Hey everyone! This is going to be a Saturday 10! Yay!

1. So I had such a good time going up the Ammertenspitz white blue white trail that I and a few other vollies did anther one! This was a completely different path though. Rather than up to a peak this path was along the side of a mountain. The reason why I think this is marked as a white blue white is because of how much shale and water there was over the path. One wrong slip and you were going to slide down the side of a mountain. However I found this a lot less challenging than Ammertenspitz so that is progress maybe?


2. On my next day off I did something a little less fun. On the staff challenge one challenge is to clean stockli (the staff house) all by yourself. So all the vollies made a chart at the beginning of the season and assigned a week to everybody. Mine was one of the last weeks, this past week to be exact. Let me tell you this was no hour job. It took me all day. I cleaned all bathrooms, living room, common areas, kitchen, and my room. Stockli is like a frat house except for all the beer cans and solo cups. Us girls are tired, we get home and maybe eat something and put away half of what we get out. I am just as bad, no denying it. I think most of the vollies will be happy to have their own space that they clean and keep up (or don't) when they get back home.

3. On my last full week on program I got to go to both Thun and Interlaken! These are two great towns in the Bern Oberland and they are both lake side. In Thun I got to go to the oberhofen castle which is just so pretty. From the castle there are great views of both Thun lake and Neissen, the swiss pyramid. Then in interlaken I got to go to Trummelbach falls, which I have already mentioned in my post on waterfalls, but this time I learned a new fun fact! The valley that holds the Trummelbach  falls was J.R Tokens inspiration for Rivendale! So cool! I also got to hangout with so cool vollies, Alison (my roomie) and Danita!




4. Then on my next day off I went somewhere that I have been looking forward to since the beginning! Geneva! It was a Princess day out, as me and Alison went together :)) (Princess Pollard and Princess Proctor) Unfortunately (like verrrrry dissapointingly) the UN was closed as it was a Sunday. But the weather was really nice so that was good. We went to the red cross museum and up the famous church were you get a birds eye view of the city, the gigantic fountain in Lake Geneva is pretty nice. Later in the day I even went swimming in the lake. Over all, nice day. However as far as cities go not my favorite. I think I must have built it up for more than it was because I found it to be a good city, but no where near amazing. Still very good day!


5. The day after Geneva we had our staff day out! It was supposed to be a surprise, but one of the Adventure park guides let slip what we were doing. And so the staff day out activity was.... klettersteiging! Which is a combination of climbing and hiking! We went on the entsligen one and it was very cool! Unfortunately it was a bit of a rainy day, however it did not take the enjoyment out of the klettersteig so that was nice. After the klettersteig we were suppose to go to the Adelboden pool, but due to weather we decided just to go back to Our Chalet and play games. We watched movies and then for dinner we had burgers and chips! (french fries). It was great I had not had a burger in forever! Then an adventure park guide (Christian) came to dinner. He was there because, actual surprise, we were going to repel out of the chalet attic window!!! So great! The long term staff planned it all and they did a great job!





6. This is now our last event group, event 8. The staff has started to get a little nostalgic because some members will be gone before this event is over with. I have met so many wonderful people this summer, it is hard to see when good things end. I know I have other things to look forward too, but I hate change especially if something is going really well. Not only will I miss the people, but I am going to miss Switzerland. Seeing these views everyday, they never grow less spectacular. Ok getting sad now gonna stop talking about it.

7. Because the klettersteig was such a success on staff day out me and another vollie, Emma G. from Maryland USA, went to go try the Kandersteg one. The one on entsligen was rated a two out of five for difficulty. The Kandersteg one was a high four. So we knew it was going to be more difficult, how much more difficult I do not think I would ever have known until I was actually doing it. This was the MOST terrifying thing I have ever done. It was so crazy scary it is hard to justly describe. So like many other things I will post a video.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1jJ7WimRyW8

8. After I survived the Klettersteig, Emma and I went to get some ice cream. It started to rain, perfect timing! Then we went off to go see the KISC (Kandersteg International Scout Center) campfire! This was a must see during the summer. The KISC campfires are legendary for their size. It is more of a bonfire than a campfire. Sam, another summer vollie, Emma, and I met up with some of the KISC staff that we had met before sat to watch the campfire. Bosco, one of the KISC staff, said that there was 700 guests, 600 of which were British. So it was not the most diverse campfire, but it was so much fun. The energy was really great everyone was getting into their songs and skits. We got to share a song, which was fun. Here are some pics.




