Hey Mom, it's SwitzerLAND!

Day 0: Travelling to SwitzerLAND
We started off the morning catching the airlink bus to the Dublin airport to board our noon flight to Geneva. Ireland said farewell to us in true Irish fashion (i.e. it was raining for our send-off). Once we arrived, we managed to get to our gate plenty early, only to find out that our flight would be delayed about 40 minutes. Fortunately, Megan arrived at the opportune time to chit chat and hang out before our flight left. We finally got going, only to discover at the gate that they were checking everyone's return/connecting flights because they had been having trouble with people, I guess. Even with all the trouble, we were shortly on our way!
Just before landing in Switzerland, I will embarrassing own up to the fact that I recognized the songs that the little 7-year-old girl in front of me was singing--High School Musical. This is also the story behind the capitalization of -LAND. The girl saw us landing and said, "Mom, it's SwitzerLAND! I can see Jeremy's house!". It was so cute. And for that matter, why do we pronounce it "-lend"? So from now on, it's been SwitzerLAND, IreLAND, ScotLAND, etc. We met some people while going through passport control, who kind of made a few jabs at our being American, but generally it was a good flight.
Next on the agenda was hopping on a train to Interlaken. With little trouble we managed to find a train, stretch out on a few seats and enjoy a relaxing 3-hour ride to Bern. At Bern we snacked on the most amazing pretzels, noticed that the language had now switched from French to German, and hopped aboard another hour long ride to Interlaken. It was already dark when we got to Interlaken and got checked into our hostel, so we called two fellow Johnnies who were also staying in Interlaken to grab a pint and chocolate fondue. Afterwards, Megan and I indulged in "Franc fries." And with that, we headed back to the hostel, exhausted from the long day of travelling.

Day 1: Rain, rain, go away
That's right. I thought I had finally escaped the Irish weather for some good ol' sunshine and warmth. Okay, maybe that's exaggerating a little bit--I did think Switzerland would be a little chilly, but I was still hoping to escape the rain that we can't seem to escape anywhere else. The weather started off looking great, so Megan and I booked a paragliding appointment at 10:00. I was SO excited! You'll be happy to know that this was the only crazy adventure we could do, so for those of you who voted for that one, you win! Unfortunately however, about 10 minutes before we were supposed to leave, the appointment was cancelled. They were also planning an excursion to go canyoning, but for some reason I can wrap my head around jumping off a platform with a rope around my feet but not around my waist. So we didn't take advantage of that, and instead found a path to hike over to the next two villages. We ate a light brunch and met up with the two Johnnies again who were planning on joining us for the day's adventures. We had to ferry across the beautiful blue-green water and through the mountains to get to the path. We hiked for about 15 minutes and arrived at a set of caves. We bought tickets for the hour long tour. It was a fun tour, but caves all begin to look the same to me, and the poor tour guide had to give the tour in three different languages (impressive) so it took a rather long time. Afterwards, we hiked the 2 hours back to Interlaken. In the rain. Gross. We were all exhausted and soaking wet when we got back, so we headed to the same restaurant we drank pints at the night before and had a wonderfully large dinner. We also were thoroughly entertained/creeped out by the creepy "cow-pants man" as we like to call him. You should ask the moms about that one. When he started talking to us, we decided it was time to leave. We headed back to the hostel for a dry, warm night of cards.

Day 2: Falling from the Sky
Once again, the first thing Megan and I did was book an appointment to go paragliding on a seemingly beautiful day. And once again, we waited the entire morning, only to find out our appointment was cancelled. A little disappointed, I started the next task on my agenda: finding a mountain to hike up. For the life of me, I could not find a trail that started at the bottom of a mountain and worked its way up! We found out later that all the trails were closed since it was still winter season. Frustrated with the whole morning thus far, Megan and I ended up walking around Interlaken waiting for the Tourist Office to open to find out what else we could do. By this time, the weather had cleared up again, so we decided to take our chances and call the paragliding company directly, to see if there was any last hope that we could get out today. The lady at the company told us she would call us back at 4:00 to tell us the answer. This was around lunchtime, so we were trying to find somewhere to eat, when the company called us back 20 minutes later! They said they would be leaving in a half-hour and could we be ready? OF COURSE! We dashed back to the hostel to grab some warmer clothes and waited patiently for the bus to arrive.
10 minutes after we were ready, the company drove up in a little mini bus. We were greeted by a cute little adventurer with ski-goggles and cap. She drove us around Interlaken to pick up our two pilots, Robbie and Bruno. As we drove up a mountain, Bruno informed us of all the legalities and essentially the whole procedure. I was slightly nervous, and the switchbacks up the mountain were not helping. This was a perfect time for him to ask if we got motion sickness. Apparently they've had problems with that in the past. Since Ireland's roads are so crazy, I have noticed that I have been more prone to motion sickness. So I said no, but I wasn't really sure how it was going to turn out. We got to pick our pilots, then, and Robbie was mine. He was about 20 years older than Bruno, but was very chatty and friendly. He lent me a jacket, gloves and a hat, since it gets so cold so far up. We strapped on all our gear and then had to wait for another paraglider to take off. It was fun to see what we would be doing. They waited about 20 minutes, and then all of a sudden they were off! It was so fun to watch and made me even more excited! We got our glider set up on the ground and got in position. Robbie gave me instructions the whole time, mainly telling me that when I ran off the mountain, I should not sit down or jump. That's right, I should be prepared to run off the mountain. We waited for the opportune moment--the wind has to be coming towards you instead of from behind you. All of sudden Robbie yelled "run!" and we were off. I tried my hardest to keep running on the ground, but all of a sudden my feet lifted and the ground disappeared below my feet. The moment was so surreal when I realized that I was hundreds of feet off the ground. I don't know how to describe the feeling, but imagine you are sitting in what feels like in a stationary position, and viewing what looks like a cinematographic shot from a movie with panoramic views of a foreign country. It was fabulous. Robbie explained what I was looking at, and why the water is green-blue (because of green stone up the river from the lakes). He also explained why we were staying so high above the ground (updraft). Wonderful, awesome, exhilarating--words aren't enough. Unfortunately, my stomach eventually reminded me how high we were off the ground, and I asked Robbie if we could land, so I wouldn't get sick. We had kind of a rough landing, but what a scenic 20 minutes! I strongly recommend this activity for anyone interested in Switzerland.
Once we landed and got ourselves situated, Megan and I parted from our pilots and took some time to enjoy the afternoon sun. It was roasting at this point, so us and the moms recalled the paragliding and lounged about the porch at our hostel. Once we got too hot, we headed over to the chocolate store to pick up some delicious dessert for a spaghetti dinner that we soon made. The night was spent recalling the past few days' adventures over a delicious homemade meal, playing cards, and preparing ourselves for bella Roma.