As some of you know, the only reason I came to Zermatt was to snowboard on Paradise Glacier.  It was pretty sweet and I got some awesome pictures.  However, my memory card decided that it should no longer work.  I cannot even format it.  Some priceless pictures of the magestic views and myself on the slopes on July 27th and 28th lost forever.  Oh well, at least I got to do it.

I’ll do my best to describe it.  It seems like you travel up endlessly high.  You need to take 3 gondolas to reach the glacier.  It is high above the tree line and even above some of the lower clouds.  The area open in the summer clearly isn’t as large you’d expect a winter resort to be in Canada, but it is probably double the size of Rabbit Hill in Edmonton.  All the runs are groomed, so they are quite icy in the early morning then by 1pm, when the hill closes, it is quite slushy.  I spent the majority of my time in the snowpark.  I actually tried some jumps that were much larger than I’m use to, so I’m pumped up about that.  Today, the 2nd day I went, I decided it was warm enough for just a t-shirt. It was warm enough, but of course that meant I had to fall directly on my arm on the icy snow and cut up my forearm.  It will heal with time.  I had a picture of it on my memory card as well, but of course that is not working anymore.

I had a good laugh today at the expense of an Englishman.  He was teaching his kids about the glacier, which he continued to pronounce glassy-er.  He must have repeated it 15 to 20 times and it just sounded ridiculously funny to me.  I’m not sure if this is how everyone in England pronounces glacier, but I certainly hope so, because I woud like to enjoy a laugh again.

I’m going to miss Zermatt, I’d like to stay a while longer and get in a few more days of snowboarding, but it quite pricey and it is probably for the best I’m moving on to Paris next.  Well, off to find a new memory card for my camera.

I really truly love it here in Interlaken.  It’s a small town of about 20,000 people and there are a lot of things to do.  You can go white-water rafting, paragliding, skydiving, hang gliding, canyoning, kayaking, biking, hiking, etc.  I’m sure there are many more activities I missed.  I opted for canyoning, skydiving and hiking.

Canyoning was the first thing I did.  There are 3 levels: beginner – 1/2 day, intermediate 3/4 day, and expert full day.  I signed up for the full day, because it really didn’t sound difficult, but due to the major ran storm the night before, the full day was canceled because the canyon was too full of water.  So instead I did the 3/4 day, which was a little cheaper anyway.  This started with a 160ft repel down into the canyon.  By far the hardest part was leaning back over the cliff to begin your descent.  Once I did that, it was still quite uneasy, but not as hard as I thought.  The rest was a breeze really.  You jumped off cliffs or slide down waterfalls.  Near the end we did a zipline into a drop.  Quite fun and it was something I never even heard of before, so I decided to do it.

The next day I decided that I should skydive.  It sounds easy enough in theory, but once you are up in the plane it is quite a different experience.  I did a tandem skydive, which allowed me to do a freefall for 45secs, which was a 6,000ft drop at a top speed of 200 km/h.  It was a total of 11,000ft down.  I guess 5,000ft is the right distance to open a parachute, so now I know.  Anyway, the hardest part was getting out of the plane.  This is why I was glad I went tandem, because the guy really just pushes you out.  I still had swing my own legs out of the plane and the thought of doing something like that is terrifying.  Anyway, as soon as I got my legs out, the guy I was jumping did a count down from 3 and we began to fall.  I can’t compare such a feeling to anything being so high above the ground and looking down.  It was weird because you couldn’t really gauge your speed against anything while you fell.  It was probably the most amazing sensation of my life, I can’t describe and I highly recommend anyone to do it.  I’m sure if I did it again, it would be a whole lot easier.

Today, I just did a 4 hour hike in the Alps.  I went up over a mountain then down the other side.  It was incredibly beautiful scenery and it made me glad I decided to go on my trip.  I can’t really say much else about it.  Switzerland is an awesome place, I would come back here again for sure.

I truly love Zurich.  It was an awesome city with a really easy going attitude.  I don’t really know what else to say about it.  There was a lake in the middle of town with a river running from it.  The river was quite weak and you could swim upstream with some effort.  Lots of steps down to the river level so if you chose to jump in, you could easily get out.

