. Once again, we were the only 3 people in our room, making for a very comfortable and private atmosphere.

After exchanging some of our Euros for Swiss Francs, we headed out into Bern for dinner. We found a very authentic Swiss restaurant and all tried the classic Swiss dish rosti (basically, hashbrowned potatoes with different meat, cheese, noodle, and vegetable toppings). After dinner we spent another two hours or so walking around the city. I think I may have covered the most distance on foot in a day since I ran the Chicago marathon back in October of 2008!

This morning (Friday) we checked out of our hostel at 10:00 and knocked out some more work in the lobby. Phil took a few quizzes, Grant booked some more hostels, and I got caught up the NBA finals on espn.com.

Now we're on the train headed to our mountain hostel destination up in the Alps. We just hit the end of the line as far as the train goes and boarded a bus to head further up into the mountains. There's no getting around it, this is really cool!

Well, it's now about 6-7 hours later than it was when I was writing the previous paragraph. In the meantime, we have arrived at our mountain hostel up in the Alps and since we have wi-fi I am about to post this.

While Phil worked on some late afternoon homework at the mountain hostel, Grant and I headed out for a hike in the Alps. We hiked for about 3 hours and saw some AMAZING scenery. Hiking for several hours in the Alps is not easy, so I'm sure I'll pay for it in the morning, but it was definitely worth it! In my opinion these mountains are even more breathtaking than the Rockies.

Until next time, this is Ben signing off from Gimmelwald.