From a town of 100 to the City of Lights

On the road to Gimmelwald
Originally uploaded by klheckert

From Interlocken we headed into the Alps to stay one night in Gimmelwald, a tiny town of 100 that doesn't even have a grocery store- though there is a cheese stand in a 200 year old hut. We arrived in Gimmelwald via a gondola to Murren, the "big town" where the grocery store (which closes at noon) and a resturant are located. We enjoyed a beautiful walk down to Gimmelwald (with all our luggage- for those of you wondering why we have backpacks instead of a rolling suitcase, this is why). About an inch of snow had fallen the night before, but the path was (mostly) clear, allowing for the perfect mix of fresh snow beauty and sure(ish) footing. As you can imagine, in a town of 100 during the offseason, there is not much of anything to do but sit back and enjoy the incredible beauty of the mountains around you. The alps are stunning in their cliff-like beauty- unlike the Rocky Mountains in the US, these peaks are truly jagged spears soaring up 13,000 feet into the clear blue sky.

It was actually a blessing to have everything closed in Gimmelwald (not that there is much to do there anyway during high season other than ski), because it forced/enabled everyone staying in the hostel, about 10 of us, to really get to know each other and hang out. We played a very fun card game that is a take-off of Uno, in which added rules include slapping your hand on the table or your head when certain cards are played and the ability to play totally out of turn where you have matching cards. It was one of those really excellent and unexpected nights, where everyone just gets along and has a great time together. While we had hoped to find this in other hostels along the way we really haven't so far, but are very happy to finally have had the experience.

In addition, we were lucky to have beautiful clear weather on the day we arrived, because the next day the clouds had moved back in, blocking the gorgeous views. Instead of heading up to the very top of Jungfrau (the highest peak in the area) when the views weren't there, we decided to head back to civilization- and 10 hours after leaving our town of 100, we rolled into Paris.

Concerned that we were headed to Paris with nowhere to stay on a Friday night, we sprinted to find an internet cafe near the train station in Bassel during our hour connection. Luckily we happened upon one within about 10 minutes of leaving the station, and were able to find a small hotel that had availablility (though indeed many of the places listed on hostels.com did not have rooms for the night- including where we were originally going to stay when we planned to arrive a few days later). While further contemplation of the hotel's location at first lead to concern as the metro stop it is close to is in fact the very end of one of the metro lines (Port de Orleans on the Left Bank), when we arrived at last we were quite excited to see that it is a bustling area with many resturants nearby, and without the inflated tourist prices of the area near the major sights.

After sleeping in (at last! a private, quiet room with a REAL bed and our own private bathroom! Haven't seen that in quite a while...) we spent the day touring the Louve and then dining with the Pariseans. We brunched on crepes filled with eggs while sipping our coffees. We unwound after the Louve tour with a Spanish Sangria and tapas. We dropped in on Harry's New York Bar, a former hangout of Hemmingway. And we ended back in our little neighborhood near the hotel with a fantastic 3 course truly french meal, starting with smooth and rich foie gras, then a seabass with mixed vegetables (Matt of course went for red meat and had a roasted lambchop served with a kidney...we think....it was yummy regardless), and finishing with chocolate profiteroles and vanilla ice cream (plus two excellent cappucinos to top it all off). A very memorable Parisean meal without the memorable tourist price tag!

Tomorrow hopefully the weather will clear up (maybe?), and we'll head to the Eiffel tower and the walk along the Champs-Elysees.

A few random thoughts on guided tour of the Louve to leave you with:
-Sometimes on a trip like this you encounter new information about something fairly common that you didn't realize before. For me today I found out (yes this will seem really stupid if you know this): Crystal is made out of stone, not glass. The beautiful pieces in the museums have been carved to hide their imperfections naturally occurring- therefore the plainest crystal in the museum is actually generally the most priceless, as it is made from the most perfect piece of rock. I have no idea why I thought that crystal was just made from regular glass that was then etched (perhaps because I assume most of it sold for home use is in fact made that way), but am glad to have been enlightened.
- I.M. Pei really is a fantastic architect- we saw his work in Berlin at a muesum there, and of course his most famous today - the glass pyramid at the Louve. It is hard to imagine what these galleries looked like before his additions, as they seem to bring the entire space together and create a sense of natural drama and lightness to the buildings.
- As we have traveled, we have now several times noticed the same sculpture in multiple locations. "Sphere within a Sphere" was in the Vatican and also at Trinity College in Dublin. Today we saw a few statutes that we saw also at the National Mueum in Rome. And we learned the difference between a "copy" and a "replica." A replica is by the original artist or their protige- a copy is by a random other artist who has nothing to do with the original. Most of the "Greek" statues around Europe are actually very old Roman copies of the older originals.
- We have not encountered any of the famed rude Paris attitude. Everyone actually seems very nice- perhaps the main problem is when Americans visit during the middle of the summer when everyone is just grumpy anyway? Or maybe it is because we preface every interaction with the few French words we learned from our guidebook- Parlez-vous English?, Merci, Si-vous-plait, Bonjour, Bon Soir. (Do you speak English, Thanks, Please, Hello, Goodbye/Goodnight).

Bon Soir!