The Glacier Express: "A train to fall in love with"

Switzerland's Glacier Express train has been on my "bucket" list even before our move to Switzerland. This 8 hour train ride across the country is famous for its spectacular scenery and daring bridge and tunnel construction. Switzerland's website describes the train ride: 

"The Glacier Express is the most famous railway in the world. It travels from Zermatt to St. Moritz in around eight hours. It is a day trip through untouched mountain landscapes, glamorous health resorts, deep gorges, delightful valleys, 91 tunnels and across 291 impressive bridges."

Given that we were already in St Moritz for the race, for our trip back home to Geneva, we decided to take the Glacier Express to Zermatt and then the regular train from Zermatt back to Geneva. Sitting on a train for 8 hours was the perfect way to avoid walking on our superbly sore legs after the race. Below is a map of the route that the train takes:

The train starts at an altitude of approximately 1800 meters (6000 feet) in St Moritz, then dips up and down mountains and valleys and reaches its highest point above the tree line at one of the highest mountain passes in the Alps at 2033 meters (7000 feet), before dipping back to the town of Zermatt.

The elevation chart of the Glacier Express

The Glacier Express Train started running in the year 1930 and over the years Switzerland realized it was hugely popular with tourists and decided to capitalize on this opportunity by putting panoramic windows into the trains, providing audio cues/guides along the route, and providing 3 course meals and service throughout the journey. The result is a relaxing and beautiful way to capture the essence of the Swiss country side, especially areas which would be particularly difficult to travel by car.

One of the most impressive bridges on the ride

One of the numerous little villages that the train passes by

The train stops in several locations to reload with supplies, etc. and you can get out to stretch your legs

Checking out the scenery while listening to the audio guide

The panorama windows really make a difference in the views you can see passing by!

Lunch time!

At the highest point in the journey, the Oberalppass at 7000 feet

One note of advice for non-Swiss residents who want to take the Glacier Express: this train ride is very expensive, CHF 30 for a reservation fee and CHF150 for a one-way ride. I would recommend (as with any train trips in Switzerland), purchasing one of the Swiss train passes which provides visitors with unlimited and/or 50% discounted travel within a certain number of days/time periods, for one fixed fee.

Race recap + the weekend in St Moritz

Greetings from my two week "staycation" in Switzerland! My mom is here visiting with me (yay for mom visits!) and the plan is to stay in Switzerland, just relaxing and exploring more of this beautiful country.

This past weekend Ryan and I traveled 6 hours to the easternmost part of Switzerland and met my mom in the famous ski resort town of St Moritz, to run in the "Engadine Sommeraulf", a 16 mile summer trail/road race at 6,000 feet altitude. Before you call me crazy, note that when we signed up for this race, we thought it was only a flat half marathon (13.1 miles) at minimal altitude.... we found out the truth a month or so before race day and by that time, we didn't really have time to adjust our training schedule. Big whoops. So, we decided that given the distance and altitude challenges, we would forego any time goals and that our goal would instead be to just cross the finish line.

Sunday morning we woke up to bluebird sunny skies but the temperatures were barely above freezing, so we bundled up and headed out the door (or at least I bundled up according to the below photo....)

The race course itself was absolutely gorgeous, it covered the length of the Upper Engadine valley, through mountain passes, into forests, past the glitzy town of St Moritz, past castles and fortresses, and next to 6 different glacier melt lakes. This race definitely wins the award for most scenic race I will ever do!

Photo credit to my mom, who waited out in the cold for hours to cheer us on at this point in the race and take this photo for us. What a cheerleader!!

The race itself was EXTREMELY difficult for us. We managed to accomplish our goal and we both crossed the finish line, but it was a struggle, especially after we got to the mini mountain from hell at mile 10. Maybe it was the altitude, maybe it was the larger than expected hills, maybe it was the distance, or maybe it was our decreased motivation to our training plan this time around - whatever it was - this race kicked our butts. BUT, in the end we hobbled across the finish line. This race made me realize more than ever, that to us, race times don't ultimately matter - what matters was the healthy workout routines that we worked to establish along the way. Also, the experience of running (literally) in the Swiss alps is one that I will never forget.

After the race, our legs were (and still are!) extremely sore, so we decided to take an easy afternoon excursion via a cog railway to the top of a nearby mountain (Mouttas Muragl) for a celebratory dinner + drink. The views were fantastic from this terrace and we could literally look down on the entire race course which was a really fun way to round out a race experience.

Standing in front of the race course view - we ran past each of the lakes in the distance!

M&M: Mom and Mountains! :)

Excited to dig in after a grueling morning 

Meat and cheese plate perfection

It got quite chilly on top of the mountain! Thank goodness for sheepskin blankets offered by the restaurant

My first glimpse of the famous Edelweiss flower: a national symbol in Switzerland due to its hardy nature - it can grow in summer or winter!

We didn't get to explore the area very much as we were in town for less than 48 hours, but we did manage to find some great spots that I would recommend:

Dinner: La Piruetta in the town of Celerina and the mountain-top restaurant at the Romantik Hotel Mourratas Muragl
Hotel: We stayed in a town directly before St Moritz, called Celerina. The town was very cute and convenient for summer excursions (5 minute train ride to St Moritz). St Moritz itself was really dead in the summer, so we didn't mind staying outside of it. We stayed at the ALL IN ONE HOTEL INN LODGE. Sounds like a shady name; but, it was extremely clean, new, spacious, and a good price.

Hello from Mallorca!

