blög!: July 2004

interlaken

9. - 12. july

i know a lot of you were waiting for pictures of this so here they finally are. in two and half days marcus and I went white water rafting, canyoning, and ice climbing.

we stayed at balmer's herberge which is tauted as one of the best youth hostel in europe. we can both sort of understand why though. all the tours we did we booked directly through them; they had free foosball, pool, pinpong, a bar upstairs and bars coupled with a dance floor downstairs...

..and a really nice green area in back. all for for $17 a night.

rafting lütschine
right after we checked in we booked our activities and left and hour later for white water rafting

with our fearless guide

on class 4 rapids

if you count you'll realize half the people in the boat lost their paddles (the guy in the middle back still has his)

including me

canyoning in chli schlieren
to our eternal disappointment (or until we do it again), the camera guy's camera broke on the canyoning trip. so i hijacked the advertisment pictures and put them here to give you and idea, but canyoning was the sole reason marcus and i went to switzerland and the few pictures we have dont do it justice. without a doubt the most dangerous thing i have ever paid to do. the day before we went the trip was called off because a guy hesitated on a jump, cracked his skull and had to be airlifted out.

the beginning

this picture was taken in one of the other canyons (there are 3; saxeten, grimsel, and chli schlieren)

there were several jumps over 30ft. you notice the guide is standing? jumping in the right place turns out to be important.

scene at top of different waterfall:
guide: jump there, okay? ready... 1..2...
me: WHAT?? WHERE??
guide: just in front of where the waterfall hits the water
me: so there?
guide: no no not there, there is a rock over there, ready?
me: is that before or after the water hits?
guide: right there, and there is a waterfall at the end of the pool, if you jump too far you the guide at the end of the pool wont catch you and youll have to swim around the whirl pool once more to avoid the getting washed down the 60ft waterfall.
me: the WHAT?
guide: ready 1..
me: so there?
guide:..2..
me: ahh f**k it
guide: 3 :::push:::

after being fished out i turned around to watch marcus have the same conversation.
quite a rush, i highly recommend it.

the water was 5ºC (42ºF)

ice climbing on the steingletscher

marcus in the crack

me in the crack

while climbing back up over (under) an inverted section i managed to dislodge a small iceberg which flung me, icepick included, back into my harness.

its unbelievably blue down at the bottom of the crevice

same place, two points of view

storm on july 7th

7. july
(click to enlarge)

taken from the roof of the insterburg

ouzo for everyone

the eurocup finals were on the 4th of july and so there were parties in the bar and on the roof. the final was between portugal and greece. its hard to explain how unlikely it was that greece ever made it to the finals; it's, without exaggeration, like the clippers going to the finals. only greece won too, it was such a shock that even the tv on the 5th exploded

no joke

khalid wasted no time in dowsing the burning tv with the local fire extinguisher

and oh, what a mess it was

but its a damn good thing he did

münchen

3.- 4. July

church for our blessed lady or 'frauenkriche' is a massive brick(!) church in the middle of old town of munich

frauenkriche and neues rathaus (new city hall) from old peter's

rathaus platz

germans love outdoor cafes

roof top view (those are solar panels)

neues rathaus by night. the new city hall is a crazy gothic construction completed early in the 20th century (yea, so a cool 500 years after the gothic period ended)

hofbräu! munich's beer halls are something to behold. here the beer is ordered by the liter and hall is by no means an overstatement

Show me the way to go home,
I'm tired and I want to go to bed.
Oh, I had a little drink about an hour ago,
and it's gone right to my head.
Wherever I may roam, on land or sea or foam.
You will always hear me singing this song,
Show me the way to go home.

it took us two and half hours to walk home...