Skydiving, Skiing, and the Hottest Men Alive - Interlaken

Last weekend I went to Interlaken (yes where they went in the Bachelor 2 weeks ago). I can't even explain how much I loved it. It's like someone took my favorite activities, people, and scenery and put them all in one place and called it Interlaken.

I had never even heard of Interlaken before I got to Barcelona, but when we went on our bike tour of Barcelona through a company called Bus2Alps, they gave away a free trip there. I looked it up online when I got home from the bike tour and booked my trip with a few friends through Bus2Alps that weekend.

Interlaken is in Swtizerland, and although it's absolutely amazing/gorgeous, it only has 10,000 residents. Although it has 4x as many visitors as residents every year (and therefore has it's fair share of hostels and hotels) I never felt like I was in a touristy city, and in fact, felt like we were the only Americans in the town. There are 3 official languages in Switzerland, French, German, and Italian, depending on where you're located in the country. The people of Interlaken speak German (but Swiss German, which apparently is a little different than regular German) but most of them also speak really good English, too, and we met a lot of people who moved there from Canada.

Anyways, enough historical facts. Here's what we did:

Thursday:


We flew into Geneva at 7:30pm and then had to wait 4 hours before we could board the Bus2Alps bus to Interlaken. We hit up a jazz cafe in the airport, looked at the prices, ordered chips and salsa because we felt bad (9 CHF) and then got the heck out of there. It was at this point that I realized Switzerland was going to be a very expensive trip. Switzerland is on the Swiss Franc (the conversion rate to the dollar is better than the euro, but not by much) and everything is EXPENSIVE. Even the chicken sandwiches at Burger King cost 15 CHF (approx. $17). It was at this point that I decided I was going to suck it up, ignore the prices for the weekend, and not check my bank account for a solid week after returning (for fear of depression). Four hours is a long time to wait in an airport, but 4 hours and 2 airport bars later we finally met up with the Bus2Alps group and were aboard the coach bus on our way to Interlaken (2.5 hour drive). We got to our hostel, Balmer's, and passed out immediately in order to prepared for our big day of skiing in the Alps the next morning.

Balmer's - our hostel

Friday:


I'm not sure how, but we got up bright and early at 7:30 Friday morning, got a quick breakfast, and headed next door to Outdoor Interlaken to rent all of our snow and ski gear. Surprisingly, it was cheaper even than skiing in Colorado. It was only 187 CHF for my lift ticket and rentals even though we had to rent EVERYTHING (coat, snow pants, gloves, helmet, goggles, boots, skis, and poles). The lift ticket gives you access to all the trains and buses your little heart desires and you can pick and choose which ones you take depending on where you want to ski on the mountain. It took about an hour to get to the top of the mountain, and when I got off, I was amazed at how pretty and enormous the mountains were (and a little terrified). I skiied with Jordan and Kat who grew up in Colorado and go to UC Boulder/ski and snowboard all the time soooo that made for a fun day of overcoming any fears/reservations I had about going down any and every run. Linda was supposed to snowboard with us too but got to the top of the run, looked down, and decided she'd rather spend her day at the hill's bar. haha. I was completely out of my league (training at Cascade mountain didn't exactly prepare me for the Alps) but I got through the day without crashing or dying! (although there may have been a few close calls). My binding came loose twice on my ski, causing me to semi-fall and both times someone skiied up to me with my ski within 10 seconds. They were so nice. Without really making a conscious decision to do it, I thanked them in a British accent both times because I was embarrassed that I semi-fell in the land of pro skiiers (who all seemed local) and decided to foot it off on the British rather than being the "stupid American that's never skiied in mountains and is way out of her league". Sorry England.

It was a perfect day of skiing. It was so warm, it felt like spring skiing, and I wished that I hadn't even rented a jacket. We skiied from 10-4 and then stopped in a little teepee bar that had been cranking the music all day at the base of the run. It was packed, everyone was awesome and so nice, and the German beer was perfect after a day of skiing. It's also worth mentioning that the Swiss guys we saw all day on the hill are the hottest bunch of guys I have ever seen in my life. Every single one of them. They were basically radiating. For all of these reasons, I decided that I am returning to Interlaken where I will meet my husband in the teepee bar (so he'll be hot, Swiss, ski, rich, awesome, and live in Switzerland). It's happening.

