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The Road to Murren
View from the hike to MurrenThe sun coming through the window woke me up at around 8:30am, Richard was gone already for his mountain-biking adventure. My bunk was in the back corner, right by the window, so when I sat up in bed, the snow capped Alps were peeping in on me. Got up, grabbed my clothes and walked downstairs to the showers. After, I went back up to pack up all my things and make my bed, the hostel locks you out of the place from 9:30 to 11 to clean the place, so it was a race against the clock. I didn’t know what they had for breakfast and wanted to conserve my Swiss Francs, so I just bought a thing of orange juice and took a bag of salted peanuts I had bought in Interlaken and sat outside with three guys from Atlanta and that was my breakfast. Right before I was shunned from the hostel for an hour and a half, I went to the kitchen and rinsed out my glass like a good boy, grabbed my Padres hat and embarked on my hike up to Murren. A short 50 minute hike according to the signs.
It was more of road
than a hiking path, but there are probably only 10 cars in the Murren-Gimmelwald metropolitan area, so I only had to step aside for two cars. The road coiled up on a fairly steep incline past small gangs of Holsteins, sheep, and goats grazing and farmers working in their slanted fields. It was a nice walk, I blame the high elevation and not me being out of shape for the stops I had to make to catch my breath. Soon on the hike I could look down at Gimmelwald and over the cliff down on Shectleberg and parts of Lauterbrunnen and I could look across the valley at the waterfalls as tall as the Sears Tower and the peaks above them. The air was crisp and the weather was nice and cool, probably an ideal 70 degrees or maybe less, and surprisingly little patches of snow on the road and on the hills. I could see Murren sitting on top of the hill in front of me and in half an hour I was walking through the bottom part of town, the houses, the road still hamstring-straining. Soon I was off that damn road and onto the flat main street
Holstein
My company on the walk of Murren, lined with a couple restaurants, a bank, a Coop (like a Safeway in a 7-Eleven sized store), and other stores. I walked down the street, it was only 10:45 so too early to eat lunch, I noticed a guy from the hostel sitting on a bench with a couple Coop bags. Stopped to talk with him. His name is Chris, 35 years old from Birmingham, UK, extremely nice and a warm, inviting personality, which helps if you are 35 staying at hostels. Asked him where I could find some stamps, pointed me to a souvenir store, thanked him and said see ya back at the hostel. Went to the souvenir store, Chris was right, bought some stamps to put on my postcards from Rome, Florence, and Cinque Terre. I don’t trust the Italian postal system.
Stopped at the Coop and checked out their wine selection. Nice selection and built for wine dummies like me. Each bottle had a sign beneath it that said what country its from, what kind of wine it is, and what food it goes best with. Saw some Chianti Classico and also some French wines, but when I am in a country I
want to sample its goods, so I bought a bottle of Swiss Pinot Noir and walked around the main street some more. Sat on a bench to revel in the fact that I am in Switzerland staring at the Alps, never thought I’d ever be in this country, and then this weird guy on a bike sporting a motorcycle-type helmet pulls up in front of me. It was Richard. He just made it up to Murren from Lauterbrunnen where he rented the bike and he was just about to ride a trail from Murren back down to Lauterbrunnen that runs along the cliff. Told him not to die as he rode off. It was 11:30 and I wasn’t that hungry, but knew Murren was about it for places to eat, so I just killed some time sitting on a bench over by the tram-lift station. This sound of bells ringing started getting louder and louder and it was going on for about ten minutes and I thought it was a nutcase abusing the town’s church bell. I stood up and turned around to face the main drag to maybe look and see what could possibly be going on and around the corner came this elderly man with a long gray beard (think Gandolf from Lord of the Rings) with a thick walking stick drudging up the road followed by about five Holsteins with huge bells around their necks and the man’s wife behind them. They passed by and visually disappeared around the next corner, but could still hear the hollow sound of the bells banging away for another five minutes. Very random and amusing.
