Switzerland

Has been so long since I've written on here, I need to remember to do it more often!
     In the second week of July I went to Switzerland for a few days and stayed with a friend and his family. Switzerland was a breath of fresh air- literally! It was much cooler and and the lush green forests everywhere reminded me so much of home and was nothing at all like the dry hot land Italy becomes in the summer. It blows my mind that in a flight that only lasts an hour you can find yourself in a totally new and different land- a land similiar to Oregon besides the fact that they use Swiss Franks, speak Swiss-German, and have really neat houses that you don't find inside the U.S. Anyways, we visited the largest waterfall in Europe, the Rheinfall, and I personally expected it to be a bit larger! From a distance it is not that impressive as it is much wider than it is tall, but they allow you (for a fee of course) to take a ferry to a large rock in the middle of the falls and all the water gushing at incredible speeds on either side of you as you climb the steep steps to the top is quite incredible. I loved it to say the least. The rest of the day was spent visiting an old fort and eating a currywurst at the top, going to a little traditional village, and enjoying the waves in a small boat on the Rhein river. The buildings in the little village were hard to peel your eyes away from, each one had beautiful intricate paintings on them. When we went out on the boat, the boys let me drive so it was pretty fun! :) that night we had a typical Swiss dinner called raclette, each person has a little mini pan and you stick a piece of cheese in it and add a combination of toppings, anything from pickles, tomatoes, onions, baby corn, sardines, mushrooms, and even bananas, once youve put all you want inside you stick it into a heater on the table that melts the cheese. While your waiting for it to melt, you peel and cut a potato and once the cheese is melted you put it on top and prepare your next toppings. This meal was great and my favorite combination was corn and banana! as odd as that sounds I promise it tastes AMAZING.
      Day 2 we took the train to Zurich, walked around plenty and window shopped, the only place we actually went in was the grocery store for some water because the streets here are lined with designer shops that don't exactly fit in my price range. We took a ferry boat that went all along the river for an hour and a half. It was pretty but I'd have to say pretty boring. Afterwards we went back to the train station to take a train up to the top of a hill that overlooks the city. Raphi (my friend) jumped onto a train he thought was the right one, well it wasn't. It goes about halfway there and turns around, we were confused but ast the first stop in its way back down we jumped off and ran up to where we had been since that is where the train we wanted to go on was to leave from. Just like in the movies, we were running to it and got there right as it was pulling away.. so we sat and waited till the next train arrived. from the top of the hill you can hike up a bit more and then climb a huge metal tower, the view from the top was just beyond incredible. Zurich is breathtaking. I never wanted to climb back down. Instead of taking the train back down, we decided to take the trail, took a few wrong turns but eventually we made it back to town. While walking back to the train station we saw a man who used to be like a president of Switzerland! Back at Raphi's house we had roesti, its very similar to hasbrowns but better.
     The next day was my last full day in Switzerland. In the morning we took Raphi's brothers car to the Alps since that's what I really wanted to see. The trailhead said we could hike up it but we kept getting lost, eventually Raphi asked someone and she said that there's still snow and its pretty dangerous since I only had my nike shoes. I was maybe a little stubborn and incredibly disappointed because I so badly wanted to hike it! Whatta bummer. Instead we took the lift to the top and it was SO windy, our steps were staggered while we walked around outside, Raphi had a cold so he kept wanting to go inside but I wanted to stay out and enjoy it! We were literally in the clouds and it was amazing but I did realize that it would have been very difficult to hike it with my nikes and each of us only had one jacket and it was suuuper cold. But I have vowed to go back, better prepared, and hike it at some point in my life! Later, we walked around his hometown, not much of anything there but a beautiful church. Dinner was raclette again, Raphi's mom made it a second time since I liked it so much the first time. We all stayed up and chatted till we were half asleep, I really love Raphi's parents. They were so hospitable and friendly to me, I couldn't have asked for better hosts. Oh and they gave me a box of 50 Swiss chocolate sticks ;)