9. Tonight I finally went out to eat. Eating in Switzerland is so expensive. A normal price for dinner is 20 to 40 francs, which are the same as dollars. 12 dollars in the states gets me a pretty decent meal at some decent restaurants. Not so in Switzerland, where the minimal wage is 25 francs an hour. I had Rostii because I heard the traditional way was so much different than the Chalet's. It was really good, but I am so full! It was nice to have dinner out for a change though.

10. Today I made my traditional dish from home, the yummy chocolate chess pie. It actually did not turn out too bad. Most the vollies ate it anyway. Here is the recipe:

http://allrecipes.com/recipe/chocolate-chess-pie-ii/

Have a great weekend everyone!!!

Hey guys! Happy Friday!

1. So I did it! Hiked to the top of Ammertenspitz! The white blue white trail was crazy, not physically too hard, but wow I tried not to look down at all. It is a good thing the girl I went with was so chill about it because I was definitely nervous enough for the both of us! Not only did we hike to the top, we hiked faster than the predicted time, so that is cool. I can officially be called a keen Mountaineer. That is what the sign said anyway. Here are some pics. And a video if I can figure out how to post it.




(this is what we hiked up!)




2. So these past few days I went to Locarno, the Italian part of Switzerland, with Betsy. It did not necessarily go exactly as planned. First of all it was so rainy and expensive and just Murphy's law all over the place. I spent a good amount of francs to see a movie, 2 Guns, at the Locarno film festival. Really cool right? About 30 mins into the film it started to poor and lightning and thunder. We are sitting outside mind you no cover whatsoever. So we sit like this for 10 mins getting soaked, eventually we try to find shelter around the surrounding areas. There is no room at all, it is to loud to hear the movie, and we missed half the movie trying to find a dry, quite spot. Finally we are like fine lets just leave. We catch a train mind you at like 12:14. Because though the ticket said the movie started at 9:30 the mcs talked for AN HOUR AND A HALF. Then the next day we get up and it is still pouring. look at weather this is the forecast for the rest of the day: 100-80% chance of rain all day. And not just drizzle but buckets of rain coming down. Suffice to say not as successful as I hoped. I did have some excellent raspberry crumble....

3. Meanwhile, as I am on my sad trip, my family is here:


and doing things like this:

and this:


Uhmppphhh. Can you believe they went to Bald Head Island without me? I mean yes I am in Switzerland, but still. The nerve, having fun without me.

4. Also back in NC, lots of people, as I can tell from Facebook, are returning to the Hill after their awesome summer adventures. It seems everyone is gearing to go back to school. And a part of me wants to go back and start this upcoming semester with everyone else. It is a bit sad seeing everyone gearing up and knowing I am going to be absent this time around. It is like missing a day of school, fun, but you kinda wonder what you missed at school and you feel a bit like you might have missed out on something. One of my friends is gear up for freshman year! She is even in the same dorm/floor/side as I was! Good luck to all those in this coming semester at UNC! Hopefully I am not going to be missing anything to big...

5. Finally I just wanted to know if any of you guys have any suggestions for places to visit in any of these countries: Germany (most likely Berlin), Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg. Suggestions can be cities, or activities or not well known areas that you think is worth a visit! You can leave a comment on this post or shoot me an email. I would love to hear your suggestions! Also I will be visiting these places in winter so keep that in mind :)

With that have a good weekend everyone!

(ps when I wrote this post it was Friday, then the internet failed, so it is now kinda a saturday 5..)

Hey everyone!

