Turning 30 in Switzerland

Well as boldly promised by Julie, we are now actively catching up on our blogs now….

Not too long after finding out that Julie was pregnant, I did the most adult thing I could imagine: I turned 30 years old.  Once upon a time Julie and I dreamed up this wild idea that we would fly to New York and invite our closest family and friends to celebrate our 30^th birthdays.  Well I guess that was the 25 year old version of what turning 30 would be like, because we ended up celebrating in the complete opposite manner: in a 12^th century stone chalet in the tiny Swiss village of Lavertezzo.

Julie has a special talent for not only finding the coolest places to visit but also the coolest places to stay.  And this time around she outdid herself with the most amazing place ever – we had the entire chalet to ourselves!  Luckily we got to share it with our good friends Jason and Melissa who made the trip from Baltimore just to be with me (and I guess to see the rest of Europe as well). 

Our trip began with the 4.5 hour drive from Munich to the tiny village of Lavertezzo in the south of Switzerland.  The Honda Jazz had just enough horsepower to get over the Alps through some incredible mountain scenery.  We were a bit surprised to see how small the “village” was where we were staying, but at least it was easy to identify our chalet amongst the church and 4 other residential buildings there.  The owners greeted us at the front door and gave us a tour of the place.  Poor Julie banged her knee on a sharp corner of the staircase and is left with a permanent memory of our trip. 

Sadly due to her morning sickness + cold combination, I didn’t have my trusty photographer to capture the interior.  But Jason later took a photo of the stone path leading up to the house – that patio and table you see is a part of our chalet. 

We spent some time settling in and unpacking the car, then made ourselves comfortable on the patio.  A few hours later, Jason and Melissa arrived in their rental car with a look of “what the hell are we doing out here” on their faces.  I don’t think many people make it out to Lavertezzo on a 2 week European tour.  I cooked up some ravioli and we had a nice dinner out on the patio. 

We woke up the next day and went out looking for some adventure (well Julie stayed back to rest).  One of the top things on our agenda was the contra dam where the Goldeneye bungee jump took place and people can still take the plunge themselves (for a hefty sum of money).  We watched as a bunch of kids insanely took the jump and shuddered each time in disbelief.  On my 20^th birthday I might have considered it, but now at 30 with a kid on the way, this was no time to be doing anything crazy. 

The main attraction in this area is of course the scenery.  In particular, there is the beautiful Verzasca river with a 17^th century Roman stone bridge called Ponte dei Salti.  When we returned from watching the James Bond imitators, we collected Julie and made our way down to the river for a swim.  Normally I would not waste any time jumping in, but this water was painfully cold (I read online the temperature ranges from 45-50 F).  So we (Jason and I) waited for the sun to warm us up before taking the plunge.  We watched as people jumped off the stone bridge into the river, and I totally would have if it weren’t for Julie asking me not too.  Maybe in my 20s… 

One of the bridge jumpers

The largest jump Noah took that weekend

The two swimmers

View from the bridge

After dinner, Jason and Melissa surprised me with a delicious black forest birthday cake.  After blowing out the candles and all enjoying a piece, three of us (again, Julie stayed behind due to her not feeling the best) took a stroll around the village and around the river.  The area really is incredibly gorgeous, and I tried to capture it through photos. 

The next day Jason and Melissa headed out early to drive up to Paris.  When I woke up, I also felt a bit under the weather.  Maybe that swim was not the best idea, because I soon realized I caught a cold (perhaps Julie’s cold – though I won’t blame her).  So Julie and I spent our last day in the chalet relaxing and reading.  Like everyone says, getting old really slows you down.  So instead of partying it up New York City, we were laying low in a Swiss village taking turns blowing our noses.

When the day of my actual birthday arrived, it was time to head back to Munich.  However Julie demanded we get at least one photo of us together by the water regardless of how we were feeling.  So we made our way back down to the river one last time for a quick photo session before starting the long drive back home. 

When we returned to Munich, I picked up my favorite Thai food for dinner.  Between

Julie’s fresh knee injury, the shockingly cold water, the memory of being sick, and the impression of our ancient chalet along a gorgeous Alpine river, I could not have asked for a more memorable and picturesque 30^th birthday.  

The Grandparents come for a visit

Back in early June, my parents came for a visit.  It was perfect timing because I was able to tell them in person that Noah and I are expecting.  At first I thought it might be too soon (I was only ~6 weeks and hadn’t seen a doctor yet), but as their arrival approached, I knew there was no way I could keep that kind of secret in. 

As the timing was in between Mother’s and Father’s day, I told them that I had gifts for them to celebrate.  In fact, I had Oma and Opa themed presents, and they were shocked and extremely excited to know they had 2 grandbabies on the way (as my brother’s wife was also expecting – but now baby Tegan is 6 weeks old!!). 

Mom figured it out before Dad

The next morning we loaded up the car and headed to Austria for a long weekend getaway.  Our main destination was the little tourist town of Hallstatt, but we found a cheap apartment hotel in the nearby town of Rußbach.  Rußbach was incredibly charming and cute – a typical small village nestled in the alpine valley.  We leashed up the dogs and went on a small walking tour. 

The next morning, we left the dogs at the apartment and drove past Hallstatt to the Dachstein mountains.  Here you find some amazing ice caves – though not without a nice little hike up from the gondola.  As it was so hot outside, it was a wonderful relief to enter the chilly caves (though not a dog-friendly place).

