Interlaken Day 2

Hey everyone! Today we woke up around 7:45am to get breakfast and be downstairs ready to go canyoning. We signed up to go on the “athletic and confident” trip to Chili Schliere (video of what it’s like can be seen here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jw9xE_ajrUc). I was pretty excited about today, but a little nervous as to the difficulty level. I knew I was athletic enough for anything I could face, but confidence is another story. It turned out to be a great day, and I didn’t really struggle with any of the obstacles. We left Outdoor Interlaken around 9am and drove to where our particular trip was. It was about an hour away in the next valley over. The drive over there was beautiful, as we got to see view of the entire area from up in the mountains. We saw some beautiful waterfalls on the way up. Once we got suited up into our gear which we had been fitted for before leaving, we walked 15 minutes to the beginning of the canyon. The initial shock the water temperature was just as I expected, overwhelming. It was really cold like I remembered it was rafting in West Virginia. The guide said he thought it was around 50 degrees Fahrenheit. The overall trip was a blast and I had a lot of fun. I was thankful I didn’t really encounter a jump/slide I was too worried about. I purposely didn’t really think about it and just did what they told me. Most of the time, they would give you a brief explanation to the group, a few pointers individually before you went, and then counted you down from 3-2-1, Go! Every time, they said three, I went and I came out ok! Throughout the 8 hour trip, about 3.5 hours was in the water and the rest of travel, preparation, quick lunch, and clean-up. We did about 8 jumps and 6-7 slides throughout the day. The slides in this canyon where a lot steeper than I expected and you really had no control over what the water did to you. It would bump you into the sides of the walls and you would have no idea where you were because water was everywhere. Looking back at some of the slides, they looked more like gradual cliffs than a possible slide. The jumps were my favorite part. My favorite jump was a “jump and slide” where you jumped into the side of a cliff, turned in mid-air, and slide down the smooth face. It was a blast! All of our jumps were in the range of 20-30 feet and were pretty fun. Some of the jumps, we had to aim for a specific part of the pool because we could hit boulders at the bottom, but I didn’t have any trouble. It was really cold when you were in the water, and my hands were numb/frozen a good part of the afternoon. My feet were really sore at the end of the trip from all the water sloshing around and I came away with a big blister on my left big toe (it’s sore but not all that bad). I was happy to come away with no injuries. One of the guys on the trip, dislocated his shoulder (has happened several times before) on the first jump and had to take it slow the rest of the day. I couldn’t afford to get hurt because of my golfing trip in two weeks which I would die if I missed. 

The rest of the afternoon was just relaxing and view a bit of the town. A group of us walked around town looking at all the souvenir stores. I’ve learned that every store pretty much sold either Swiss watches or Swiss Army Knives. Tonight we ate dinner at the BierGarden at Balmers. I had a burger and fries for 10 Francs which was the best prices I’ve seen since being here. Tonight we have just hung around the hostel playing cards, ping pong and hanging out. I think tomorrow a group of us are heading up into the Alps to hike a little bit and then catching a 6pm train back to Strasbourg. Not looking forward to Finals on Wednesday, but I come home Friday! Looking forward to free refills, golf, friends, family, good food, my bed, and many others! See everyone soon!

Jonathan