1. This week I am guest services again! Yaaaay..... So to counter how much time I am spending indoors cleaning and cooking, on my off days I am determined to go hiking around the area. So one day me and a few other vollies, Betsy from Hong Kong and Jana from Slovakia, hiked to Kandersteg! This required going up over a mountain range to get from one valley to another, about a 5 hour hike swiss time. It took about 6 1/2 hours. On the hiking signs there is always an estimated time for different destinations, see below: 

So the time estimates you see on the signs are in swiss time. For example this sign says it takes 3hrs to get to kandersteg. It took us 4hrs and we were going to a closer point in the valley than kandersteg so going into the town center would have been at least another 1/2 hr. These shorter time estimates are due to the fact that the Swiss grow up hiking, they bring their 6 yr olds out and up onto mountains (seriously passed a 6yr old running down the mountain not 20 meters from this sign, notice the height of this mountain pass?) When we got to Kandersteg we ate dinner there and slept over. It is a great place to hang out, I even met a group of boys there with their unit from Chapel Hill! (One was wearing a UNC t-shirt). Then in the morning me and Jana grabbed some breakfast and headed back to Our Chalet on the bus, cause we both had to work that day. Here are some more pictures from our journey:
Betsy and Jana and Kandersteg! 
Adelboden!:


2. We had a special staff night out this week! We got to go to the Circus! It is a pretty famous circus in Switzerland and features no animals. The main acts were clowns and acrobatics. The Clowns were meant to act like goofy children and came in acts between the acrobatics. Clowns are not my favorite, I am not really a clown person, but this little girl behind me found them hysterical, so I think it is just me. The acrobatics were amazing, both girls and boys participating. I was expecting older people preforming, however all the acts were preformed by especially youthful looking folks, and some very attractive might I add. So that was nice. A lot of people compared it to Cirque du Soleil, which is the really famous, amazing Circus that lots of people go to. Including my family! Without me. So I personally do not know how it compares with Cirque du Soleil, but as far as I can tell it was a good show.

(also we got photo bombed... that random guy in the back we have no idea who he is....)

3. This week was a very special week for several reasons:

1. The most diverse group evvver! two groups from Japan, one from Norway, 2 from Canada, 1 from the US, and 1 from the UK. wow! For a place that has seen a lot of North Americans in this particular event the North Americans have been out numbered! 
2. It is the largest group we will have, the total number of guests rounding right about at 100. We are typically comfortable at around 60 people.
3. It was Swiss day! August 1st is like Switzerland's July 4th! It was super exciting, firework bangs starting to go off around noon and continued until 6am (not as cool). At night we made a Chalet precision into town where we sat and listened to an important person speak, about what I do not know I do not speak swiss-german. There were free sausages and bread, which were delicious. There was an alpine horn show and yodeling. Finally after the Swiss national anthem we gathered and joined the parade, which was oddly enough a majority of non-swiss people waving swiss flags. The other groups in the parade included the UK girl guiding group staying somewhere else in the valley and a group of Scottish boy Scouts who brought and played bag pipes in the parade. So it was a bit bravehearty... Then after the parade we sat and watched the spectacular firework display! Then home to bed. 
4. It was also the CHALET'S 81st BIRTHDAY!!! We had a carnival were we did different stations and crafts, games, you name it. At the end of the day we had a huge cake, lots of candy, and the chance to make great smore's! We decorated the place head to toe, and gave out invites with schedules. I think everyone had a good time. My roomie (Alison) and another vollie (Aisling) made the cake! Take a look: 

4. I have been hearing a lot of new information from Nottingham! I now know my dorm, Derby Hall, which is where a friend who went there suggested I stay at and where she personally stayed for two years! It is super central, but also very close to the bus stop so you can get to town really easily! I also now know my classes: American Chaps and Maps: American foreign policy since 1950, American Film adaptions, IPE and the political economy, and Democracy and it's critics. This ends up being 20 hrs credit so I will have to drop one... but I am into all the ones I wanted which is what counts! It is nice now that the summer is barreling to an end to have something else exciting to look forward too! 

5. The last thing I want to mention is that tomorrow I plan on completing my personal challenge! For our staff challenge you have the chance to come up with your own personal challenge which you can then earn points for. Mine is completing a white blue white trail. There are three types of walking trails, road, white red white, white blue white. We only take guests on roads and white red white trails. The white blue white is supposedly a big jump from red. Blue trails are supper exposed and usually falling of them can be very detrimental to health. However, I will be careful and slow up the white blue white path, and it is supposed to be a challenge. I have seemingly developed a little bit of vertigo as I have grown older so hopefully it won't be too terrible... I guess we will just have to see tomorrow! 

