Interlaken

For the last stage of our trip, we headed to Interlaken.  We had a long train ride from Venice, and we drank little juiceboxes full of wine.  Interlaken was beautiful, but expensive.  We stayed in the tallest hotel in town which gave us a great view.  I convinced Megan to go parasailing which turned out to be one of the highlights of the trip.  We also took a train up into the Jungfrau, the highest train station in the Europe, but didn't go quite to the top.  It was almost 300 euros per person to go all the way up.  We went to Murren for dinner and had a fantastic time walking in the snow. 

Megan getting ready to fly

Megan taking off





We climbed for what seemed like a very long time.  I had no idea the updrafts could take us thousands of feet into the air.
I got to do some acrobatics on the way down, I swear at one point (not in the video below) we got moving fast enough to get upside down in a spin.

I love this picture

That afternoon we headed up into the Jungfrau region to Murren for dinner.  It was gorgeous!

Murren

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Have I told you I like Swiss food?  We had this restaurant all to ourselves, I had roesti again, and Megan had fondue.

We had to take a tram out of the first village

And then a quick cable car ride

The next day we had to head to Geneva to fly home,  We had a beautiful train ride along Lake Geneva



We didn't know what this was, we had to go look it up.  Evidently it is the Jet d'Eau, one of the largest fountains in the world.

Enjoying the European spring hours before we flew home :(

Been busy!

Since getting back, I've been to NYC, one college graduation in Montana, and have one more on deck. I promise to finish out Europe this weekend!

Paragliding in Interlaken

Venice

We ended up spending two days and two nights in Venice. We arrived on the night train from Vienna, walked to our hotel near the train station, and then set off to explore. Megan hadn't visited Venice on her previous trips, and it has always been one of the places I wanted to visit the most. Ever since I was little, I have been intrigued by living in a place where you use boats instead of cars (I think boat was my first word). However, we had heard some bad things, Venice is crowded, hot, smelly, and you only need to spend a single day there. None of that turned out to be true. We had fantastic weather and it wasn't crowded at all. We had only planned on spending a single day in Venice intially, but Megan and I were so enchanted by the city we stayed an extra day and ended up skipping Florence. Even then, we didn't get to see everything we wanted to and didn't take a gondola. We thought a gondola ride would be very romantic in the evening, and saved it for our last night. However, the city seemed to shut down quite early, and we missed out. Next time.

Having Campari at the Rialto Bridge

View from our hotel room

Looking out from the Rialto Bridge

The lagoon.  Sonja, I think you have a picture from this exact spot!

Of course.  I want my food to be historical, not sexy, don't you?

The largest calzone I had ever seen.  I ate less then half.  Right next to us, a 100 lb Japanese girl polished her's off and ordered dessert.

The lagoon

That yellow boat is a Venetian ambulance in front of the hospital.

One of the outer islands.  Each of these islands seemed to have a marina.  Those little "sticks" are sailboat masts.  I would love to sail around this area!

Riding the public boat which turned out to be just like a bus anywhere else

The entrance to our hotel.

Piazza San Marco

Piazza San Marco is the main square in Venice with beautiful buildings on all sides and highlighted by the church of St. Mark and the clock tower.  We stayed on the north side of Venice and would walk down to the Piazza.  Pigeons are everywhere!

St. Marks

Clock Tower

Venice at Night

Venice was a little spooky at night. The streets were empty, everything closed early, and the canals were still and quiet. I'll never forget walking the tiny back streets and popping out into a large square with a massive church. This happened several times our last night there as we explored the center of the island. We had dinner on the main canal, and like our dinner the previous night, ordered off the "Turistos" (tourist) menu. Evidently tourists eat a lot, because each dinner came with two entrees.

Silent streets

Still canals

Dinner on the Grand Canal

Entree #1

Entree #2.  We didn't finish this round!

We saw this candle holder through a restaurant window.  Megan and I have been saving corks for quite some time (with assistance from both our families) and it looked pretty cool.  We might have to make one.