Switzerland Week 2

Switzerland was a hard place to leave. Its natural beauty and remarkable snowboarding left me in awe. After leaving Bern I headed to the "Swiss Alps Retreat" for a week. It was a cool chalet/hostel with many travelers living there on a more permanent basis and working in the area. The snowboarding resort, Villars-Gryon, was only a 15 minute walk or 3 minute ride on the train from the chalet. My timing couldn’t have been better because they got huge dumps of snow all week which made for fresh powder every day. The guys living there said it’s the best conditions they’ve had all season. These were literally conditions that I dream of. I was gliding on new powder every run and it was not busy at all because it was during the week. The resort had an upper section called “Glacier 3000” which is closed whenever conditions are potentially unsafe – cloudy, windy, avalanche danger, etc. – so it wasn’t until my final day of snowboarding that I got to go there. In terms of conditions, I found it very similar to other runs, but the view was outstanding! That extra 1000 meters made a huge difference in terms of the surrounding view of the Alps – as you’ll see in the pictures. I snowboarded for 4 days straight at Villar Gryon – making for a total of 7 days of snowboarding in the Alps on my Euro trip. My last two days at the chalet were spent exploring the Village and planning the rest of my trip. I was admittedly very sad to leave knowing I may never return to the Alps, but the memories I have of this outstanding experience will not be leaving anytime soon.

On Sunday I left the Swiss Alps Retreat at 8:30am and arrived in Geneva at 11:00am. The only train available to eurail pass holders from there to Nice (my next destination) left at 2:00pm, so this gave me a couple hours to put my bags in a locker and explore Geneva. It was a nice sunny day which made the city even more beautiful, especially looking across the lake with the Alps in the background. Back at the train station, I had about 12 Swiss Francs to get rid of, and I found a bakery where I carefully purchased a sandwich and various other goodies to perfectly spend my remaining Francs. After this 3-4 minute process, I realized my train left in only 2 minutes and made a dash for it. But for some reason I didn’t have that “extra energy” that I had when I was running to catch my train from Munich to Switzerland (yes some things never change, but I did catch that train). So I reached the tracks just in time to watch my train to Nice take off. I was actually pretty happy about this because I really wasn’t ready to leave Geneva; especially since the weather on Monday was supposed to be crummy, making it the better day to spend on a train for 8 hours.

After getting the departure times for the next day’s trains to Nice, I checked in at a nearby hostel and sent a message to Ben, a friend from high school currently living in Geneva, to let him know I was in there for the night. Then I went to have a look at the European Headquarters of the United Nations and took a tour of the Red Cross museum. Back at the hostel, I met a group of 30 or 40 American students who are doing a study abroad program that’s a wee bit more intense than what I did in Copenhagen. They’re in Switzerland for a two week orientation, then going for 5 weeks in India, then 5 weeks in China, followed by 5 weeks in South Africa. Living in both hostels and local families’ homes, a professor gives them lectures along the way (their classroom in Switzerland was a church) as well as various assignments related to the experience of their trip. It sounded like quite the experience and I really enjoyed talking to them about it.

Later in the night I got a call from Ben and we met up for some drinks with his girlfriend and some of his coworkers from the hotel he works at. He said only 10% of the hotel’s staff are Swiss, making for an interesting mix of international people he works with. Ben’s clearly having a great time, and he’s got an 18-month work permit for Switzerland which I didn’t even know we could get. Definitely sparked my interest as a fantastic way to see the world without putting yourself into debt. Ben’s girlfriend from Canada is working in Zurich as a nanny (or some similar European term) for a Swiss family. This also sounds like a pretty sweet deal and an interesting experience, however only an option for girls. So maybe this is something my little sis Kim can consider doing one day.

All in all, Geneva was an excellent experience and I truly enjoyed learning more about other ways that people are seeing the world at a young age. It was great catching up with an old high school friend and getting a glimpse of his life working abroad, and Geneva was a beautiful city to check out on a sunny day. Yes, I am happy that I missed my train yesterday. I hope you enjoy the pictures! Jake.

First day of snowboarding - with people from the hostel.

Looks like a Canada flag, doesn't it? I found out after taking the picture that it was in fact a Swiss flag.

The way out in a skiing emergency. Minimum cost, $1500. Better hope you got travel insurance!

Swiss Cottages in the mountains.

Taking the Gondola up to "Glacier 3000"




Fresh powder on the glacier.

I think that's my track in the powder.


At first I felt a sense of urgency for the bus to come, then I sat back and enjoyed the view (pictured above & below) and I realized I was in no rush whatsoever.

