The Eiger, the Matterhorn and Barb

We woke up bright and early to catch the train from Tincino to Zurich to meet Lisa´s mom, Barb who had just flown in from Detroit.  When we met her Barb was shaking with excitement to see us (Lisa).  We had reserved a rental car and had planned on me being the driver.  Unfortionatly since I am not yet 25 they wanted to charge us an extra 20 dollars a day.  We decided to save the money and let Barb drive.  Within half and hour I was haveing dejavu.  Crash! The mirror was broken by a reflector that must have just jumped out at us.  I drove the rest of the day.  Other than the minor mirror incident (which I am getting a lot of practice handeling) we had a really nice drive to Zermatt over some beautiful mountain passes.

There was some confusion in finding our hotel becasue we had google directions telling us how to drive there, but you cannot drive in Zermatt.  I would have expected more out of google.  Eventually we figured it out and took the train up to Zermatt.  Zermatt is pretty much like Aspen or Vail with one difference: The Matterhorn!  Just looking at it made me want to climb it right there, gear or not.  I felt completely inadequite just hiking and wandering around town below it.  I think I took around 150 pictures of it, most are probablly the same, but I couldn´t help it.  I just kept snapping.

We did take some really nice hikes though.  One was up a huge glaciar valley through the tiny village of Zmatt.  We hiked up a couple of miles and Lisa and Barb decided to turn around.  I turned it into a loop adding a couple thousand feet of elevation gain.  At the top I realized that I was running late to meet the girls so I decided to run down.  It felt ok while I was doing it but after I could hardley walk.  I guess 3000ft elevation loss is not the way to ease back into running. 

The next day it was raining so we just "bopped" around town, Barb buying hankercheifs for what seemed like everyone she knew!  The next day we took a train to the top of another mountain where there was supposed to be some sport climbing.  We did not find any sport routes but the view was well worth it.  We spent the rest of the day hiking down.

After Zermatt we headed to Grimmenwald, home the Eiger Nor Wand.  We went over one of the same passes as on the way to Zermatt where we had planned on doing some climbing the second time through.  This time, however, it was snowing so hard there was only a few hundred feet of visability.  It was 50 degrees F colder than it had been four days eariler!  We did not climb.  At least Barbs driving had improved in time for the storm!

Grimmenwald was really nice.  Still touristy but much quieter than Zermatt.  Barb, being the slave driver she is, had us hiking every day we were there!  We also had a chance to do a little climbing.  The Eiger, covered in fresh snow, inspired more of a "I´m glad I´m down here" feeling than one of insperation to climb it.  Someday. (maybe.)  While we were there we also explored the neighboring valley, properly named the valley of water falls.  There was waterfall after waterfall all at leat 200ft high!  We took a short hike behind one, and then a long hike to the top of it.  When given the option of hiking a nice flat trail in the valley or straight up, Barb chose up!

While we were there we did 50/50 cooking and eating out.  It was fun to have another person to cook for but also really nice to have some great meals out!  On the last day there, Barb and Lisa treated themselves to a well deserved spa day while I just wandered around town.

We spent the last day in Zurich shopping (Barb bought more hankeys for all her snotty firends), going into chocolate shops and eating.  Before we knew it Barb was on her way to the airport and we were heading back to Italy to climb!