Swiss Alps to Tuscany

We are now in Florence Italy, and although it is incredibly beautiful, it is hard to make a comparison to Switzerland. Switzerland was the cleanest, friendliest, most beautiful place I have ever been! Interlaken is a small city\large town located in the heart of the alps, and in between two lakes. It was incredible to see the snow capped mountains all the way around us, when it was warm enough for us to be wearing tee shirts. The only real down-side was the cost of everything. While the exhange rate to the Swiss Franc is actually favorable, the cost of everything is enough to make you want to cry. It was outrageous. 12CHF for a meal at McDonalds, made it easy to forget that the franc was actually very slightly cheaper. Our first night in town, we made our way to Hooters of all places, where the cheapest thing we could find was a hot dog and fries, and even that was 8 bucks. Since it was pretty easy it was difficult to see the true beauty of the area, but that all changed the next day. We woke up and headed towards a small town nearby, but higher up in the mountains, called Grindelwald. From there we had the most amazing view of the mountains. Everwhere we looked it was just grassy green hills dotted with small swiss chalets, and ENORMOUS alps in the background. Truely Incredible. We then made the decision that the reason the Swiss will not join the EU, and have remained completely isolationist for the better part of their history, is beacuse in a place like this, you have no need for anything, or anyone else. If I lived in Switzerland, I would be perfectly content with everything, and I would have no need to complain, or be angry either. We also made a day trip to Luzern, but being Good Friday, it was rather uneventful. The city is indeed beautiful, but once again expensive, and Justin and I were happy to have stayed in Interlaken.

The other thing that is really truely amazing is the Swiss ability to retain languages. You can walk into literally any store, be it the most expensive, or the cheapest grocery, and you will be greeted in German, French, Italian, and Romanch (the official languages of Switzerland) and in English. Not only is this incredible, but when they begin responding to you in English, you realize that they are perfectly fluent in all of these langagues. They do not seem even the slightest bit offended when you cannot respond in any of their native languages, instead they seem pleased to be able to be of assistance. This was only more obvious, when leaving the country, a man at the ticket counter at the train station helped us reserve the rest of our reservations for our trains in perfect english, giving us as well an infinate amount of knowledge about sleeper cars, Italian trains, and the Czech Republic.

Once on the train, the only thing I can say is that is was incredibly surreal. To go from the Swiss Alps, to Tuscany and Florence in Italy, was unreal. It was a long journey, but facinating, because unlike anywhere else we have been, you litterally get to see the culture, language, and climate change in front of your eyes. We got into Florence in the early evening, and headed towards our hostel. Justin wasn't feeling well, but we pushed on. We checked in, and it was pretty cool to find that our hostel was more like a small community than anything else. The owners just recently opened it, and hang out with the guests, and live upstairs. It's pretty cool. Shortly after we arrived, the owner decided that it was time get a drink, and he brought a bunch of us to a small wine bar, where the wine was cheap but good. Unfortunately Justin was still not feeling well so we headed back.

Today we went to the Duomo, the main cathedral in Florence, to see the push cart fireworks. They litterally attatch a 15 minute firework display to a small cart and they light them off after mass on Easter Sunday. It was crowded and hard to see but incredible nonetheless. Justin still is not back to himself, so we are just catching our breath, but hopefully he will be better tomorrow, so we can do a bit more exploring.