Day 1 - June 8-9, 2006

American Flight 38: DFW to Zurich
We left Dallas at 3:00 p.m. which was great because we had time that morning before our flight to pack and think of last minute things. We took a cab to the airport and checked in. Neither Curt nor I had flown overseas before and we handed the ticketing agent our ID's like we usually do so she could look up our names in the computer to verify our flights. "Um, I need your Passports, not your ID's." she said. Our first awakening of the trip. Other than showing her our passports, we checked in as usual and waited for the flight. Before we boarded we got our last Tex-Mex fix in the terminal. I was pretty apprehensive before we left how I would survive such a long flight. Before we took off, I of course watched all the passengers board and walk-by. There was a whole bunch of Mexico soccer fans on the plane, even a guy with a sombrero! After taking off, "dinner" served to us about an hour after boarding and then breakfast about an hour before landing. I brought some sleeping pills (over the counter) and tried taking one but it didn't really hlep me fall asleap. It's hard to sleep when it's not that late. When we reached the French coastline, the pilot got on the loudspeaker and said that the left side of the plane had a great view of Paris. We were on the left, but unfortunately it looked like any other city since we were so high-up. As we flew closer to Switzerland, you could see the snow-capped peaks of the Swiss Alps. I started getting excited! After we landed, we went through Swiss customs which was very quick and easy. The agent glanced at our passports then said we could go through. They didn't even stamp anything.

Driving through Switzerland
After we got our baggage, we headed to the Avis car rental counter. Curt had reserved an upgraded car that had a GPS navigation system. The saleswoman gave him the option of the Mercedes or BMW; we ended up with a BMW hatchback wagon that was brand new. I started to get really tired waiting for the car rental. It was afterall 2:00 a.m. Dallas time by this point! The Avis people showed us the car and set up the GPS for Curt to English. We spent quite a long time figuring out how to use the thing before we even got out of the garage. There was one button that you pushed or hit up/down/left/right to select things on the computer screen. It was pretty temperamental but we got the address of our hotel in Lauterbrunnen, Switzerland entered. We left the airport and headed down the road. I tried to read the Switzerland road map to see if the GPS was working but I honestly had no idea how to read the thing. I figured all road maps are pretty similar but I couldn't find any of the highways we were driving on! Curt was really good about following the GPS. It had a women's voice that would say "Take the next exit, 500 meters" and then the map on the computer screen would show the route and where our car was on the map. We drove through Zurich and then into the mountains. That's when we both got really excited. It was so beautiful! The roads were very winding and narrow. The Swiss drivers had really small cars and there were lots of cyclists on the road which cars would pass. It was pretty scaring turning around a corner to see a car in your lane that had just passed someone.

Lauterbrunnen, Switzerland
We reached Lauterbrunnen and found the Hotel Silberhorn which was at the top of a hill. We had our first 'parking in Europe' experience trying to fit our big car in the little parking lot. We did it and then tried to check in, but our room was not ready. We decided to walk down a couple blocks along the main street to find some where to eat. The main street of Lauterbrunnen is lined with hotels which have outdoor cafe seating along the street. There were several people that were in their cycling or hiking clothes who stopped to have a beer and eat lunch. I ordered a salad and some asparagus filled pasta. Curt ordered some bratwurst and "rosti" which is a local dish. It's actually hash browns. After eating, I could barely keep my eyes open so checked into our hotel room which was in another building across from the main hotel and took a nap before dinner. Curt aparently reserved the nicest room at the place. We had the top floor suite with our own balcony that overlooked the town and Lauterbrunnen's most stunning feature, Staubbach Waterfall.

People were fascinated by the 300 m high Staubbach Falls as early as the Middle Ages. The milky-white waters thundering down over dark green rocks have inspired painters, poets and travel writers over the centuries. Goethe wrote a poem based on his 1779 visit, making the lake famous in the late 18th Century. When Goethe visited the Lauterbrunnen valley in 1779 he made the waterfall famous by dedicating his "Gesang der Geister über den Wassern" ("Song of the Spirits over the Waters") to it: "The soul of man is like water. It comes from heaven and rises again to heaven, it ascends to heaven and falls again to earth, eternally alternating. The pure stream flows from the high, steep rock face, falls softly in cloud-waves onto the smooth rock and, gently accepted, rolls and ripples into the abyss."

History of Lauterbrunnen
In 1240, Lauterbrunnen was mentioned in a letter as "in claro fonte" The scattered settlement was almost certainly naed because of the more than 70 waterfalls in teh Lauterbrunnen Valley, "lauterbrunned" (only Springs) aor also "lautere Bache" (clear streams). In the 14th Century, the Walser Village of Lauterbrunnen was home to the main colony of people from Lotschen in teh Valais, who has settled in the Bernese Oberland.

Mining & Lacemaking
Between 1715 and 1805 metal ore mines existed in the Lauterbrunnen Valley, which eventually closed for two main reasons. Providing sufficient wood for the smelting ovens and charcoal worksresulted in intensive deforestation, and transportation costs were too height to allow for profitable production. In 1750 there was a mass emigration of local people to the United States. The authorities attempted to stem the flow by introducing home industries such as lacemaking. The art of lacemaking is still practiced today, with regular courses being held in Lauterbrunnen's old school house. Today only a few women make a living from this skilled craft, but during WWI, about 450 local women and children supplemented the family income by the production of exquisitely fine yet durable lace.

Alpine Farming
About 15 cows and the same number of calves still summer on Ap Untersteinberg. The mountain farmer still uses a traditional and extremely involved system of grazing adapted to the Alpine pastures and this retains the pastoral charm. Is spring and summer, he moves his cattle in stages from the lowest to the highest level, before in autumn he brings it back down over the same levels to the winter quarters in Stechelberg.

That evening, we went to dinner at the hotel restaurant which was very nice, it was family run and there even was a old grey Basset hound that would wander through the dining room. At the back of the dining room was the kitchen and a big round table that was reserved for the family. We sampled our first Swiss wine during dinner which was very good; similar to Reisling. After dinner we took a walk through the town. I didn't get dark until about 10:30 at night. At night, the tourists, cyclists, and hikers had all left so it was quiet with the only noise being the waterfall. Every now and then a lone car would drive by.

Walking up three flights of stairs to the hotelroom we realized that we were in a high mountain altitude becuase we both got winded after the first flight of stairs! It was really hard getting our luggage up to the room. There were two keys for the room one to enter and another to lock from the inside. which we had to figure out. The key and the door hardware was much slimmer than in the U.S. and the door was thinner with a lip that overhung the door frame. The bed was low to the ground and with seperate matresses. There were two folded down-comforters but no sheets. This wasn't too big of a deal, except was was a a little warm during the day and it took awile to cool the room off. There of course was no A.C. but opening the windows let a really nice breeze in. Interestingly, there are no screens, but then I never saw any bugs really. The bathroom was similar to what we were used to except there was just a handheld shower head.