Day 15

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Amber's Journal:
Wow! This place is beautiful! We have absolutely loved our time here in the Lauterbrunnen Valley. It helped a lot that the weather was perfect today as well. We started our day by going to Trummelbach Falls. They are huge waterfalls inside the mountain. You go in and ride this giant elevator/funicular thing up into these caves. The water all comes from this huge glacier but it comes raging through these crevices in the mountain. It was pretty cool to see. From there we drove to Stechelburg and rode a gondola up to the town of Murren. From Murren we hiked up a ways, then down through the forest to some more waterfalls. It was called Sprutz Falls and you could walk behind them. It was pretty. Today was a fulfillment of a dream for me to actually get to hike in the Alps, and to experience the cute little Alpen towns/villages built into the beautiful green, steep hillsides. Every few minutes I would stop and think, wow, I'm hiking in the Alps right now. It was gorgeous, and everything I ever imagined it would be. They have a very organized series of different types of trails. The trail we took was sometimes a little dirt trail that looked like we were cutting through peoples' yards, and at one point it was just a strip of grass in the middle of a field of wildflowers. There are so many random houses up on the hillsides. Even their gardens and pastures and hayfields are grown on the slope, not on a flat space. It was so great to be able to experience the Alps with Preston because we both love the mountains so much and really appreciated the beauty around us. Every direction you look there are amazing views. They have 3 massive mountains right here. One is the Jungfrau (young woman), the Monch (monk) and the Eiger (ogre). Supposedly the Monk is protecting the young woman from the Ogre. Their peaks are spectacular to look at. We hiked down to this tiny town of 150 people called Gimmelwald. The people here are self-sustaining and the place is hardly touched by tourism. It isn't even accessible by car. It was cool to see a real non-touristy Alpine Village. There are lots of goats, no stores (well kind of, but not really), one restaurant, lots of water troughs, and gorgeous views. We bought some candied almonds made by local kids and Preston got some homemade raspberry yogurt that this woman made and it was the best yogurt I think I've ever had in my life. We rode the gondola back down to Lauterbrunnen. We bought some Swiss Chocolate, then went to dinner at the same place as last night. Both our dinners were really good again. I had chicken cordon bleu. It wasn't called that but it's basically what it was. Preston had a skillet type thing with hash browns, ham, and cheese. He has been so wonderful on this trip. I really do have the best husband and I consider myself very lucky to have such a good man by my side. We are a little sad to leave this beautiful amazing place tomorrow.

Preston's Journal:
This has been one of the best days of the trip so far. We woke up to blue, cloudless skies and sunshine, and it stayed that way all day. Both Amber and I have a little bit of a reddish hue to us thanks to that wonderful sunshine. The breakfast here was great, and made for a good start. The first thing we did was Trummelbach Falls, which is a river of glacier water running through the mountain. It has formed amazing waterfalls and caverns that we were able to explore. After this, we drove up to Stechelburg where we parked and rode the gondola up to Murren. It was a nice town with some beautiful views. We hiked from there going uphill, following the Northface Trail. This took us through beautiful mountain fields and forests. We found Sprutz Falls, which we were able to go behind. Finally, we walked into Gimmelwald. This is a tiny town, but actually pretty cool. Here we bough some candied almonds and some delicious yogurt. It was so great hiking through the Swiss Alps! The powerful, beautiful mountains with the lush, green meadows. If the gondolas and such didn't cost so much we would have gone to some other cool places, but even with what we did it was sweet. We got back into Lauterbrunnen, and took it easy the rest of the evening. The food here has been delicious and we bought some Swiss chocolate that is also very good. I am sad to have to leave such a beautiful place. The waterfalls, mountains, trees, meadows, cows, goats, people, and beautiful weather made me home that someday we can come back. P.S. The Alps are amazing mountains, both in Austria and Switzerland.

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