The Summer of 827: Berlin and Beyond-Part Drei

The following day was very relaxing, since that afternoon/night Kristina and Benny took us to a sauna on the outskirts of the city. First was indoor beach volleyball which was tons of fun, followed by the sauna. First up, the 100 degrees Celsius room which was incredibly hot. Yes, water does boil at that temperature. For sauna newbies, the protocol after leaving the sauna is to immediately step under an ice cold shower. After this shock, we took a slow walk to the next sauna which was 120 degrees Celsius! Even hotter, and the shower was outside so it was even more ice cold. Then we settled down in a hot tub followed by a regular pool, both of which were very relaxing. I slept like a baby that night, and the following day we came back home after class to pack for Zermatt! Our train left at 19:30 and we had a three hour layover in Frankfurt at one in the morning. Arrived in Visp the next morning, then took a little train to get us to Zermatt, since cars are not allowed in the city. We (Adam, Zach, Alex, myself, Lindsay, and Bailey) made it into Zermatt at 10:30 on Saturday morning with plenty of excitement, despite our severe lack of sleep.

The views in Zermatt were absolutely amazing when we arrived on the sunny, Saturday morning. We found our apartments, dropped off our gear, then rented some mountain bikes to explore the city. The lady gave us three different choices, easy, medium, or hard routes. With the two girls with us, we decided they would like the easy one and the guys could do the medium or hard the next day. After riding straight uphill for 30 minutes, the girls dropped off and we decided to keep pressing on. After another 20 minutes of even steeper slopes uphill, we decided to check our progress on the map. We were about a fifth of the way done with several hundreds of feet of elevation left. At that point, we decided to start going downhill since our legs were no longer functioning. We picked a trail going through the woods for our way down, which led us to some amazing sights on the hill. We ended up finding a restaurant on the side of the mountain to stop for lunch. I had a Rosti, which is a Swiss dish consisting of French cut potatoes mixed with cheese and topped with 2 eggs. Stuffed and satisfied, we rode entirely downhill back to meet up at the hotel. Our butts were way too sore to keep the bikes for the original 24 hours, so we returned them after only four or so hours. At the hotel we all took showers and the lack of sleep and physical exertion put us into a well deserved nap. We went into the main part of town just as everything was closing, but found a nice little spot for a fondue dinner. After, we found a bar to watch USA lose to Ghana, then back to the apartment to sleep.

The next day we walked to the gondola to see what the prices were to reach the top of some nearby mountains. To save some money, we took a great 45-minute hike up to the first gondola stop and basically got a half-price ticket. The girls took the gondola all the way to the snow covered Alps, but having seen skiing mountains before, Zach, Adam, and myself went to the second highest stop. We hiked around over an hour and took some amazing pictures (that huge mountain you see in all the pictures is the Matterhorn, and it never got old looking at it). I did all the uphill, rock filled, hiking in my Vibrams, which made me feel so close to the earth. We ate at another mountainside restaurant, and this time I had joghurt and plum pie! The group met up, walked down, played in a creek, then went into the main part of town. There were so many cool shops and I bought some amazing Swiss schokolade. We made it back to the hotel to relax and watch Germany dominate England 4-1, grabbed our gear, then left for the bahn. We had a two hour layover in Frankfurt at 3 in the morning Monday, which is always fun. Back in Berlin by 10 in the morning for the second half of class; what a weekend!

The following week was a lot of schoolwork, and that Thursday we took a trip to a Berlin wall museum which was pretty interesting. That night, we found a 24 bar called AM-PM and dance to a mix of American music spanning disco to today’s music. Then Saturday, Kevin, Colin, Ian, and myself went to Wannsee for a concert at the beach! They had a huge stage with screens in the water for the concert, and were showing the Deutschland-Argentina game on the big screens. We got to watch Schland dominate Argentina 4-0, all while standing in the water. After the game, the concert started and there were a ton of cool German bands that we really enjoyed. After the concert, they had fireworks and I got to use the fireworks setting on my camera. Later that night, we attempted to get into a fancy rooftop club, but were rejected for getting there too late, and maybe for being American. That didn’t stop Ian and myself from finding another club at 3 in the morning. We left at 6 with the sun shining brightly since the sun sets at the 23rd hour and rises around 4 in Berlin. I figured I would take some pictures of our apartment (in Wedding) at 6 in the morning since it was sunny and no one was around. Then Sunday, Adam, Zach, Bailey, Kevin and myself went to museum island and went to the new and old museums. The new museum is famous for the bust of Nefertiti which really was a cool piece of Egyptian history. We came back to Wedding and met up with the rest of the group on a rooftop grillen area for a 4th of July picnic. Good burgers, ice cream, card games, and great views of the city. Monday and today have been a lot of engineering work, but class is done this Friday so we can push through. Tomorrow we are going to the fan mile again for the semifinals between Schland and Spain. Also, this weekend we are going to Malaga, a beach town in Spain which looks absolutely beautiful.