New blog post tomorrow, promise!

Have a good weekend everyone!!

Hey Everyone!

It has been a while! But I have been busy...So fortunately for you, two friday posts this time! Yay!

1. Last week I was lucky enough to be picked to go along with the white water rafting group! Every week on program one vollie gets to accompany whichever guests signed up to go white water rafting. It is during the Interlaken day, so we go see the chocolate show in the morning and then we quickly have lunch and then one group goes to see waterfalls, the other to rafting! I have been rafting once before in NC. It was with Girl Scouts of course! Now my water trips with Girl Scouts have sometimes left me wanting. For example when I was in sixth grade I went on a tubing trip down the James River in Virginia. Rather than the water doing all the work, I specifically remember having to paddle my way down the James. Not enjoyable. Though there were a few rapids we went down which was fun. Then the rafting trip I was talking about before in NC, was good, except a college student group of about 100 people accompanied us. Their boats kept getting stuck on rocks and we were almost always waiting on getting them unstuck, enjoyable but not as exciting. This rafting trip though, was perfect! Our guide seemed British, but I later found out he was born and raised, and owned his own rafting company in Uganda. In my boat there were a few swiss German guys there for a bachelor party, an English girl of 12 and her father. The rapids were great, the water was really cold. We got to practice rescuing each other out of the water. This was the first of the many adventures this girl and her father were about to do that week, the others include, but are not limited to, 1. sky diving 2. bungee jumping 3. paragliding 4. canyoning 6. ice climbing. I checked later that day, yep no age restrictions on any of this in Switzerland. No big deal. When we got back to the rafting place all the girls and leaders were telling my what a fabulous time they had and how great their guides had been. We got cheese and bread and a free drink when we got back. Really great I'll post a link to the place we use here in case y'all are ever in Switzerland.
http://alpinraft.ch/

2. That week I also got another chance at the adventure park! I did not do the pendulum swing like last time, but I have gotten pretty good at abseiling down from the bridge! This time because it was not raining we got to rock climb on real rock. I have to say after doing it both ways, I much prefer the real rock. This time after the girls had climbed for a bit I got Betsy (another vollie) to belay while I climbed. Rock climbing is an activity I could really see myself trying to do more of when I get home. Maybe get a pair of rock climbing shoes, they really help, and see what North Carolina has to offer! I have been to hanging rock to climb before (yep with Girl Scouts!). Which was a lot of fun. So I guess I will have to look into it more.

3. This week I got to climb up Bunderspitz! Again! Except this time instead of going during the day, I got to hike up there at night! There was only a girl from Northern Ireland and a mother and daughter from Washington. We normally take up to 18 girls up bunderspitz, but this time the interest was really low. That's okay though, it was better with a smaller group! We started the hike at 7:30 pm and stopped at a cheese hut at about 9:30 there we met a very cool atmosphere. There were several other hiking groups there having drinks. We settled in above were the cows stay, yes it smelled. Then we went back downstairs to have hot chocolate. Then to bed! For four hours... cause we got back up at two. When got up at two you cannot imagine the stars. They were so pretty it was incredible. After working at the Planetarium for so long my fascination with stars, planets, and space has really grown. So it was really great to see the stars so bright. Then we made our way up to the top of the peak, hiking until 6:00 am. Then we settled down to watch the sunrise right there. I ate toblerone mountains on a mountain. The sunrise was beautiful coming up a lot quicker than I imagined. Once we had our full of the sun we headed down to arrive back at the Chalet at 10:30.

4. This week I have been really working on my staff challenge! So I went swimming in a lake. A glacier lake! It was very cold, but also refreshing. I swam for a good while then got a cappuccino, then hiked to another lake, only entered up to my stomach couldn't take it so I didn't swim in that one. Oh well next time. Then I also before going up bundersptiz went to the local swimming pool in Adelboden. This pool is really really nice. It is also really really freeee! It had a trampoline that you jumped of into the water, as an alternative to a diving board. Which I was all over, I love diving boards! Then we just sat out by the pool, I read David Sedaris. It started to rain. So we had to go!

