Day Sixteen - Murren

Waking up and opening your eyes to see the Swiss alps out your window will never feel normal and will never get old.

Our hotel offers a complimentary breakfast which we take full advantage of each day. I will say this a few times but Switzerland is expensive. Not London expensive, it’s even crazier than that. It’s a totally different level of expensive that no one can prepare you for. More on that later.

Our objective today is to partake in some snow activities. We don’t really want to ski or snowboard, also that whole scene is just a bit out of budget. Sledding is the answer. All we have is jeans - we were not prepared for snow activities whatsoever, so after some searching we find a little sports equipment shop that rents out gear. The lady that helps us is so friendly and has the most adorable accent. She suits us up with snow pants, goggles and wooden sleds. I’ll admit, I had no idea what we were doing.

We drag our sleds up to the Allmendhubel which is a Funicular lift. None of this made sense to me, all I knew is that it looked like a train carved into a very, very steep mountain side. It’s also very expensive to take.

We get dropped off at the top of the hill along with all the other skiers and snowboarders. We head for the sledding trail and with absolutely no idea about what we are doing we sit down and proceed to try to sled. I was really scared at first because the snow trail winds along the edge of the mountain and has absolutely no gate or rail or safety net… If you lose control of your sled you fly off the mountain, you die.

We do our first run with little to no clue on how to control our sled or our direction. By the next 2 runs we are experts (gotta use your heels). Halfway through the trail there is a restaurant where you can stop and have lunch and a drink. It was a really beautiful sunny day so we stop for lunch and have a beer. We finish our last run and have so much fun we decide to go for an extra fourth run. We finish completely exhausted and covered in snow. Fun fact, the 1969 James Bond flick "On Her Majesty's Secret Service" was based and filmed in Murren and features a hilarious bobsledding chase.

We turn in our gear and head to the hotel. We stop by the town grocery store and pick up some beers to drink on the hotel sun terrace. Our hotel, Hotel Regina, is a Swiss Historic Hotel, built in 1895 and it's full of charm. From the creaky wooden floors to the vintage ski posters that line the sun drenched dining lounge, you feel every bit a part of the history of Murren.

We have worked up quite an appetite and are ready to eat. The thing about Murren and I imagine most ski resort towns, you have limited options. There are only a handful of restaurants and without a car or public transportation you better hope you like your options. The other thing is, everything is closed, always. I'm exaggerating (slightly).

La Grotte, the restaurant at the hotel across from us comes highly recommend. We are one of only a few people dining that evening. The beer is cheaper than water and the food is fantastic, I get curry butter chicken, Jacob gets pesto pasta. I decide to leave a nice big tip because there were so few people in the restaurant. I find out later tipping is not practiced in Switzerland and a service charge was already added to the bill, another laughable moment out of many just like this.

We spend the rest of the night drinking beers in the hotel room and watching Bill Burr stand up on Jacob's iPad. We also notice we have new upstairs neighbors. We notice this because it's a young child that apparently can't walk but must jump everywhere they go. We assume.