The only way through is via a guided tour, and it turned out we were the only English speaking family in the group of about 40.  The tour guide was very accommodating and told us to stay up front with her, and she would translate her German speech to English for us at each station.  The only issue – some people really wanted to be in the front and would cut us off, only for the tour guide to tell them they had to stay behind us as we needed English translations.  We would then hear ripples of people talking about the ‘Brits’ at the front. 

And of course being at the front had some advantages – I was able to get some nice photographs without anyone in them! 

After our tour and lunch at the nearby restaurant, we took the gondola back down and drove past Hallstatt again back to our patient pups at the apartment.  They were more than ready to hop in the car to join us when we finally made it to Hallstatt.  It really was as picture perfect as you see on the internet – though there were plenty of tourists (including us of course).  

We ate dinner at a cute restaurant on the water, and Noah spotted a swan being ‘chased’ by his larger, paddleboat version. 

My parents had really wanted to take a boat ride on the lake, but we had already missed all the trips for the day.  So the next morning after checking out, we went back to Hallstatt so they could catch the first boat of the day.  As I am not a huge fan of boats, and we had the dogs with us, we stayed on dry land and took some of the same pictures as the day before – but this time with sunlight! 

After meeting back at the dock (where the girls made quite a few friends while we waited), it was time to head back to Munich.  While Hallstatt was adorable and definitely worth a visit, it was the perfect size for a short weekend getaway.  

The Wonderful German Alps

This last Saturday I awoke to the sun shining through the window.  I immediately hopped out of bed, found Noah already awake in the living room, and insisted that we must go do something! 

After some initial thinking, we decided to check out Höllentalklamm – a gorge down in Grainau.  Now, it was a bit iffy trying to figure out if it would even be open.  There is no set closure date listed online – just that sometime in late October it closes for the winter.  Well, it was November 1^st, and the sun was out, the weather was warm, and we figured – what the heck.  Let’s go check it out.  The worst that would happen is we would have a bit of a hike and have to turn around.

We pack up the car with the dogs and some snacks and some sunscreen, and begin our drive south to the Alps. 

As we make our turn off towards Grainau, I see the brown-colored tourist road sign that says ‘Höllentalklamm’, and underneath it a smaller red sign that says ‘geschlossen’.  Closed.  Well – that was lucky!  We didn’t even have to make it to Grainau to see if the gorge was open or not.  Ok – time for Plan B.  We are in Garmisch, had plans to check out a gorge… what about our old friend Partnachklamm?

We turn the car around and head over to the Olympic Ski Jump center, where the short hike to Partnachklamm begins.  As we are heading down the path towards the entrance, we see that we are far from the only ones that had the idea to spend this gorgeous Saturday doing the exact same thing.  I guess the incredibly packed parking lot was the first clue. Noah and I both have decided that neither of us really wants to take the dogs through this narrow cliff trail with so many other people - except neither of us wants to tell the other one that we have changed our minds.  So instead we both take our time with the dogs, letting people pass us by, and focus on taking some photos of the autumn colors.  

In my mind, I have decided that I wanted to at least check out the bridge that crosses the river – especially since it is before the payment point (after that, you are stuck with the crowds maneuvering through the narrow passage).  We bypass the line of people waiting to pay, and head up the path to the bridge.  Here we pause to take photos and learn that neither of us wants to go in the paid section.  So what to do instead? 

As we are pondering our next move, we realize that on the other end of the bridge is a free path upwards towards the top of the cliff.  And it is essentially clear of all people.  Bingo! 

2 happy dogs and examples of the trail we were on

We make our way gradually higher and higher along the path, only having to leash up the girls a handful of times as people pass us heading down.  Neither of us has a clue where this trail takes us, so after a bit of time hiking I suggest that we might want to turn around to head back.  Thankfully Noah suggests checking out what is behind the curve of the cliff to see what is out there.  Then we can turn around. 

If we had listened to me, we would have missed the bridge that crosses the entire gorge!  We would have turned around right before the main attraction!  Here we find the ‘crowds’ – 7 other hikers that have also gathered on the bridge to look down into the gorge. 

In the top of the photo on the right, you can make out the 'paid' trail cut into the cliff

Now that we felt satisfied that we saw what there was to see, we were ready to backtrack to the parking lot for our next activity of the day – taking the gondola up to the top of Eckbauer Mountain.  I have to give our two dogs a lot of credit here – the gondola fits just two people (one on each side) and is completely open from your waist up.  But those two dogs have learned to trust that we are taking them somewhere awesome, and they nervously sat by our feet in the tiny, swaying gondola. 

It is only our shadows, but you can get an idea of the size of the gondola

The views were lovely, at least for Noah and me

Once we reached the top and freed the dogs, it was like they hadn’t spent the last 10 minutes confined to a small terrifying space.  We walked up to the top of the hill and warmed ourselves in the sun and ate our snacks – us humans sticking to oranges and chips, the dogs excitingly eating as much deer excrement as possible before heeding to our yelling. 

While the views were lovely – the sun was at the wrong angle to get any nice photos of the mountains.  So after our small break, we began following a trail that led away from the restaurant/gondola area and towards where I expected to find good views of the sunny side of the mountains.  I wasn’t disappointed. 

With this lovely lighting, how could we pass up opportunities to photograph our two favorite subjects??? 

First we get the solo shots

Then them together

Then we run them!

With daylight savings over, the sun sets rather early now.  So before we were ready, it was time to leave our alpine oasis and start the journey back home.  We loaded two very happy and exhausted pups into the back seat and followed the other day-trippers back towards the city.  Until next time!