Mt. Pilatsus

Location: Lauzer, Switzerland

Subject: The days activities included a loop around and over the top of Mt. Pilatus with an evening stroll and dinner in the old section of the city.

Due to the flooding most boat traffic on Lake Luzern had been temporally suspended due to a surge in debris in the water. Instead we played the train shuffle again. Thankfully I had checked with the TI located in the train station before simply waiting for a boat.

With all of 5 minuets to spare we made our train only to discover that our station would be only accessible by bus from the station just prior. Apparently they were still having problems with the rail lines though the region (not that much changes in a day).

While transfer off our train and waiting for the bus Jill and I were joking about the Japanese kid’s lack of a clue about the ambivalence towards him from a German girl at our hostile the previous evening when all of a sudden the very German girl steps off the train just in front of us.

After a some rather awkward moments of where we didn’t know to feel embarrassed about our comments or not Jill managed to strike up a conversation with the girl. We quickly found she was from Potsdam, but now was living and studying in Berlin.

With a quick bus ride hugging along the lake shore and ducking under cliffs and through tunnels we found our selves at the base of Mt. Pilatus and the start of the world’s steepest cog railroad.

At the top you find a two hotels starting at about 100 chf a night for this alpine hide away. A series of sun decks and outdoor dining offer spacitular and nearly 360 degree views of the region. The decks face south towards the Berner Oberland region where the Eiger is located near Interlaken. The sounds of cow bells from graving herds give the impression of large amount of wind chimes placed on the mountain top adding a surreal element to the already thin atmosphere.

In addition the Swiss Army has military instillations built into the mountain it self complete with a radar and communications array situated on one of the peaks. Word on the street is that these circular entry ways to the mountains side’s contain 80 mm guns with a range of nearly 9 miles. Both the added height and remoteness of these instillations act give the advantage of being in an out of reach area while still projecting force out over a vast region. The Pilatus instillation is one of many throughout the region and is intricate to the Swiss Militaries strategy of defense. Since if we weren't in the Lauzern area on a Monday and Boat traffic hadn't been suspened we weren’t able to take in Fortress Furigen. Fortress Furigen is a converted Swiss military instillation dedicated as a museum all thing Swiss military related. Rick Steve describes it as a weapon petting zoo.

Because of my kneen we decided to do the round trip by comming down the cable car on the otherside. You need to transfer to one more gondola to get us back down and to a suberb of Luzern. After squezing out of our sardine stuffed cable car our gondola was spent with a nice swiss older swiss couple that led us back to the bus stop after a quick detoure to used book and junk shop.

We spent our evening soaking up the photogenicness of the old section of Lauzern and a nice dinner along the river.

The Swiss Army

The Swiss Army

In Robin William’s Live on Broadway, Robin laces into the Swiss as the “nice Germans” poking fun at their famous neutrality and their blend of French and German culture. Shouting “Some of you men have never opened Chardonnay under fire…” he point out the absurdness of any Army that has a wine opener on its knife.

My friends I can report that these stereotypes can be set aside. Because of its neutrality and economic prowess Switzerland has needed to adopt a strategy of defensive planning. Starting in World War II the Swiss government has set out simply to protect Switzerland and avoid alliances such as those that precipitated World War I.

The Swiss government has used their biggest resource to their advantage, Switzerland’s geography. A mountainous country they have used its limited travelable terrain to channel and funnel invading armies where they want as well as developing a series of mountain fortification throughout the country (see Mt. Pilatus entry). All bridges and tunnels (and there are a lot of them) in Switzerland are pre-wired with dynamite and other explosive charges allowing for the military to disable strategic roadways by blowing these vital transportation routes.

During World War II with the threat of Nazi invasion from the north and the west, and Italy on its southern border the Swiss government began installing hidden fortresses and fortification throughout the country. Camouflaged into the sides of mountains and hidden under barns these instillations give Switzerland a very valuable and out of sight defense system. Rick Steve even describes batcave like facilities where the Schweizer Luftwaffe’s (Air Force) fighter jets can take off and land from hidden facilities. With the end of World War II and the threat of Soviet aggression in Europe these hidden fortresses were continued on until modern day. In case of invasion the government can retreat to the heavily mountainous Berner Oberland region and hold out in a secure mountain fortress scattered throughout the region.