We got back to the hostel that night around 7, ate dinner in the hostel's restaurant (surprisingly good) and went to bed early. We were so exhausted.

Saturday:


I knew before I left Barcelona that I definitely wanted to skydive in Interlaken, so even though no one else that I knew was going, I decided to wake up bright and early for 8:30am skydiving. I thought at least other kids from the hostel would be signed up, but when the van and instructor showed up, he said I was the only one for that morning...awkward haha. What was more awkward was that when I got in the van, the first song to play on his CD was Bad Touch by Bloodhound Gang. He was from England and was a skydiving instructor in California for 10 years before coming to Interlaken 13 years ago. I couldn't believe that he literally made a living out of jumping out of planes. It was weirdly inspirational. Another thing I thought was cool was when he showed me the huge traffic jam from people trying to get to the mountain early to ski. It was nice to see a traffic jam of people going to ski, rather than a traffic jam of people going to work.

When we got to the skydiving place, I got all suited up and then had to wait by myself for an hour and half because the guy I was supposed to tandem jump with apparently got confused and instead went to the mountain to sky all day. There were a bunch of younger guys there who were training to be instructors and/or trick divers (I didn't realize then that they were all going to jump with me out of the plane) and a few of them tried to talk to me but only spoke German, so I just gave them my look of confusion/fear/awkwardness that I've pretty much perfected at this point and then we'd laugh and awkwardly walk away because neither of us could understand a single word of what the other one was saying.

They called in another guy to tandem with me, and when he finally showed up, we (meaning me, my tandem, and all the soon to be instructors/trick divers) all crowded into a little plane, straddling one another to make room, and were off. The plane ride was beautiful and since it was a perfectly clear day, I got to see Interlaken, the Alps, and a bunch of the other little mountain towns from 13,000 feet in the air. Strangely enough, I wasn't nervous at all up until this point. In my mind, these companies have a safety reputation to uphold otherwise no one would skydive with them, plus my tandem had been jumping for 20 years. So even though they only go over safety information for a total of five minutes (most of which I didn't remember by the time I was dangling over the edge of the plane), I never really felt scared...just excited.

When we got to 13,000 feet, my tandem attached four clips on my suit to his and strapped us together. Then he opened the door and told me to scoot to the edge of the door and hang my legs out with my feet wrapped around the bottom of the plane. We were the first divers, and after such a peaceful flight through the Alps, I had kind of forgotten what I was up there for in the first place. It was at this point that although I didn't really fell nervous, my legs started shaking out of control. It was weird. I paid extra for pictures and video since I heard that everything happens so fast and its hard to remember/pay attention to everything that's going on, so the trick diver who was videoing me stepped out the door first and hung on to the edge of the plane (while it's flying through the air) in order to videotape me as I jumped. crazy crazy crazy.

Seconds later, we pushed off from the plane and the 40 second free fall began. It was at this point that I realized that when Dave (my tandem) told me we would probably do flips at first, he wasn't kidding. I had laughed at him, thinking it was just something else to try and scare me (they do a lot of that surprisingly) but what do you know, as soon as we left the plane I was suddenly flipping through the air. I think I flipped around 3 times before we straightened out and I was able to let go of my harness and put my arms out.

Free falling was the coolest experience I've ever had. The perspective from 13,000 feet is so weird because you're so high up, that at times, it doesn't really even seem like you're falling. You're just...flying. I had the same exact face for all 40 seconds of my freefall. Just pure excitement/adrenaline/top of the world happiness. It looks like I'm screaming in the pictures, but it's impossible to scream since the wind is blowing up at you so fast...so I'm really just making that face haha

40 seconds later, I felt Dave tap on my shoulder (my queue to put my arms in again so he could release the parachute) and all of a sudden we were flying...flying...flying...PARACHUTE. The parachute shoots you back up into the sky and does a good job at making you finally come to the realization that you were just free falling to the ground at 120 mph.

