Hotel Splendide Crans-Montana

Destination 405<br><br>km197'555<br><br>Not entirely shure, if I spend my last day in a foreign country, I head towards north. A stopover at Novi Ligure provides me finally the opportunity to send a notification to all family and friends about my remaining itinerary before return back home. The date has been fixed to the 29.<br>The ride up to Vercelly in the low lands was not that exciting like the sighting of the mountain of Mont Blanc in the far. Since my ...

... the casualties of the Matterhorn.<br>Zermatt itself is tiny, with only electric taxis. It is much colder than Lauterbrunnen even though it's on the border of Italy.<br>Switzerland is strange. It has no language of its own. In Bern, Lauterbrunnen and Zermatt they speak German but in Montreux they speak French, even the train announcements change languages. It gets confusing, so I just stick to greeting people in English most of the time. When I had arrived here I was fuming a bit because I ...

I decided to change hostels because I really didn't like this one. I am not fond of the international hostels. They're like hospitals, although the buffet breakfast was nice and I liked their cat. I was woken up by screaming, unruly kids. Some parents aren't parents. I was happy to change. The sun had also come out and so I snuck on the train from Montreux Tilletet to Veyvey which is only 5 minutes away. The place is much nicer and has free food and a kitchen. I actually got an entire 6 ...

... van hurt her nostrils..eeek!<br>After deicing and all the rest we headed to Lucern.. or so we thought. Honeydew made her record amount of noise so far. I have never heard a van or car rev so hard in my life. When I went to park (stopped off at the wonderful coffee shop there - she does amazing coffees and learnt the skill in NZ!) I had to keep going as the amount of noise when she wasn't in gear. It was like 5 aeroplanes landing! OH MY GOD.......<br>

... that I have much to compare it to, but I wouldn&#8217;t argue with that. Pictures will tell that story.<br><br> Shortly after I got to the hostel I met Bill, a retired engineer from Baltimore. He&#8217;s a pretty experienced hiker and I decided to go with him on a "six hour" hike the next day. That six hour hike turned into nearly 10, but it was entirely worth it. I can&#8217;t count the number of ...

... the thrill has glossed over how desparate i was on top of the mountain. Single craziest experience thus far. <br> Met Alana. We arrived together in gimmelwald. She came with her friend Dan. but they're going their separate ways. She and I decided to travel together - florence, venice, budapest, croatia, then italy. Croatia and Italy fell thru because of her circumstances. she's 19. <br><br>

... us Aussies with the names they call their towns in Swiss German. I know by the age of 30, you shouldn't find it funny to drive through Wankdorf, or to visit Mannlichen. Matt was also perplexed at why there was a ban on duck flatulence as we kept seeing signs saying Durchfarht Verboten in Interlaken. However it was awfully nice of the truck we passed coming into Lauterbrunnen that had signs on the back wishing us Gutte farht and Gutte route. We are such children!!

... start to climb into the mountains proper, as in over a pass. Some of the inclines are so steep I am in 2nd gear with my foot flat. As we get higher we get well past the snow line and eventually we turn the corner and it seems we are at the top of the pass. But then we see a barrier over the road. IT'S CLOSED!! Can you believe it? We had been driving for ages and we were really close geographically to our destination but we can't get there because ...

... thundering waterfalls, fields of wildflowers in brilliant pinks, yellows, whites, oranges and purples, and cows with gently pealing cowbells wandering on hillsides dotted with ancient wooden barns - basically, just like every stereotype of Switzerland we had, all if needed was a milkmaid with braids and an embroidered apron to complete the picture! At the top of the second peak we stopped for a break at a little ...

www.elodie50a.com<br><br>Here is a video (sorry for the very bad quality)<br>http://www.youtube.com/watc h?v=R5_9hODsqgs<br><br><br>