Switzerland!

Thursday was kind of a long day getting into Switzerland. We took the metro to the bus train station in Madrid and then took a bus to the airport. The flight to Geneva was probably only like an hour and a half, but then we had to take a 3 hour train ride to Interlaken. By the time we rolled up to our hostel at like midnight, we were all pretty much ready for bed. It was our first hostel where we had the room to ourselves though, so that was awesome.

The next morning, Caitlin and I woke up early to explore the town on a run. It's so beautiful and the mountains were just astounding. We ran for like a half hour, came back, showered, and then set off on our trip up the mountain to Grundlewald. All the Florida girls were so excited to see snow so we all played in it, ate it, made snowballs, and found this little playground to run around on. I got a lunch and hot chocolate on top of the mountain and then we went back to Interlaken.


Caitlin and I on one of the contraptions in the playground

Our hostel just so happens to have the biggest (and only) club in the whole town. So we went at 9 and I ended up staying until like 1. We made friends with a Canadian and another guy from Oklahoma.


Friends

The next morning we got up and just hung around the hostel until our adventures. Monica, Caitlin, and I all did a canyon jump, which is like bungee jumping, except you jump feet first and it's more like a giant swing. Erin, Emily, and Kelly all did paragliding. So at 1 we met everyone for our canyon jump group in the hostel and we rode in a van to the canyon. There were 11 of us, and we all were talking and bonding quickly because of our shared experience. They put us in harnesses and then asked who wanted to go first. Of course I volunteered and he strapped me to the rope. You just stand there on this little platform, staring down at the canyon, and it's literally the weirdest feeling in the world making yourself take that jump. But I didn't really wait around and just went for it. Free falling for 120 feet was just straight crazy and I loved it.


The three canyon jumpers before our big fall


Getting strapped in


Me falling through the air

I watched the other 10 people come down and cheered for Caitlin and Monica, who were perhaps a tad more nervous than me. One guy that night thanked me like a thousand times for going first and said "if that little girl could make the jump, then I figured I had to do it too." Haha, he was really nice though. When we got back from our adventure I took a nap and missed fondu dinner. My punishment: Erin iced me (aka gave me a smirnoff ice and i had to chug it) in my bed. I was angry haha. But then we all went downstairs to our hostel club and got to party with everyone celebrating all the exciting stuff they did.




All in all, I absolutely loved Switzerland and had a blast. I definitely want to go back and visit another time in my life. Sunday morning we had to leave the hostel at 9:30 and it was another full day of traveling. We had the train to Geneva, the flight to Barcelona, the 3 hour lay over in Barcelona, and then the flight to Valencia. We landed at 9:30 pm and I came home, unpacked, did some homework, and fell asleep pretty early.

Only 2 weeks of classes left until I go home! I can't even believe how fast it's gone!