5. I had one more day off before my week of guest services. So me and Betsy went to a valley that was only open to the public around 1913. This was because it was really hard to get to the valley and the three towns until they started to build the rail way through the valley in 1903. The best part about this is that most of the houses and buildings look so different than the rest of Switzerland. They look older and more rudimentary. Another great aspect of this valley was that they have a festival and tradition that have to do with wooden masks. Now they put on a festival to scare non-locals once a year in February. It's great! I will put up some pictures and links below!!!!!!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L%C3%B6tschental







6. Like I said this week I am on guest services! Pros: This American life podcast listening time, quite cleaning, afternoon breaks, giving tours. Cons: People, cooking, cleaning up after cooking, and getting up to fix breakfast. Like anything both pros and cons. It is teaching me a lot about how I think working in the hotel business would be. So that is cool.

7. So new developments for the year! I was talking to my roommate here, Alison, about how cool it would be to visit Our Chalet in the winter! All the snow the skiing! It would be a winter wonderland! So we started to look at programs for which we could attend. Then I skype with my friend Arlee, who has grown close with a girl from Manchester while at camp. Arlee says "I want to come visit you and Manchester in England". So I am like "I might go back to Our Chalet in the winter" Arlee "OMGIWANNAGOTOO!!" and I am like "OMGYESSSS!" so now I am scheduled to fly home from Zurich coming full circle this year!
http://www.ourchalet.ch/en/events/20828

8. This week I did the amazing! I finished a book! I started the book because the movie that the book is based off looks amazing, and I really want to see it. So to help with the impatience I decided to read the book and now it was AMAZING. The main character just had a great voice. There are a few things I would like the movie to do differently, the main girl was kinda whiny and annoying in the book so I  hope she is a more likable character in the movie and the ending was really open. But the main character, I don't know how they will do him justice. I think it will come all down to the acting and writing. It always does. I am really hopeful though because the guys who wrote 500 days of Summer also wrote this movie!! And the clips and trailers I have watched seem pretty good, links to both below!!!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wceaLzbtuDY

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ItJr9dtRon4

9. Today I went with Alison, and then last minute, one of the vollies friends who is visiting her while she is at Our Chalet had nothing to do, so he came along... Scootering!!!!!!!!! I know what you are thinking what do I mean by this. Well we took a gondola up a mountain, longest gondola ride evvverrr, and then at the top of this mountain we rented scooters and then we rode them all the way down! Multiple times!! It was so much fun, we rode into town and got ice cream and then kept taking the gondola up. Unfortunately I forgot my camera because the views were unbelievable. But there were a view photos captured and I will put those up here!




10. If you have been keeping up with my blog you know that I really miss watching movies. So me and Betsy have decided that we are going to an international film festival in Locano Switzerland, which is in the Italian part of Switzerland. Here is the movie we are going to see!!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dP562PeToBQ

Helllloooo!

1. So during the summer Our Chalet has a ton of guests, generally young girls, who come to visit during the summer holidays. Most of these girls do a week of program at the Chalet, activities including two town days: Thun and Interlocken, two hikes: Elsigenalp and woodcarver, one on site day, one day at the adventure park, and one free day! This is a normal week of program for these girls, not including all the night program we do, which includes a night hike to the peak of an alp! However, we also have mini breaks in between big program groups. These are called Education First (EF) groups. These are a bit different to the groups we see during the week because EF is a tour company that not only works with girl scouts/guides, but also school and church groups. The EF tour that we often host has the girls coming from London then Paris and then to Our Chalet as a last stop. These girls have usually had about two weeks of traveling when they get to us and they are often very tired. They stay for 1 1/2 days and two nights. It is crazy how different the two groups dynamics are.

