Walking by the Klöntalersee.

Today it was sunny for the first time in at least two weeks, which meant that I had to get out into the mountains. I'm quickly running out of weekends here, so I'm trying to make the most of them!

Anyways, I had been for a hike near the Klöntalersee over a year ago and remembered it as a really beautiful area, with a nice path around the lake. That, plus the fact that this area was supposed to be clear and sunny the whole day, made it easy to pick this place to go today. So, the Maurer-Jones family and I headed out in the morning for this area near Glarus. The lake was still, and you could see the reflection of the mountains super clearly.

One thing that I didn't remember was how steep the cliffs are, which today meant that the sun never reached the side of the lake we were hiking on. It was actually pretty chilly- we could see our breath for most of the way!

It was especially beautiful today because the mountains surrounding us all had a layer of fresh snow, which seemed to outline and highlight every feature in the rocks and to sharpen and focus everything. I really do love these clear, crisp days of fall with the hint of gold in the trees, the incredibly blue sky, and the clarity (coming from the lack of humidity) that makes it seem like every detail is in focus and like you could reach out and touch the mountains.

Once we got to the other side of the lake, we stopped for some lunch and a warm drink at a little restaurant. It was perfect for warming up after being so chilly on our hike!

The Klöntalersee is a beautiful place, and I am glad that I got to go back!

Hiking near the Klöntalersee.

This past weekend the weather was beautiful: sunny and very warm. I had to think long and hard about where to hike this weekend, since when it is 90 F, doing a really strenuous hike above the tree line is probably not the best idea. Accordingly, I chose this hike in the nearby kanton of Glarus. Not only was it nearby so that I could get the hardest part of the hike out of the way early in the day, but much of the hike was in the forest, and there was a lake along the way for cooling off. I was sold!

The hike started out in the town of Glarus, but quickly climbed in to fields. And a random gravel pit, which I had to take a picture of, just to show that there are some not-so-nice-looking places in Switzerland.

The lovely gravel pit.

This tree was so pretty!

The hike climbed through the woods for quite a long way, with peeks of the mountains every so often. As crowded as my hike last weekend was, this hike was empty. It was very lovely and tranquil to be on my own, climbing in the forest.

All of the sudden, I arrived at Schwammihöchi and was treated to the beautiful view out over the Klöntalersee. I have to say that the lakes and rivers here in Switzerland really do come in the most fantastical blues I've ever seen. For evidence, see here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here. And that's just from the past year or so. Just sayin'.

I took the opportunity to have a Coke at the restaurant overlooking the lake before hiking down the hill to the lake.

I had a picnic in the shade by the lake and seriously regretted not having my swimsuit so that I could also take a dip in the lake.

My picnic location.

From the lake, I hiked along a little stream back down to Glarus. I had a slight mishap in which I believe I hiked through a working shooting range. This is not even a joke. I was following the yellow hiking trail signs, but there were also "Danger from shooting" signs. I thought that the hiking signs could not possibly be wrong, until I ended up in some hollow with shooters on my right and targets on my left. Thankfully, the targets were elevated quite far above me, but it definitely made me a little nervous to hear the shooting around me. I'm not quite sure what I should've done instead, since stop-drop-and-roll doesn't exactly apply to gunfire, but thankfully I survived!

At the top of the shooting range. Oops.

At the bottom of the shooting range. You can see the targets in the background!

It really was a beautiful hike, through the cool and aromatic woods, up to the beautiful vantage above the lake, alongside the lake, and then back down along a river. Two thumbs up!

View over the Klöntalersee.

Skiing in Elm: the full post.

This past weekend I went on a ski trip to Elm with a group of 22 people from my institute at ETH. Over half of the people were from my research group, and the rest were from the microbiology group with whom we share a lab.

We got up bright and early on Saturday morning to take the train together to Elm. Of course, my tram happened to be late (which hasn't happened to me before), so I missed my connection and was really late getting to the train station. I literally had to sprint from the tram to catch the train, which made me pretty happy that I wasn't also hauling skis in addition to my overnight bag, sleeping bag, and ski helmet. Thankfully, I made the train in time.

