The Portugal Papers

We are in Mürren, Switzerland. I was last in the Swiss Alps in 2008, when I solo-traveled to Europe for five weeks. Out of the sixteen cities I visited that trip, it was in the top two. I’ve been waiting to return since then.

After our visa expires on September 19th, we won’t be able to leave Portugal until at least May (government Bureaucracy revolving around getting our temporary resident cards). I knew we had to fit a trip in before then.

I told Sara it could be a challenging travel day and it was. I just knew this was going to be a day that called for the hardcore aluminum antiperspirant.

The entire day consisted of being crammed in lots of different places with lots of other people, in stifling heat.

• Alarm went off at 3am.
• Got to the airport at 4:30am, with a whole lot of other people, to catch a 6:35am flight to Zurich.
• Crammed in a stifling bus with a whole lot of other people to the plane, where we then sat for 15-20 minutes. The bus sat. We were all standing.
• Sat on a hot plane in close quarters, as we were delayed for 30 minutes. I guess they didn’t see the need to turn on the A/C.
• We planned to take the train from Zurich airport to Lauterbrunnen, but I wasn’t able to reserve seats (because it said there weren’t any) and with it being peak summer travel season, I worried we would have to stand for much of the 2.5 hour trip. It was at this point that we realized our cell phone plan doesn’t work outside the EU (Switzerland is not in the EU).
• We Ubered to Bern and planned to train from there (which only cost $50 more). It was only later that I found out that Europeans/the Swiss don’t bother with train reservations, only tourists do, so I’m sure we would have been fine.
• On the hour-long car ride, I mentioned to Sara that we would need to have grace with each other for this next part of our journey. And that one of us could just say “grace” if the other person was acting ungraceful. Great idea, right?
• Wasted a bunch of time wandering around the Bern train station (which looked like a mall inside!), trying to find an eSIM so we could use the internet. This is where I started to unravel a little. It was at this moment that Sara pointedly looked at me and said “grace.” When that didn’t take effect, she said it again, this time through clenched teeth.
• Decided not to wait another two hours for the train we had reserved seats on and catch the next train and hope for the best.
• Got seated in the upper level that was totally empty except for one other guy. So we didn’t need to worry about seat reservations after all.
• Got off at Interlaken where we were supposed to switch trains. Right as the train was pulling out, I realized there were two Interlaken stops and we had gotten off at the wrong one (Sidebar: anytime I have to make a navigation related decision I invariably make the wrong choice. It’s uncanny). The next train didn’t come for another hour. It was 93 degrees in Interlaken yesterday and Switzerland is a country that doesn’t really have A/C.
• We made it to the correct Interlaken stop and crammed on a train to Lauterbrunnen with a whole lot of other people.
• Then we crammed on a hot gondola (Mürren is a car-free zone) with a whole lot of other people.
• Finally, we crammed on a little train to get from the gondola to Mürren with, you guessed it, a whole lot of people.
• We arrived at our hotel after 11 hours of travel, which may not sound like that much, but with the heat and all of the people everywhere, it felt like a lot. I fell asleep 15 minutes after that and didn’t leave the room, even to eat dinner.

I realize that much of this retelling might sound complain-y, but it really was miserable. Now, here’s a bunch of pictures.