2. Now to say a bit more about Swiss food! We have a traditional dish about 2 times every week, one for EF and once for the program group. It is called Rosti:

I have never had it the traditional Swiss way because here at the Chalet to make it quick and easy we bake the dish rather than frying it. So I believe it would be better getting it out, but it is still pretty good at the Chalet. Another really Swiss dish is called Alpine Macaroni


If you can tell, what makes it Alpine rather than normal Macaroni is the: caramelized onion, potato, meat, and apple sauce (that you pour on top), that accompany the macaroni and cheese. The other big dish that I am sure you have heard of is Fondue which literally means "melted' in Swiss German. They do cheese fondue, chocolate fondue, etc.

3. One of the night programs we offer is international night. This is the night after the guest's first full day at Our Chalet. On this night each unit/troop/group puts on a bit of a show to tell about where they come from. This week we had a few groups from Canada, the USA, one from Scotland, and one from Northern Ireland. This time around we learned/watched a dance from almost every group. Whether it was line dancing from the Michigan girls, or traditional Irish Clogging from the Irish girls we could all stand up and participate. My personal favorite was the dance the Scottish showed us. It was a partnered dance and it was crazy! Here is a video of that dance:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lgMcMI0Qmok

4. Have learned a lot of new dances, but also a lot of new campfire songs! Here are my top 5 new fav songs!

• Auntie Monica: (Here it is sung--- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Clu3TX3ZajE and here is the dance that goes with it! This video is quite long, but pretty funny... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uY2V94zwZ8g
• Campfires Burning: This is a song you sing when you are trying to start a fire, or at the beginning of campfire, and it is so catchy! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZNTSjgXfMk8 
• Land of the Sliver Birch: this I think is a predominantly Canadian song, it is wonderful. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UlE9uB_23kw
• Vem Kan Segla? This is a Swedish folk song that one leader who has family in Sweden saw in the Our Chalet book, recognized and sang for us. So crazy though because I recognized the tune! We would sing it in English at a camp that I worked at last year at the closing ceremony as the girls were sending wish boats out into the lake, it is gorgeous in both languages! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lTeMmJ_F9LE
• and of course, the Our Chalet song! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5xoCHpcNy6Q

5. When guests come to Our Chalet they are told they can try to earn the Our Chalet Challenge badge. They must complete a good amount of challenges to get said badge and the amount of times I have to give my signature is ridiculous. However, we as vollies can complete the staff challenge. With over 30 options and earning up to 80 points the staff challenge is no small matter. The challenge tasks range from having a tea party in baby chalet, to checking out the night life in Adelboden, to trying an extreme sport. They seem to be a list of things not to miss out on while on staff. I am trying to complete mine, but I only have 18 points so far... But don't worry everyone! I have a plan to do three tasks a week from now on! Hopefully I can earn whatever it is you earn when you complete the staff challenge!

Have a good weekend!!!

Hey guys! I got safely back from France a day or two ago! Here is my "Friday" five!

1. For the week before the 5th of July I was on my turn for guest services. I was told that guest services would be something of a break from program, which in some ways it was. However, it was not a break in that it felt like less work, if anything it was more exhausting! I was on site for most of the week cleaning building and preparing food. You are up at 7:00 am to get breakfast ready and done by 9:00 pm after washing up after dinner. The list of activities for the day seems to get longer each day so you never quite finish checking off your to do list. Even so the Chalet looks very clean after a long days of work and program starts to become more of a prize when you don't get to do it every week. Guest services has its purpose, but there was no denying that it was quite a long week.

2. This was the week of the Fourth! It was my first fourth of July out of the states. I like Fourth of July, but I didn't realize how much I would miss going to get food, then piling into the back of a pickup truck and watching fireworks! We decorated the dining hall with American flag colors and themes, put the American flag up on the flag pole, and popped a few fire crackers. The world center manager's husband also had an American folk sing along at a local bistro. The troop of girls from Georgia who attended the second event came and then several of the other vollies too. We sang this land is your land, country roads, and a few girl scout songs before I had to go back to help with dinner. Another vollie from Florida made apple crumble for desert, which was soooo good! All in all a good fourth, but I am looking forward to the next one in the states.