During our time in Switzerland the military presence was dramatic. In hind sight I can see that this would make sense, but at the time it was quite surprising. Switzerland’s neutrality has had many benefits to the country as a whole. As was stated earlier the Swiss have held out of any formal alliances for as long as possible. Refusing to join the League of Nations and later the UN, the Swiss have managed to stay out of NATO and even the EU in spite of a rapidly developing integrated European economy. The Swiss finally joined the UN on 10 Sep. 2002, but still refuses to join many other world organizations. As a result the Swiss military needs to only really concern it self with protections. They approach their military role the opposite of us. Rather than projecting their force through out the world as the United States does the Swiss are able to focus on their own defense. Consequently the nation has more military personnel at home who often will go home to their families at night. Therefore it isn’t uncommon to see a Swiss solider sitting at a train station one his way to work whit a sub machine gun slug over his shoulder.

A second and major factor is that according to the CIA World Fact Book “the Swiss Confederation states that "every Swiss male is obligated to do military service"; every Swiss male has to serve for at least 260 days in the armed forces; 19 years of age for compulsory military service; 17 years of age for voluntary military service; conscripts receive 15 weeks of compulsory training, followed by 10 intermittent recalls for training over the next 22 years; women are accepted on a voluntary basis, but are not drafted” (2005) Making military service mandatory for all citizens automatically puts more men in boots than an all voluntary service. We weren’t able to find out if there were options for community service such as Austria offers as an alternate to this compulsory service. In recent years protests (mostly by youth) have precipitated the government to reexamine its compulsory service, but have still opted to stay with its policies for now.

This neutrality has helped attract many international aid organizations to choose Switzerland as a base of operations. These organizations range from the European UN headquarters and International Red Cross both located in Geneva, many sports federations like the International Olympic Committee headquarters in Lausanne along with many other international sports federations ranging from baseball to archery.

The Swiss haven’t always been this peace loving. In fact there is a long tradition of mercenaries as a major Swiss export throughout European history. A heavily religious bunch, the Swiss have had strong ties back to the Catholic Church over the centuries. The Pope’s bodyguards are called the Swiss Guard and began as Swiss mercenaries. Even the Swiss flag bears a cross. During the 30 Years War primarily Catholic Swiss waged war on behalf of the Church on Protestant reformers throughout Southern Germany, Bavaria, Switzerland and Austria. The Swiss were even sell soldiers across the border to France during the French Revolution.

But I must say Robin is right about one thing; “When the world goes boom. The Swiss will be just asking: What was that?”

For further reading on the internet check out the following links:

• Rick Steve’s Europe: the Swiss Army


• CIA Fact book entry on Swiss Military stats

Luzern

After a great day on top mt. Pilatus shared with some cows, a few mountain goats, and a new German friend we are now having dinner on the river Reuss and waiting for the night train to Viena.

Skaters in the world capitol of sport

Location: Swiszerland

Subject:

Skaters in the spot capitol of the World

Lake Geneva

There is nothing like wandering lake Geneva by paddle boat. The alps towering out in front of us and France off to the right. We ended up on the wrong boat and ended up in evian france
Oops

So long Deutchland hello Switzerland

Were hopping the first train out of Baden-Baden and headed to Lausanne on lake Geneva.

Playing bond for the day

Location: Baden - Baden, Germany

Subject:

You ever see that seen from the James Bond flick Never Say Never where Bond gets into a video game contest with villain while in the posh casino. Well the casino here is like that modeled after Versill and built in the early 18 hundreds.

If James Bond was every able to talk Moneypenny into a weekend off together they would be going to Baden - Baden. Basically a resort town in the Black Forest that started off catering to nobility with it's mineral spas and casinos. It's attracted people like Mark Twain, Trotsky, and Dostryeski over the years just to relax and gamble.

Jill and I spent the day soaking in mineral baths and walking around trying to blend in with people who have way too much money eating overly rich foods. What a contrast from East Berlin. We are catching it at the end of the season so the only show in town is the horse races ( they are a big thing donät get me wrong) but the spas are nearly empty so we soaked with some naked Euros in a saunas, steam rooms, and grottos. Hell they even have a real Naked Juice bar (not the brand thing in the buff). We fell well refreshed and relaxed.

My James Bond mission for the night will be gettingoutfittedd to get past security in the casino since they have a strict dress code.

On a side note:
D glad to hear Pragueg isawesomee.Keepp in touch and we will be looking for the English version of your story.

Berlin

Location: Berlin, Germany

Subject: Berlin Day 1

Since we realized from last nights BBC weather report out plans in the Alps were on hold we decided to take advantage of out hostles name sake and simply sleep in the moring. After some quick showers in some cramped quarters we were off some sight seeing in Berlin's center.