Speaking of jumping in, that was the coolest part about the lake and river.  Stuff to jump off of into the water all over.  It really was a blast.  Relaxing on by the lake and enjoying the hilly town and mountains on the horizon.  Then taking a moment to jump off a bridge, dock, raft or whatever you can climb.  I would love to go back, but now I’m in Interlaken.  I don’t want to say anything about it yet, because then my next post would be boring.

Anyway, I heard the Zurich was voted to have the best standard of living in the world.  I really wouldn’t be surprised, but be prepared to spend a few extra dollars on food.  The accomidations are a fair price however.

When I first got into Italy I wasn’t too pleased.  I smelt quite bad when I got off the train and the streets were visibly dirtier than any other city I’ve been to.  The tourist info office didn’t open until 11am and it was 9am when I arrived.  This is usually my strategy when I get into a city.  Find the tourist info booth and get them to give me lots of info.  Sometimes they don’t like to help, so I always try to them to show me where my hostel is on the map and how to get there.  They usually have free maps too, which is always a plus.  That’s what they’re there for anyway, right?

The transit system in Rome is kind of lame.  It seems like the buses come very rarely and I end up walking long distances to catch the more reliable Metro train system.  They have 2 main lines in the old Rome city.  Metro A and Metro B.  This was handy to get to the Vatican of the Colleseum.  Otherwise, be prepared for lots of walking or waiting for the slow buses.  I found out an little annoyance that the Metro A closes at 9:30 pm today.  So I ended up having to figure out which bus to take from where the Metro B and A meet.

Well, the train system and the dirtiness aside, Rome has an insane amount of things to see.  I was quite surprised to see so much excavated.  As well, to hear of where a lot of materials in the Vatican city came from as well as other Christian buildings, monuments, etc.  Before I came, I wasn’t expecting anything from Rome.  I could take it or leave it really.  I’m glad I’ve seen it now.  I would recommend a person to come here for 3 days and go on some tours.  There is so much to see and know about Rome that you need guidance of some kind.  I did 3 tours in a row today; Vatican, Catacombs, and Rome at Dusk.  I probably walked for about 12 or so hours today.  I’m tired now, I’m going to bed.

I have to say this city was really beautiful.  I went in not really expecting anything, because it was kind of just on my way to Italy and Switzerland.  It was well worth the stop.  The city was so clean and just plain beautiful.  I would most definitely go back.  I’m really sure what else to say about the place.  I’d recommend going there and just seeing it and either renting a bike to cruise around the sights or going to one of the beaches and having a dip to cool down.  Did I mention it was the first place I went to where the temperature was above 30 C?  Well it was, and it was awesome.

Prague quite an interesting city. The easiest way to describe it is like a maze.  You try to take a shortcut down a side street and then after 10 to 15 minutes of walking, you are completely lost.  You realize after finding where you are on your map that you went in the exact opposite direction of where you wanted to go.  It would have been frustrating if I had any sort of agenda.  Fortunately for the aimless traveler I am, I had no real problem with the city.  I kind of just explored all the locations the map told me to.  I didn’t really learn any of the history or any such thing, just enjoyed my time and relaxed.

I did; however, head to this one bar with a couple of people in my room one night.  I forget the name, “U Sodu” sounds vaguely close.  It was like a labrynth.  There were probably about 8 to 10 rooms with small halls weavy, and stairways going down and then up.  Each room was different, and played different music.  It was like a bunch of small bars you could easily wander in between.  I had a few beers: Pilsner Urquell and Master were what they served.  Master was great, it was dark and flavourful.  I also tried some absinthe, which is the alcohol Czech is famed for.  We have a variety of absinthe in Canada, but the stuff in Czech is incredibly powerful tasting in comparison.

I will add one thing though.  If are interested in seeing the Ghost Trail tour, don’t bother, it is a complete waste of money.  I’m quite sure stories are made up and then some guy in a costume pops out every once in a while and tries to scare you.