Mike’s Marvelous Europe trip

 8/5/02 Day 1

London

Arrived after too long on two airplanes and in Frankfurt. We then piled down a long series of stairs to the underground. We had to make two transfers to get to the other side of London and most of us thought that we wouldn’t have to carry our stuff all over London. It took a while. Got to the South Quay stop and walked to the Scout ship. The British scouts have a fleet of small boats and kayaks and canoes with one large ship, formerly a supply ship. We put all our stuff away and then slept while Sternberg made dinner. We had spaghetti and then piled back on the Underground, sans bags, and went on a Jack the Ripper tour. That lasted till 12 and I got to sleep at about 2.

Day 2

London

got up and had a typical English breakfast: bacon, beans, toast, egg, fruit. Started today going on a double-decker bus tour of London and then split and had lunch. We went to Trafalgar Square and all of the older guys that I was going with piled onto one of the lions and everybody gave dad their cameras and said he looked like a Japanese tourist with $3000 of photo equipment strung all over him. This happened routinely on this trip. After that we walked down James boulevard which was decked out for the Jubilee and saw Buckingham. Went down Whitehall and got to Big Ben and Westminster. It was closed but we did get a picture in front of Churchill. Then we went to Piccadilly circus and Covent gardens and had dinner at a pub. Went back to the boat and crashed.

Day 3

London

Breakfast as usual and then to the London dungeon tour. We were the first group there and got a really cool picture. That was successful in scaring me. We then walked across the Tower Bridge and did the tower of London. Took off for Westminster and toured that. Then in 10 min flat Dad and I went from Westminster to St. Paul’s and I got to climb to the top and look out over London. It started to rain as we rode the underground from St. Paul’s to Liechter square and got discount tickets for the complete works of Shakespeare Abridged in 97 min. Went to a nice Italian place near the ticket booth and then to Covent Gardens. I met a street performer who was doing poi and learned some tricks and then saw a really cool gadget shop and lost some time there. Rode back to Piccadilly and saw the show. Very funny complete with Hamlet backwards. Went back to the boat and packed.

Day 4

London-Bayeux

The bus was there in the morning and we all piled on. I got a seat two rows from the back door. Dad was a seat in front of me. We got to Dover and stopped by the border patrol. I spent my remaining pounds in the arcade on the ferry and then we hit Calais and headed for Bayeux. I used my French to call ahead to the hostel and we got there. It was cool because the rooms were huge 20 person rooms and the boys got two. In typical clique fashion most piled into one room and I got one whole 7 bed section to myself. Fiddled with the TV and got it to play Happy Gilmore and hit the sack. The two rooms were decorated one in Disney the other in Little Mermaid, very popular.

Day 5

Normandy-Paris

Because of the travel time the day before the schedule changed and all we did to the Omaha cemetery, Point du Hoc which everyone loved, and St. Mere Eglise. There is a new section to the Museum at SME. We then piled into the bus and left for Paris. Got there and bunked with two other guys at the ONSEC hostel. Had dinner and slept well.

Day 6

Paris

Woke up and high tailed it to the Eiffel tower. Then to the Arc de Triomphe and down the Champs Elysses and went to the Louvre. Wandered around there for a while, saw the Mona Lisa and other famous paintings. Then we walked along the Rive gauche to the Ile du cite. Went up the towers of Notre Dame. Not nearly as cool as St. Paul’s. Went to the Latin Quarter and had dinner. Up to Sacre Coure and Paris a night is really cool. It looks a lot like the National Shrine and is really pretty. Back to the Latin Quarter and to the Email café. I sent some messages home and then went back to the hostel.

Day 7

Paris-Strasbourg

Went to Mass at Notre Dame and headed to the Pantheon, there is one in Paris. I liked this over all other churches on this trip. The floor to Ceiling paintings were really nice. The only bad part was that Fucult’s pendulum was removed because of an art exhibit that was two huge balls that had the inside of the dome printed on them, really stupid, this is Paris. Walked back to the Rive Gauche and bought 3 comic books and a painting for Mom. Left for Strasbourg. Got there and walked to the Cathedral. Really nice with incredible ornate stone work. Saw a rather interesting street performance and then walked down to the river. All the bridges were light up with fish and colors and stuff. Nice half timbered houses. Back to the cathedral for the light show and I saw some people with fire poi and we had some Ice cream. Got lost and ended up in the pretty university district. Slept well.

Day 8

Strasbourg-Kandersteg

took all day to get to Kandersteg and we had fondue when we got there. slept in a room with all the younger guys and got a cold.

Day 9

Kandersteg

hiked to the cable car and up the side of the mountain to the roloban. Lots of fun. Then we hiked to a glacial lake and some of the idiots went in. I climbed around the edge of the lake to a waterfall and had fun there. then we hiked all the way down. A long way. Bought a nice rain proof Jacket and had dinner. Went out and practiced some circus stuff and was mobbed by British scouts who thought this was cool. Beat Josh in a game of chess on a huge chess board.