Once we got to Elm, those who needed to rented our skis and then we took the gondola up to the ski hut where we stayed overnight. It was a really sweet set-up, since the ski hut was basically in the middle of the moutain: 25 m from the top of one gondola and 100 m from the bottom of another that would take you to the top. We dropped our stuff off and hit the pistes.

The weather was really perfect. It was sunny and totally clear, with lots of new snow. I haven't seen the sun in what seems like a very, very long time, so it was really nice. Although I, of course, didn't think about putting on sunscreen until it was too late and ended up looking a little like a lobster with a very nice outline where my sunglasses were. I even got sunburned under my chin, because of the reflectivity of the snow!

Lilli and Jan and I, who went to ski school together, decided to start out by going up to the top and then going down a blue piste to get warmed up before our private lesson.

Big mistake.

While Lilli and I were maybe a little more comfortable because we had been skiing the weekend before, the slopes at Elm were much steeper and busier that any that we had been on before, which made it really hard. Not only that, but we saw a helicopter picking up an injured person off of the slopes, which is not always a good sign. Basically, we had a bad experience.

After skiing once down, we retired to the ski hut to recover and have a little lunch before our lesson. The view from the ski hut was really amazing!

At noon our lesson started, and it really was the best lesson so far. (Although I guess I've only had two lessons, so I don't have a huge basis for comparison...) The instructor was really helpful and was great at finding ways to help you remember to be in the proper form. Unfortunately, my boots were much too large, so I was sliding around in them more than was helpful for proper ski form. Overall, though, I really feel that I made progress during the lesson, and when we went down the same blue piste from the morning, it was really so much better.

The piste on Saturday.

Lilli and Jan.

After the lesson, we went up and down by ourselves a few more times before going to aprés-ski at the restaurant near our hut. We enjoyed a beautiful sunset, had a beer, and played a typical aprés-ski game that involved competitive hammering of nails into a tree stump. It definitely required a lot of hand-eye coordination, which I am apparently lacking.

Sunset on Saturday.

After, we had a nice dinner at our hut and sat around and chatted until we all couldn't stop yawning (which was approximately at 9.30 pm). All that fresh air just does a number on you!

This was my first time sleeping in a mountain hut, and it definitely was an experience. Basically, I was in a room with eight other people, with all of us sort of in one giant, connected bunk bed. We were four across on the bottom and four across on the top (see picture from website below). The mattresses were definitely not large, and any time someone moved you could feel it. It definitely takes a relationship with colleagues to a whole new level when you sleep cheek to cheek with them... I was just happy that I was zipped up in the sleeping bag so that I couldn't flail in the middle of the night and hit someone.

**Photo from here.

On Sunday morning we woke up to a steady snow. In some ways, this made skiing more difficult, because you actually couldn't see that much, especially in the higher bits where the fog rolled in, so figuring out where the piste was going was a challenge. But the fresh, powdery snow was really nice to ski in and nicer to fall down in, and there were not so many people skiing. I actually had quite a bit more fun skiing on Sunday than on Saturday, simply because I wasn't so nervous about all of the other people skiing around me, I felt that the snow was nicer, and I finally started to feel the rhythm of it.

The piste on Sunday.

I feel like I turned a corner with skiing this weekend. I am no longer afraid for my life the whole time I am skiing, only some of time, and I can imagine a time when skiing will actually be fun and not just terrifying and difficult. I've even decided to look for skis at the end of the season, to see if I can find some on sale.

After skiing, we traveled back to Zurich together, and I was so happy to sleep in my own bed! I'm actually not as sore from two days of skiing as I thought I would be, so I am pretty pleased that I had gone skiing a few times before to get used to it. It was  really quite a fun weekend, and I really enjoyed going with such a large group of people- hanging out with old friends and making new ones.