3. Finally my break days were there! After working for six days straight I was super ready for a break, and to be honest a get away from the Chalet. Lucky me, I was headed to France with another summer vollie Emma Walsh from Newfoundland, Canada! On the way we stopped in Basel which is a city in Switzerland that is super close to Germany and France. The Rhine River runs through it and the town center is great! It was a nice stop for the day. We went to the Basel art museum which was having a Picasso exhibit. We saw a lot of Picasso's pieces, I will put a few of the highlights up. We also saw some Monet's, Dali's, and Van Gogh's. Emma and I ate dinner at the Cathedral near the Rhine than went to catch a train into France! We ran through the station grabbed a train to Mullhouse and then had to wait there due to strikes going on. We grabbed a cappuccino (my new fav thing). Finally we caught a train to Belfort and we were in the city that the festival was in!!!!!!!!! Here are the Picasso's:









4. So we got to Belfort and just figured we would go follow others with sleeping bags/the signs in french with the Festival's name on them. We stood around waiting for a bus for a while and everyone just seemed confused. Everyone also seemed to be a bit intoxicated, due to France having zero laws about open containers. Finally we filed back into the train station to find a train with the festivals name, Eurockeennes, on the screen, a free train to the festival score! There was then a shuttle to the campsite, all of these were free! All the French use this one tent, it was all over the campsite, just a sea of them here:



They are supposed to be able to be put up in two seconds. Our tent that we borrowed from the Chalet stuck out like a sore thumb, haha. The campsite was beautiful, it was flat but was surrounded by mountains that looked just like the mountains back home rather than the alps. Emma and I went straight to bed because we were so tired and wanted to rest for the next day....

5. Finally the day had come! We got up planning on going back to Belfort to see the town before the festival opened at 4. But there was no way we could tell to get back to the town so we walked for a bit and found a local bakery had great croissant and coffee. We then walked to the super market and wandered around (so many shirtless/shoe less french boys....). We went and sat by the creek behind the super market and later when walking back from the creek we passed by the Phoenix tour bus! Finally we entered the festival!!! The first group we saw was from Ireland, their average age was 16! Then we got some Argentinian bbq and sat and watch Kenny James, a french rapper that I did not understand a word of! Finally, finally, we started to gather for Two Door Cinema Club. It was a bit of a mosh pit in the front, but the show was awesome. However, everyone was there to see Phoenix. The crowd knew every word and went crazy over the more popular songs like Listmania. Emma and I walked a way that night wishing for a repeat and humming our favorite songs. Pictures from this event I will have to post later because I need to borrow ones Emma took :))

Hey guys!

Here are the Saturday 10 points I promised!

1. Our first official guests for the summer was a Troop of girls from the Chicago area. My mom sometimes talks about the Chicago accent she ran into while at collage. However, I had no idea the accent was that strong until I heard some of these girls speak, whoa. If you don't know what I am talking about I would definitely YouTube Chicago accent. We had a really nice dinner for the first official day of summer season, raclette, which is an extremely famous Swiss dish. You take raclette cheese and use a raclette grill to cook both the cheese and the veggies/meat. Here is a pic to help explain:

Nice right?

The Chicago group was impressed anyway. Which was good because they were a great group of girls, very kind, respectful and helpful! They made all the staff bracelets and by the end asked to take a picture with us! They also were sporting the new Girl Scout tie which I am posting a link to cause I think it's so cool! 

http://www.girlscoutshop.com/OFFICIAL-SENIOR-AND-AMBASSADOR-SCARF

Yay! Girl Scouts is finally getting with the necker movement! 

2. Here in Switzerland, along with mountains, there are a ton of waterfalls! The couple I have been to have been really awesome because it is just starting to get warmer so a lot of the snow is melting off the alps and streaming off the mountains. I went with another vollie, Angie from Vancouver Canada, to one of the tallest waterfalls in Switzerland, Engstligen falls right here in our Valley! 

And here is a pic from when I went! 

As you can see it was very misty from all the water coming off the falls! 

Another famous falls I have visited are called the trummelbach falls. These are super cool because there are 10 of them falling from/off/and through the Mountain. You take a lift up to about waterfall 7 and walk the rest of the way up. Then you walk down, in and out of caves and looking at all the falls. Here are some pics! Not my pics, but some pictures I found on google images!

a

And finally the last fall that is famous that other vollies have gone to, not me yet, are the Reichenbach falls that Sherlock Homes falls off during his "final" battle with Moriarty in the books. He doesn't die supposedly in the books because Sir Arthur Conan Doyle brought Sherlock back to life because Doyle needed more money? That is the story I have been told before at least. Anyway there is a little Sherlock Museum and everything, it sounds really fun! 