As per EuroAid's suggestion and the rave reviews of other travelers at our hostels we hit up the free New Berlin Tour. This s well worth its free costs. The 3 ½ hour walking tour takes in most of central Berlin. Starting at the Brandenburg Gate and ending on Museum Island. We were blasted with an information overload. Our guide Nick an ex-patriot Brit whose specialty is Archeology and rolling cigarettes with one hand. Nick gave an incredibly detailed whirlwind history lesson ranging from pre-prussion to post cold war Berlin. The tour was well worth it. Payments can be done in the form of tips at the end. In action Spanish versions of the same tour are also available by the same company.

Afterwards we walked around the neighborhoods around Oranienburger, a fashion soho like district. Joining was was a Canadian couple we meet on the New Berlin Free Tour. Jessica and Tia recently graduated College in Ontario and were just finishing a tow month tour of Europe before starting up as teachers in Bristol England. We found them to be quite like minded travelers with similar stratiges when it came to eating and entertainment (cheep). We debated the merits and advantages to the Pub Crawl pluged by the New Berlin tours we took earlier and eventualy decided to give the Berlin night life a shoot. After agreeing to meet back at eight Jill and I split for out hostel to eat quickly, cleanup and change.

By this point Jill wasn't feelin so hot and Hypoglysmic ass made for a bad combination. Once we ate we were fine and ready to get going. 4 U-ban transfers later and dwe were meeting up with our Pub Crawl group. Or at least we thought our group....

A quick Berlin tourism promo.

A nice Berlin tourism video. I especialy like the us of time laps photography through out the whole thing.

Finaly got the mms thing working. We're about to start the free walking tour. This is me in Berlin leaving from Brandenburg gate. Berlin rocks. It is cool, funky, and full of life.

Some Admin notes

Location: Berlin

Subject:

So just a few notes on our Blog. If you havn't figured it out Jill has been making our last few posts so that is why it has looked like I am talking in the third person.

Jill is all set up with her login so you will see the difference between mine and her posts from now on.

Cheers,

Ed

Frankfurt to Berlin

Location: Berlin

Subject:
We left the hostel this morning after a free breakfast and hiked back to the train station taking some pictures of Frankfurt. It looked a little less unapealing early in the morning but it still is not that pretty of a city to me. There were lots of ducks and swans hanging out near the water which was neat but I thought that to people who live here it must be like the geese in Fenway are to us Bostonians...annoying. We left at 10:13 for the 4 hour trip to Berlin. We soon found out we were sitting in someone's reserved seats, but we figure better we find out sooner than later. We ended up getting two aisle seats across from each other. I sat next to a sweet German girl who was helping me figure things out (how the seat goes back, stations on the free radio in the arm rest, and explained to me that you can't really sleep becauset the conductor changes or comes through at ever stop...there has got to be a better way I'm sorry). Eventually the girl next to Ed left and I scooted in next to him. The trip was nice and went by quicker than expected. We then waited for the EuroAid office to open which is a free booking and information place staffed by Americans. It was worth the wait because we had some big questions such as how do we get to the hostel we booked?? It is called Lete'm Sleep, which is in Eastern Berlin and a bit umm dirty. It is cheap though, which is fine AND free internet which makes me pretty happy. Score! We headed out to dinner after settling and exploring where the toilets that aren't clogged and flooded are and decided to eat at a non-German restaurant. It was actually middle eastern and right across the park from where we are staying. We were thinking of doing the pub crawl to see what the night life is like here but neither of us really want to actually drink or anything so we probably will pass. We are now watching how some of the towns we really wanted to see in Switzerland are flooded. Serious flooding at that. We are pretty shocked and will have to plan according to that. Interlaken was high on my list of to-do's and they showed it covered in high waters. Bern was also shown where we thought we might stop by in on the way to Lousane and/or Geneva. Oh well. We will keep you posted. It seems that we will stay here until the direct train either tomorrow at 4:40 or the following day at the same time because that is the only direct train to Baden-Baden which is a spa town with a casino. Oh yeah. Looking forward to that!