We parachuted for about 5 minutes and Dave made sure to keep the ride interesting with lots of dives and turns. Despite Dave's antics, it was really peaceful and I just kept smiling the entire time.

5 minutes later it was time to land back in front of the skydiving place. Since it'd be pretty near impossible for two people to land/run together, tandems just land on their butts (which makes pulling your legs up a key step...that I almost forgot). We came in really fast, but then all of a sudden right as we were about to land, he pulled the parachute in really quickly and we landed unbelievably softly for just jumping from a plane.

I got up and already wanted to go do it again. Ahhhhhh so awesome. I have a video and 200 pictures and I still can't stop watching them.

After I got back, we grabbed lunch at a little restaurant across from the hotel called Utopia. We ordered bagel sandwiches and homemade french onion soup and after talking to the owner, Alexis, for a while found out that she was from New York! I said something about how much I missed bagels and was surprised that she had them and she told us that she actually imports the bagels from New York to Interlaken every week because nowhere in Europe has the right yeast, etc to make them the same. No wonder they were so good. After graduating from college in New York, she moved to Austrailia for 8 months and then met a guy from Interlaken and moved there to be with him 8 years ago. Ughh I want her life.

We rented bikes from the train station in Interlaken and took one of the bike paths that goes through the mountains and a bunch of little mountain towns. The lakes, mountains, towns, and meadows we came across were unbelievable. I couldn't believe a place like that existed on Earth and I had never even heard of it. We biked past a little barn of cows, with the doors open just inviting anyone/everyone to come in...so we did. Then we came across a tiny brewery and naturally had to stop in the adjacent restaurant to have a beer (the only people inside were 5 old German men smoking cigarettes and laughing at us as we tried to communicate with the waitress who also only spoke German). And the towns seemed to be still living the same life they lived 100 years ago. I'm obsessed. 3 hours later, we had to return the bikes so we could go back to the hostel and get ready for our next activity NIGHT SLEDDING.

When we signed up for night sledding we had no idea what to expect, but it came with a swiss fondue dinner at a mountain restaurant so we figured what the heck. Night sledding turned out to be way more extreme than what I thought, essentially dropping us at the top of a mountain (in the dark) with sleds and lights around our neck (so night sledding didn't turn into night bumper cars). Then the guide goes first and you sled down the zig-zaggy mountain...usually with minimal control. To give you an idea, it was a lot of sledding....sledding....sledding...bump came out of nowhere/flying through the air/landing...surprise! 180 degree turn...hit the snow bank...fall off sled...get back on as fast you can so the people behind you don't hit you...yeah you get the idea. I felt like I was in my own real life version of Mario Kart.

The ride down the mountain was about an hour long and at the end they take you into the this tiny little restaurant that serves you a traditional Swiss meal (salad, pork, and some kind of hashbrown potatoes that must have come straight from heaven) and then Swiss fondue for desert (smells really bad but tastes really good).

We got home around 10 and despite much peer pressure to go out to Metro Bar (the bar at our hostel but apparently the best night life in Interlaken...kind of scary) Linda and I chose to instead shower and eat chocolate in our room before going to bed early. I had absolutely no problem with this decision. We then had the pleasure of being awoken at 3am to another girl in our room puking all over the floor of our room (seriously...how do you get that drunk at Metro Bar. and why?!) The worst part was, it was right in front of the door, so we were baricaded in and couldn't even go down to the desk and plead for another bed for the night. Gross.

Sunday:


After a not-so-lovely night in the hostel, we woke up the next morning, grabbed breakfast, and set out on a walk to see the rest of Interlaken. We got second breakfast at a really cute little restaurant called Cafe au Paris and I had the best breakfast I think I've ever had (yes, it even beat the iHop International Crepe Passport...sorry Julia): waffles, homemade berry sauce, fruit, and homemade ice cream. I wish I had some now.

Broke after our weekend in the city for the rich (well I guess it's all relative to them since their minimum wage is 20 CHF) we picked up salads at grocery store and boarded the bus for the airport to fly back to Barcelona.

Upon returning home, I've looked up couch surfing, internships, apartments, and houses in Interlaken. I have to go back.