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| I've seen uglier places...The beautiful Melchee-Frutt! |
After a slightly interrupted night’s sleep thanks to my friend Mr. Jet Lag, SMS and I were ready for a fun day. Gisele had planned for us to go on a hike to see the bearded vultures, an endangered species that recently had a pair released in the wild. Gisele and her family had seen the release a few months prior so she was excited to see how they were doing.
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| Wildflowers don't care where they grow...which Dolly Parton song? Anyone? |
Breakfast was a delicious feast of croissants and jam. I had been eating super “clean” before the vacation so it was a switch to be eating so much grain but it wasn’t hard. In fact, it was delicious!
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| Hiking! |
We headed out to Melchsee-Frutt, a four-seasons resort kind of place. We took the train to the gondola station and then rode up the mountain. It was an absolutely gorgeous place and we hiked for about 1.5 hours to get to the vultures. Now, we did have kids with us and it was a fairly leisurely pace so keep that in mind before you think we are super slow. We were hiking in peak wildflower season so all of the fields were filled with flowers, which was a theme of the entire vacation.
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| Fire pit. |
The highlight of the hike for me was lunch! Hear me out. In Switzerland, they have little huts with fire pits that are stacked with firepits. You start a fire and then grill the sausage you’ve brought along on your hike. It is amazing! It’s also very neighborly since at lunchtime, you tend to take over your predecessor’s fire and then someone takes over yours. It was awesome! I love the concept. It would never happen in California, land of the wildfire but maybe on the East Coast…
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| Do you see the bearded vulture sitting on the little rock? |
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| Yum! |
We got to where the vultures were and yes! They are doing very well! We saw both of them flying and roosting so that was very cool. We hung out for a bit, watched the kids climb a rocky hill face after SMS decided to be a good example. The kids did great but we were a little worried when we saw a guy climb up holding two kids. I said something in English (inadvertently! I was just so shocked someone was doing something so stupid!) and his wife looked up and yelled at him. International diplomat over here!
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| Playing at the Visitor's Center! |
After hanging out, we stopped in a cafe, had a drink and then caught a little train back to the gondola. Now, when I say train, it is actually several cars linked together and driven on car wheels but the exterior looks like a train. It’s very touristy and we saw similar transports in other cities.
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| Yay, no more walking! |
We headed back to Gisele’s and had a delicious dinner of pork chops, potatoes and salad. I felt so Swiss, I almost started speaking Swiss German!
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