Day 10-11

Glacier trip

The trek started at 730 on the 14th of Aug. I had packed the night before and was double checking my stuff. We met our guides Mustard (the English) and Yacapo (Spanish not sure of the spelling) and got the remaining climbing gear, crampons, Ice ax, harness and carabeener. we all piled into a van and took off. the road to the start point was 45 min away. a section of the road we went on was so narrow that there were certain times that cars could go one way or the other. It had two tunnels dug into the solid rock of the mountain. The driver of the van was incredible as we wound our way upward. The scenery was indescribably beautiful. (thus I will not try to describe it) The start point was a small store at 2500 METERS we piled out and all 14 of us including guides strapped on our packs and started up. we walked 15 min till we could finally see the edge of the glacier. The trek up was, so I'm told, harder than anything at Philmont. (Philmont is the Mecca of backpacking for scouts in new Mexico) The trek ! began in a forest and if you have ever seen the picture in the doctor's office of the trees and every thing covered  with moss that is where is was painted. It was green to the extreme. Then we hiked to a bridge to get over the glacial river that had formed in that part of the valley from the melting snow. That was where it got fun. The climb from the bridge to the glacier was a rise of I think 2000 feet or more. We started at a pretty good clip with the stragglers starting to emerge. we passed grazing cows with their cow bells and up we went. after some time climbing we came to the most level stretch of the hike. It was about 300 ft long and about 2ft wide with steep slopes on either side. during the whole trek to the glacier we kept seeing the Swiss air force fly over in f 16s f15s and even a Mirage. Then we hit the glacial streams that run down to the river and crossed five of those. We then hit the sheep. when I say we hit the sheep I mean that we encountered a flock of sheep and all the excretions thereof. the was so much sheep shit on the track that all the boots were covered in it. we climbed higher and saw a pair of mountain goats. They are brown with 2ft horns and look like all the pictures. The trail became progressively rockier and now was mostly climbing over rocks and gravel. This is the point at which My dad had to stop. we were almost to the glacier and Mustard said that if he had been having this much trouble on the hill he would not make it on the glacier. So dad turned back. It took him 3 hours to get down and his knee was killing him. he got back Ok and had a good nights sleep. He was fine the next day. The rest of  us hiked the next 15 min to the glacier and got our gear on. Crampons are metal frames that attack to the bottom of the boot and have six spikes pointing down of them and two on the front. They are designed to grip the snow and ice and do it well. the ice ax looks like a pick with a hoe on the back and a short handle with a point at the end. this is used to! catch you're self if you fall. the harness is like a climbing harness and the carabeaner hooks into the rope that attaches to the other people in the group. the group of 11 boys was split into a 5 group and a 6 group. There had been a large amount of snow on the glacier and so all path was covered. the 5 group was going to be braking a trail. (this entails wading through knee deep snow to have a path for the rest of us, very strenuous) the first hour or so was crossing crevasses of varying sizes which involves jumping with a fully loaded pack over a gap 2-5 feet wide. after that it was all snow. several of our people had had crampon problems and when we stopped for lunch Yacapo gave one of the scouts his crampons and continued in boots. Lunch was eaten on a large rock berm in the middle of the glacier. glaciers are strange formations because despite the rock crushing ability the glacier cracks in several places and pushes the rock up forming these berms. after lunch began what I reefer to as the mirage. there w! ere several hill on this particular glacier and as we hiked up one and hopped to see the hut we were greeted with another hill. we were far from board because one side of the glacier was a line of mountains that had hanging glaciers on it. these are small glaciers that sit on mountain sides and have a tendency to collapse. every so often we would hear then see the avalanche from one of these glaciers. it sounded like prolonged thunder. they were all minor avalanches and well away from us. It took us 6 hours from when we got on the glacier to the hut because there were some in our group who were not fit enough nor able to climatize enough to allow a good pace. we got to the hut and my toes were swimming in a frozen glacial lake in my boots. I got out of my gear and had an interesting dinner in a hut that didn't have running water or phone. the diner was soup, rice with sausage pieces and a peach for dessert. all of us were pretty exhausted and hit the sack soon after. Water cost 1 franc a liter because they had to! boil snow with wood that was dropped from a helicopter. The hut was on the glacier. the next morning Mustard decided based on the performance of the group the day before that we would go down the way we came up. the whole route took a down another way that involved going up another glacier that had no trail. so we went back the way we came and this time it was easy because the snow was frozen from the night before. we left at 730 and were off the glacier by 9. 1.5 hours to do 6 hours hiking. after that it was simple to trek down the way we had come and we were back in camp by noon. several of the group were severely sun burned and all of us had ripped some clothing with the crampons. on the way down we saw 3 f 16s flying low in the valley and then over the glacier. Ben our medic was snow blind and had to wear sunglasses the whole way down. Keagan had stabbed himself with a crampon and had a bloody leg but we had all made it. There was an international BBQ that night and we all had fun. I beat David at chess.

Day 12

Bern

as a break from all the hiking we went to Bern and toured around there. Saw Einstien’s apartment and the cathedral there was very German and pretty. We went to a pool and the water was freezing but I did go off the high dive. Some of the guys went in the river and swam down stream. Got back to Kandersteg and did a performance for the Campfire and was followed by some guys who passed 7 clubs in near darkness. We saw one of them later.

Day 13-14

Lameran hutte hike

got up and out by 9 and hiked to the cable car that sliced 2 hours of up hill off our trek. After the mix up about the last hike and it being so strenuous we were doing a really easy hike. It took us through some really rocky country and we had lunch by a hotel in the mountains. Then while discussing the Michaelson Morely experiment, we continued to climb and saw the Austrian riding a unicycle with a full size pack weaving his way downhill erratically. Very impressive. We stopped at a huge glacial lake and some of the guys were hot so they decided to strip down to tier shorts and go swimming. I declined and ended up as photographer. It was funny watching these guys in the water and their faces at how cold it was. Kept going and got to Gemmi Pass. The view was incredible you could see lots of the alps and the peaks were amazing. There was a cable car down the other side of the mountain but now we turned to go up the valley to the hutte. The next hour was spent on a flood plain that had once been the home of a glacier.