Last chairlift ride in the Alps

The Swiss Alps Retreat where I stayed for a week

Geneva's fountain


Old town Geneva

European Headquarters of the United Nations

I thought this looked like Mike Myers...

Red Cross Headquarters & Museum

At a pub with Ben & his co-workers

Ben and I near the train station in Geneva.

Switzerland

Switzerland was the #1 destination I wanted to see on my Europe trip. It always sounded like a beautiful paradise for snowboarders and outdoorsy people, and from talking to my friend Anina in Copenhagen it was very obvious that she absolutely loved her home country of Switzerland. After spending a week with Anina in Switzerland, it’s safe to say it lives up to its reputation! Not only did I enjoy the beauty of the country, I was made to feel apart of Anina’s family for the week which was fantastic. This was the first time I experienced a family atmosphere since leaving Canada and I can’t even describe how much I enjoyed it. On the first night, we had a traditional Swiss dinner. It’s hard to quickly illustrate exactly what this was, but it involved cheese, lots of cheese, and it was delicious! The next day Anina and I explored the city of Bern, where she lives. It’s a cool city and sounds especially fun in the summer. Apparently lots of people swim in the river which I thought was awesome! The following day we headed to Zermatt for two nights at Anina’s friend’s family chalet in the Swiss Alps. This was the most amazing mountain I’ve ever seen and probably the best day of snowboarding I’ve ever had. I say probably because hitting powder on my 17^th birthday in B.C. was also amazing, so I’d rather leave it a tie. After taking multiple gondolas we reached the highest mountain lift in Europe at 12,336 feet! While climbing the stairs to the lookout we could really feel how thin the air was at that elevation, and it was much colder than the other snowboarding runs. I went off a big jump for the first time since breaking my wrist snowboarding in grade 8. This time was a bit different because there was a big air mattress to break my fall. This made for a pretty cool picture (shown below).

On Friday, Anina and I went to explore the city of Lausanne, which offered beautiful sights and a very nice church. Anina’s dad told me that many Japanese people come to Switzerland specifically to get married in that church; a little random, but interesting I thought. That night I said my goodbyes to Anina because I was leaving the next day and she had to work in the morning. As the day progressed, I didn’t feel quite ready to leave and I asked Anina’s parents if I could stay one more night. I used indecisiveness on my next destination as the reason, but really I was enjoying my time with them so much that I didn’t want to leave! That feeling of being part of a family is something that I’ve really missed while traveling so I wanted to enjoy every moment I could. The extra day & night was great because I got to learn more about their family, including seeing old photo albums of Sri Lanka when Anina’s parents met. This was really cool because they are taking a family trip there next week to show their kids where they met, 25 years ago. After another delicious home-cooked dinner (another thing I miss from home) we chatted for a while and then I played a couple games of chess with Anina’s dad. In the second game Thomas had me in checkmate after 3 moves, a play I’ll have to remember for the next time I play chess. This morning we had bacon & eggs for breakfast, chatted a little more, I showed some pictures of my family and the cottage, and then it was time to leave for real. I have just arrived at the “Swiss Alps Retreat” in Gryon. It sounds like the snowboarding here isn’t quite as amazing as the two previous places I’ve been, but it seems like a really fun “Swiss Cottage” and the prices are very reasonable – more than I can say about the previous two snowboarding mountains I’ve been to! They also have cross-country skiing here which I think I’m going to do one day. Ok I think that’s enough for now, if Anina and her family are reading this I just want to say, thanks again for everything, and I hope you have a fantastic trip to Sri Lanka! Jake :-)

BMW Museum & Olympic Park

Here is a collection of photos from my last day in Munich. I am now in Switzerland and absolutely loving it! But you'll have to wait a few more days for those pictures because I'm still living them :) Here are some pictures from the BMW Museum, followed by Munich Olympic Park.

First BMW engine. This beast was powerful!!

The M1

This little thing doesn't look like a bimmer to me!

Not the most practical looking car, but perhaps the beginning of a new era.
A few more buttons than my steering wheel!

BMW headquarters seen from Olympic Tower

This is hard to make out but it's every BMW model hovering over the year it was released. I thought it was cool because when I worked at BMW I found it a challenge to remember all the current and recent BMW models. Not that it was vital to my job, but in casual conversations it was nice to "know my shit" about cars, specifically BMW.

Recognize this car? Last seen driven by James Bond. (exact car)

Beer Garden at Munich Olympic Park.

Incredible engineering in this place! And Alex's Romanian Grandpa (pictured right) was an engineer involved in this construction when it was built for the 1972 Olympics. Unfortunately just as I was sneaking this perfect picture of him Alex decided to point something out to me.

Munich Olympic Tower

That's all for now!