Rothenburg to Frankfurt

Location: Frankfurt

Subject:
Today we had breakfast in Ruth's house at 8 am with our friend, D. His english has already improved since we spent one night with him. It was good and we soon packed up and left our bags there to head to town. She told us to meet her at the bus station at around 4:30-5:00 and she would bring the bags so we wouldn't have to carry them. We headed out to town and had an awesome day. We first walked the wall and got some nice pictures over the town. We also went to the Friese shop to get our free map our guide book said we were able to get by flashing it. We walked in holding it, she ran over to us and offered us the map (usually €1.50) and told us we all get a 10% discount. Nice! After we climbed the Town Hall Tower. It was a bit creepy but an amazing view. I thought Ed's knee was going to snap in two climbing out the small door on top. Haha. After we toured around the town more playing in the playground with this insane spinning thing the boys got on but i turned green just watching them we went to the Christmas shops and I bought a few ornaments for souvineers while the boys just followed me around probably wondering how I could look at Christmas ornaments so long in August. We also went to Restaurant Glock which was recommended in our guide book to sample the local wines. It is actually a weinstube (wine bar) and for €4.20 you can choose to test taste either the dry or half dry wines. We all chose half dry and out came a little basket filled with 5 small wine glasses (5 cl each whatever that means. We all argued as to how many ounces it was haha.) Under each glass was a number that correlated to a paper he gave us describing each wine. It was really fun but it was too much wine for my empty stomach even with the bread. There was a large group from Montana there who were doing the exact same thing (because they had the same tour book-even funnier) and we had a blast discussing our favorites. After another quick walk around the part of the wall we hadn't walked we were off to meet Ruth then the bus at 5:20. Wouldn't you know that not one of us remembered where the bus dropped us off?? After asking a million people, getting a million different directions, and running all over the place I managed to find the bus leaving town at 5:30 (just when we decided to screw the bus and take the train bc we missed it). I, of course, obnoxiously flagged it down to get directions to where the stop was supposed to be to get our bags and he was sooo nice. He pulled over, called Ruth for us, and waited while she came to give us our bags. She wasn't too happy but we were all so happy to be on the bus. We stopped in Weikersheim and then next was Wurzburg where we had to say good-bye to D. So sad! We have his info though and his blog (http://blog.goo.ne.jp/t_daisuke4009) and will attempt to translate it with one of those online websites. Two hours later we arrived in Frankfurt and hiked to the Hostelling International youth hostel filled with Catholic youth groups on some sort of retreat to see the pope then travel. We were lucky to get a bed with all those people but the hostel has 470 beds. Ahh sleep time. Long day, but good. Just wish D is having a good time and made his train safe. (If he could find the train station-I'm just being silly here D. I'm sure you did fine because you are so awesome. Miss you!)

Fussen to Rothenburg

Location: on the bus

Subject:
Today we rode the bus all day. It stops in all the romantic towns along the way and the driver plays a cd discussing the area before stopping the bus to let you walk around the square, take pics, use the bathroom then pop back on. It is funny bc he has lots of dif. languages so you have to listen to german, english, and japanese all with the same corny music. It was actually really fun bc we got to see so much. We stopped in Hohenschwangau, Wieskirche, Landsberg, Ausburg, Nordlingen, Dinkelsbuhl, Feuchtwangen then finally Rothenburg. The driver set up our accomodations at a private house and another boy on our bus was going there too. I introduced myself and Ed and invited him to go on the night tour with us because i noticed he spoke english to the driver. He was so sweet and nice and ended up going to dinner with us and we hung out all night. His name is Daisuke and he is 24 and from Kioto, Japan. (check spelling later on that town). He changed his itinerary to hang with us the next day in Rothenburg and we slept happily after the annoying hostel experience.

Munich to Fussen

Location: fussen

Subject:
We picked up the romantic road bus at 8:00 am and headed to fussen. We made it into town a bit before 10 only to realize the hostel was more of a hike then expected and the castles were 5 km away, not in town as we thought. Our guide book says to get an english tour u need to be there at the crack of dawn so after a long wait at the hostel, the walk there and back, figuring out HOW to get to the castles, and arriving there we were shocked to get tickets to both with no wait. Luckily it was a rainy day and not too many people were out. They were beautiful and we had a lot of fun and exercise climbing up and down the "not for handicapped people" mountain paths to reach the entrance. The hostel was a mess though. They put us in seperate rooms as expected bc of the sexes being seperated but he had 2 girls in his room and i had 2 girls and 1 guy in mine. They messed up everything. We hated this hostel.

Boston to Munich

Location: Munich, Deutschland

Subject:

We arrived in London early this morning. After fighting for sleep on
some benches in the terminal we made our connecting flight to Munich
and promptly passed out for the whole flight there.

Jet lag was seriously taking its toll on me after leaving the airport
heading downtown on the S1 train. After a whole lot of confusion
about our subway tickets, we never really used them. Not sure how
that was supposed to work, but we will have to figure that out a bit
more in the coming weeks.

Now back to the jet lag. The trains are very fast and efficient but
the air was stuffy. I was starting to feel a bit woozy by about the
4th stop. In a mater of seconds up came the free Brit air waters that
I had been living on for the past few hrs. While puking into a
plastic bag, I was doing my best not to disgust the other passengers.
By the next stop, people were volunteering to help me off with my bag
and a very polite British women had to excuse herself from the seat
across from me.

