Mark's 60th - Lauterbrunnen, Murren, Gimmelwald

Next on our itinerary was the Golden Pass to Interlaken and then to Lauterbrunnen in the Bernese Oberland. The scenery was beautiful, as we expected on that train journey, but nothing prepared us for the stunning landscape of our first hike. First, we arrived at the Hotel Silberhorn, just a short walk uphill from the train station. The Swiss chalet lodge, with its flower boxes of red geraniums at the balcony windows with mountain views, had an intimate patio facing its Japanese garden. There we had drinks in the evening and our favorite dessert of apple pie (the best). Breakfast every morning was in a sunny, glassed-in room with big views of the Alps, and it was generous: meats and cheeses, eggs and sausage, fresh breads and pastries, fruit and granola, oatmeal, juices, coffee, and the most delicious yogurt I've ever tasted -- fresh strawberry from the Swiss dairy cows. No wonder we wanted to hike miles every day!

For the Mannlichen-Kleine trail that first day, we boarded the local train to the cogwheel railway connection which took us to the trailhead. Our first sights of the Swiss Alps were spectacular, and the panoramic views were made more atmospheric with the clouds. Mark and I wanted to savor every turn on our hike, even with the threat of rainstorms, and at the very end of the trail, the rain poured down, as if was waiting for us to finish. We met a couple from Seattle, Ron and Colleen, and had a long talk with them on the train ride back to Lauterbrunnen. And back on our little street, Mark and I found the only pub in town - the Horner Bar - where we met the base jumpers who were watching their friend take his "turn" off a cliff (free-falling, then parachuting.) For guys who had to have a death wish, they were really nice and level-headed. We were thankful for the ground beneath our feet as we walked back to the hotel. Our room, spare and small and all golden wood, had to be my favorite, especially because we kept our windows open to the balcony views and the crisp mountain air.

Our hike the next day began with the journey to Murren via cable car and continued with the walk to Gimmelwald. Both are picture-perfect mountain towns with wooden chalets, huts with stacks of  golden wood, and tiny gardens of colorful flowers, against the backdrop of the snow-capped Alps, of course. We especially loved Gimmelwald that seemed frozen in time. We stopped in the Mountain Hostel to inquire about the lodging -- in the event that we want to rough it someday after days of base jumping. At the Pension a few feet away, we had lunch of homemade potato and bean soup. Sitting there with that incredible view was heaven. Next we found the Mountain View Trail reached by funicular that took us through high meadows of wildflowers, lush green vegetation, and boulders near flowing streams (like Scotland I've seen in pics). Always, the Alps loomed in the distance. Near the end, the trail became rocky and descended through a forest. We heard the cowbells before we saw the grazing cows, and what a magical sound. After that long hike, our drinks and dinner at the Hotel Edelweiss in Murren, no matter how good they actually were, tasted amazing. The mountains-in-your-face views from the patio didn't hurt. Back at the Hotel Silberhorn, we sat outside near the garden for coffee, and a while later we heard the cowbells. The cows were coming down from pasture, walking right past our hotel down the little street, a man at the front leading them on and a woman with a shovel holding up the rear. I had to make a joke about women being left to clean up the shit. I thought of that line from The History Boys. "What is history? History is women following behind (men) with the bucket."

I had a tough job to do the next morning, trying to convince Mark to see the Schilthorn, which involves a white-knuckle ascent, and descent, through the mountains by cable car. We took the bus past Trummelbach Falls to the cable car station, where we went up to Gimmelwald, and then to Murren. But at that stop, Mark hesitated and said he was not going any farther. It took him just a minute, though, when he saw me move with the crowd into the cable car, to change his mind. He said if I was going to go down, then he was going down with me. (Thanks.) Our photos show us thrilled to ascend the mountain through the clouds. Talking to this older couple calmed Mark's nerves, thank God. At the top, after going through the James Bond exhibit -- the Schilthorn is a setting in "Her Majesty's Service" -- the dense clouds lifted, and the forbidding snow-capped Bernese Alps, partly shrouded, came into view. With the 30's temps at nearly 10,000 feet, the panoramic sight was literally breathtaking. A few crazy college kids romped in the snow in their underwear, and the ecstatic Chinese tourists posed for photo after photo. Mark soon had enough of the cold and the craziness, and we found a table in the Piz Gloria revolving restaurant. Views of the Elgar, Monch, and Jungfrau mountains surrounded us. We left the Schilthorn behind, with a huge dip in the cable car, and we stopped at Birg so I could do the Thrill Walk. Taking the stairs down to the walk along the mountain edge - made of steel mesh so you could see straight down - I followed the walk to the "tightrope" over a steel net, but skipped the glass-bottom section. Mark took pics from above, and I think he was relieved to finally get back to solid ground. We spent the rest of the day trying a trail or two and landed in Murren where we watched paragliders, some of them first-timers going tandem. We met a father and daughter from Atlanta who had gone "flying" for the first time, and I have to admit that floating down at the side of steep mountains to a cushy landing looked pretty tempting, but not tempting enough. We continued sipping our beers and watching instead. It was still bright at 8:30 when we had dinner at the Hotel Blumental in Murren, a romantic spot, but we called it an early night back at the Silberhorn so we could get going for our train in the morning.