A few weeks ago, Ryan and I realized we didn't have any plans for this weekend, which happens to be a 3 day holiday weekend due to Swiss national day (essentially Switzerland's version of July 4).  Being the unpatriotic expats that we are (tis tis!), we looked on skyscanner.ch and found that airplane tickets from Geneva to Mallorca were relatively inexpensive. We honestly didn't know much about Mallorca, just that it is a well loved beach vacation destination for Europeans and it is only a 1 hour Easy Jey plane ride away from Geneva. So we booked the tickets and chose a hotel and hoped for the best. So far we have been more than pleasantly surprised! While the island is very busy given that we are visitng smack dab in the middle of the European summer holiday season, it is ruggedly beautiful, with blue waters and dramatic coastlines. More photos and a recap to come later, but until then -- hello from Mallorca!

The view from our hotel's terrace onto the bay/beach of Camp de Mar

Delayed recap of the weekend in Interlaken

Last month, one of my best friends Leah and her boyfriend Joel came to visit us in Switzerland.  We decided to go to Interlaken for the weekend as it is an active destination that has many "Swiss" highlights and is relatively close to Geneva with lots of different excursion options.  Leah's brother Mark and his girlfriend Cyrielle live in Paris, so they also joined us for the weekend.  I had visited Interlaken almost exactly a year before with Sarah, so we decided for this new adventure to revisit one of my favorite locations in the Interlaken area, Gimmelwald, and also explore a new destination, the Jungfrau.

Gimmelwald

We started by taking a series of trains and cable cars up to the town of Murren and then hiking down to the town of Gimmelwald, where we sat for many hours in the sun at a small alpine pension - we took in the views, enjoying lunch, beers, and each other's company. Since we don't go home to the US very often (and when we do we often have to divide and conquer our time), we love when visitors come to see us in Switzerland because it gives us time to give them our undivided attention and truly catch up for lost time!

Leah met a friend on the hike

Cheers from Gimmelwald!

Mark checking out the kiddie slide in the playground in Gimmelwald

After our delightful lunch, we took a cable car down to the valley floor and hiked the Lauterbrunnen valley, consistently voted one of the world's most beautiful valleys. This valley looks like it is out of a movie, you meander among meadows of Swiss alpine flowers, cows, and a glacial water river while 60+ waterfalls tumble down the sides of the towering valley walls on either side of you.

Frolicking in the river 

When hiking in the alps, I can't help but put flowers in my hair

Acting silly next to a series of rock formations made by hikers

Relaxing on the patio of our hotel overlooking the Lauterbrunnen valley, couldn't have a more perfect view!

In the evening we headed to a Mexican restaurant in town that had surprisingly good Mexican food for Swiss standards - we are always on the lookout for good Mexican spots

Jungfrau
On the second day in Interlaken, we decided to cave in and finally do one of Europe's top tourist attractions, the Jungfraujoch summit.  I say "cave in" because the price for this excursion for non-Swiss residents is approximately $200 (yikes!). So, for the past 2 years, we have hesitated actually doing this, but had heard that despite the price it was still a highlight of Switzerland and that we should check it out. So what do you get for $200 you may ask... well, scenic train rides up and town the summit that take 2.5 hours each way and then a visit to Europe's top railway station and the summit of Switzerland's most famous mountain.  On the summit there are multiple attractions: a scientific/weather center, a palace carved entirely out of ice in a glacier, several look out points where you can take in the views or walk, sled, or have a drink on a glacier. In the end, while expensive, I'm glad I did this trip at least once while living in Switzerland as it was a very unique experience and we had a lot of fun visiting it with friends.

Train ride up the mountain 

We made it!

First view of the Aletsch glacier - the largest in all of Europe - approximately 12 miles long

While the temperature was almost hitting 100 degrees on the valley floor, it was just barely above the freezing mark on top of the mountain - nature's air conditioning at work!

In the tunnels of the ice palace

Guess who? Scrat from the movie Ice Age frozen into the glacier :)

Care for a drink from the ice bar?

Whiskey distilling in the glacier

On top of the world

Eeks!

Beautiful Lauterbrunnen valley on the ride down

Since I often find myself forwarding blog posts to friends for trip ideas and then separately e-mailing them lists of restaurants and hotels we recommend in the area, I decided it would be helpful to end each of my travel blogs with a list of these types of points of interest for reference - accordingly, below is a list for Interlaken and I will be working on updating older blog posts with the same information.

Lunch: Pension Gimmelwald (delightful mountain top restaurant, good prices and authentic)
Dinner: El Azteca (excellent Mexican restaurant in the town of Interlaken) and Hooter's (TERRIBLE service, but it fulfills a wing craving when in desperate need)
Hotel: Hotel Schönbühl (slightly outside of Interlaken, so it wasn't not very convenient to the town, but quiet, cheap, and clean, shared bathrooms)

Goodbye little buddy

Two weeks ago we had to suddenly say goodbye to our little buddy, Pumpkin. As you all know from reading this blog as well as just being friends/family, Pumpkin was very special to us. He was born when I was in my teens and I have lived with him on and off for the past 14 years. This furry feline meant so much to my family and to Ryan and I. If you ever had the pleasure of meeting Pumpkin, you know that he was more than your average cat, there has just always been something extra special about him. He was an especially big part of our lives here in Geneva because he was a loving and comforting piece of home in an otherwise foreign country. Of course Pumpkin was a pet and not a human, but he was a part of our family regardless and words can't express how much we miss him. Fortunately, we feel comfort in knowing that he passed away at home with us and without pain. Each day we fall into a new routine without him and slowly move on, but we always keep the memories of him safe in our hearts. We know that we will eventually get to the point when our sadness will pass and we will be able to think of him with a smile on our faces instead of a tear in our eye -- in the meantime, thank you to everyone who has provided such sweet thoughts and kindness to us over the past few weeks, it really means a lot to us to have such a network of support (sending many virtual hugs and kisses of thanks your way)

I love this picture of him from last year because he looks SO peaceful :)

Wise words sent by my sister... so true