After catching my breath we caught the next train in and continued our
journey downtown. After making it to Munich's Central station, we
needed to find the ticket office for buses on the Romantic Road, an
old medieval trade route that we will head out on tomorrow. Thank god
Jill has been doing her homework on this portion of the the trip
because it took well over an hr to find the ticket office while
following explicit directions from Rick Steeve's Guide for Germany and
Austria.

Next up was getting our dead tired bodies to the Euro Youth Hostel and
getting our beds for the night. All in all the place is quite nice
and we will have to stop back in on our last days in Munich at the end
of the trip. Jill and I quickly decided to nap for a few minutes.

Those few minutes turned into a few hrs and probably longer if it
weren't for two of our roommates waking us up by walking out of their
rooms laughing at the official Munich Oktoberfest Leinerhosen that
they manged to find while shopping earlier today. There is no way not
to laugh if a couple Brits in short shorts, hats, and suspenders is
your first sight after waking up from some much needed sleep.

Other than that the rest of the day has been just wandering Munich and
getting oriented.

Logan airport Boston, ma

Location: Boston, MA
So we made it to logan airport and are enjoying dinner thanks to a british airways meal voucher. You got to love labor disputes that leave us with 40$ in hand. This will be my last state side post for a few weeks. Ta ta

Around the World and Back in Three Weeks

Around the World and Back in Three Weeks

Another nice blog to check out I am headed out to Germany tomorrow and am hopping to do a similar thing as we go.

Train tix

Location: cambridge, ma
Subject:
Jill managed to talk fed- ex into giving us our rail passes out of the truck while stoped in the street. Anyway it was supper cool of them since it will save us a trip to Somerville.

Props to FedEx

Mobile test

Location: South Boston

Subject:

Here is my first mobile blogg post. I am planning on using this feature while in the Alps. Slick MMS Feature. I am doing this while I was hooked up to e-stim at a Physical Therapy appointment.

Passport in hand and ready to go

Location: Boston, MA

Subject:

Jill bless her little heart was able to pick up my passport earlier this afternoon downtown. All I need now is the rail pass' to show up.

Cha Cha Cha Changes...

Location: Marblehead, MA

Subject:
With a little help from my girlfriend Jill, my girlfriend and her family we were able to roll a ton of change. Basically I have been collecting change for the past year and some. At the end of each day I would empty my change into a Carlo Rossi 1 gallon wine jug. This was either money for when I became unemployed and broke or was going on a fun trip. It seems the later as won out (thank god). All in all we exceeded my expectations on the amount of loot I had saved. I think I have just about enough to cover Jill's and my EuroRail passes. Not bad.

Props to Ned Lovely for the ride up to Marblehead and even more Props to Grand Ma Tudal for her awesome change rolling abilities.

Planning Jitters VI

Location: Cambridge, MA

Subject: T-minus 6 days until Europe. I missed Fed-Ex with the rail passes and wasn't able to get out of work in time to get my Passport. Will have to get this all done on Monday. Damm!!

Planning Jitters V

Location: Cambridge, MA

Subject:

T-minus 7 days until Europe. Ordered Euro Rail passes today. We are really going I guess.

Planning Jitters IV

Location: Cambridge, MA

Subject:

T-minus 8 days until Europe. At the Passport Services Office's suggestion I called at 8 am when the appointment lines opened so that I could get a cancellations appointment sometime that day. I was in luck at 1:30 I managed to shoot downtown and get everything done. My passport will be ready for pick up on Friday.

Planning Jitters III

Location Cambridge, MA

Subject:

T-minus 10 days until Europe. Unfortunately I haven't been able to speek with anyone who knows anything at the Passport Services Office. Their automated phone services suck and there isn't really any way to check on the appointment you may have made.

When I finaly made it downtown I was only to discover that the Passport Services Offices stop taking interviwe appointments after 2 PM. HELP!!!! I don't know what I am going to do.

Planning Jitters II

Location Cambridge, MA

Subject:

T-minus days until Europe. I have an appointment with the State Department's Passport Services office downtown at the Tip O'Neil Federal building.

Planning Jitters

Location: Cambridge, MA

Subject:

T-minus 18 days until Europe. I am in a state of utter nervousness. I can't find my passport. I have looked hi and low, but no luck. I know I had it when I came back from Puerto Rico last summer. Unfortunately I am striking out on finding it. I guess I will have to look into a rush passport. I know it is possible and the offices are in Boston.