The clock at the tram-lift station said noon, my stomach said sounds like a good time to eat, and walked over to a restaurant and sat outside. Ordered this plate of lamb strips with garlic mayonnaise and a salad and water. The meal was delicious. Surprised at the culinary skills of the Swiss, they aren’t just one-trick ponies with chocolate.
Decided to head back down to Gimmelwald. On the path my eyes were alternating between the spectacular views and looking out for the numerous Holstein piles of crap on the road. I was worried the sheep were going to flick me off for eating one of their buddies as I passed by. When I was almost down to Gimmelwald, Richard was walking up the road to see if I was still in Murren. He told me about his biking adventure and showed me his battle wound on his arm where he flew over the handlebars. But he said it was an amazing mountain-biking time. We walked to Gimmelwald and decided to do some laundry. In the hostel we struck up a conversation with a guy named Tim from South Dakota. He’s 55 and just taking 75 days to explore Europe. Nice guy. Richard was hungry so we decided to walk up to Murren and eat and then if it wasn’t too cloudy we would take the tram up to the Schlithorn peak after the laundry was done. Tim had just gotten in from Dresden and was starving too so he would come with us. We hung up our clothes on the outdoor clotheslines (no dryer) and we made our way up to Murren, my second time in a five hour period. The afternoon clouds had rolled in and lightly drizzled.
Back in Murren, we walked around the main street, Richard stopped to buy some food for the train tomorrow from the Coop. Walked over to the tram-lift station, inside they have a TV with a live camera feed of the top of the Schlithorn and it definitely look too cloudy. None of us wanted to spend 50 francs to look at the anatomy of a cloud. We all strolled around the town and then went to the same restaurant I ate at five hours earlier and ordered hash browns covered in melted cheese, a Swiss staple. It was good, couldn’t finish mine, Richard loves both cheese and potatoes so he was in heaven and gobbled his up. Tim had the bratwurst. Meeting all these guys like Chris and Tim kind of shows there really isn’t an age limit to take trips like this. It started to rain harder, so we decided to take the short tram ride back to Gimmelwald and rescue our hanging clothes.
Five minutes later we were there and even with the 500 or so feet change in elevation from Murren to Gimmelwald, the rain was pretty much non-existent. Took our clothes inside and relaxed. I busted out the bottle of wine and Chris, Tim, Richard, and I had a couple glasses of it till it was killed. It was good, not the best, but happy to taste what the Swiss have to offer. Walked outside and sat at a table with a group of people. It was Chris, Rebecca and Allison from Indiana (in IUPUI shirts, that’s how I struck up a conversation with them), Jeff who was from Fort Wayne, Indiana but is moving to San Diego a week before I am, Richard, and me. We played a card game and then Rebecca and Allison brought out the Jenga blocks. We had two incredible, suspenseful games. You couldn’t believe the kind of towers we ended up building. You wouldn’t feel comfortable with us as architects. It was a lot of fun. I hadn’t played Jenga really ever before, was impressed with my sturdy hands, and after the last game we all just sat outside and talked about school and life. We moved inside and had continued the conversation and shared a bottle of wine. Met two girls from Australia. Learned some lingo. We are all pretty much leaving tomorrow. Jeff, Rebecca, Allison, and Tim are headed to Germany. Chris is going down to Interlaken and the two Aussie girls are headed to Zurich. It feels like summer camp at this place. Its funny, everywhere I have been has been great, but the places I have enjoyed the most (Florence and here) have been because of the people we have met. Sad to leave. Sad to leave everywhere, but the journey must continue.
Have fun,
Matt
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AaronQ
non-member comment
Travel
This week must be the week of travel, I was in Flagstaff for Arizona Boy's State, mom and dad are in Nashville, and you traveled to another different country. You'll get used to the altitude, after a week at 7000 ft, I was fine. It is ironic though as I am reading Frankenstein and Victor Frankenstein is from Geneva and keeps talking about the beautiful Swiss landscape. Have fun, big bro.