3. Here at Our Chalet we have nightly programs during the week. A very popular one is called Swiss night. First Fritz, a very old Alpine horn player, comes and plays the alpine horn. Fritz is so old that he, as a boy, used to run errands for Falk. If you remember Falk was the first Center Manager for the first 20 years after the Chalet opened in 1932. An Alpine horn looks like: 

And here are the Vollies with Fritz! 

After Fritz plays his horn we listen to the Vogellisi a Swiss folk song that is sung by children all around Switzerland here it is: 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iA-nhE2heuo

It is about a girl named Lisa and because vogel means bird they believe Lisa had a pet bird that was always on her shoulder as she walked around. In the story all the village boys thought Lisa was so beautiful, so they wrote her a song. In the actual song it not only describes how beautiful Lisa is, but also the village of Adelboden and the Berner Oberland, which is the canton that Adelboden is in! Fritz told us that Lisa used to live behind the Chalet, but I don't know how much I believe him...

The girls then play Swiss jeopardy which is really just facts about Switzerland. The prize is....

Yum!

4. For a day program one of my favorites is the hike to the woodcarvers. The hike is not long and usually we repel in the morning. However, I personally really enjoy going into the woodcarvers shop and I especially, especially enjoy the cafe next door. The Woodcarvers is really just one room filled with wooden trinkets. It is geared toward the scouts and guides that visit so there is a lot of Our Chalet and Kandersteg themed items. It is all really expensive, but it is also all handmade. The whole family is in to the business. There is a mom, dad, and two brothers. They are all really nice, the mother a particularly good saleswomen. The cafe next door is not so much a cafe, but the woodcarvers neighbor who decided to take advantage of all the traffic the woodcarvers bring. Her coffee is so good, but her apple cake is TO DIE FOR! Oh my gosh, it's so good! 

5. Speaking of Kandersteg I know I have mentioned it before when I was writing about places Falk and Storrow were thinking of putting the Chalet, but on one of my days off I went and visited! As a reminder Kandersteg is where the Scout Center is. I am part of WAGGGS, the scout center is WOSM. Boy scouts are a part of WOSM, however around the world scouting is a lot more Co-ed. Anyway the scout center is HUGE! They can host for about 1200 people! At our fullest we can host 150 people. They also have a much larger staff which was cool because it was so diverse! Ours with ten though, is a bit more intimate. Their campsite is ginormous. Their valley is a lot different too, very flat with sharp cliffs. The boy who showed us around was from the UK. Apparently Kandersteg is the end all be all for UK scouts. We saw a few boy scouts from Florida too. It is a part of our staff challenge to hike to Kandersteg. We did not this time because of the snow, but maybe when we go to have our free meal and stay over? The staff from Kandersteg also can come to Our Chalet for free as part of the agreement. I would definitely go back, and would recommend it to anyone who is a scout!

6. On a different off day me and a few of the other vollies went to Gruyere. Yes this is where they make Gruyere cheese! We saw them making it and took a very informative tour about the Gruyere cheese making process. A cow was our tour guide through this listening tour we took around the factory. We also got to sample Gruyere cheese which was quite good. The way they make cheese is kinda weird because it is the curdles that are the cheese product. It takes a lot of time and the cheese must sit for a long time for it to be any good. We also went to a Castle which was quite pretty 

and the little town was very cute

But the Giger museum was very interesting, but creepy, but interesting. Giger is a Swiss artist who did all of the art design for the Aliens movies. His museum was so cool, but also very gruesome. Here are some of his pieces: (warned probably not for kids you do not want watching Aliens...)

https://www.google.com/search?q=giger+art&rlz=1C1CHFX_enUS506US506&um=1&ie=UTF-8&hl=en&tbm=isch&source=og&sa=N&tab=wi&ei=JGPPUa3TA-es4ASexoHYAg&biw=1366&bih=667&sei=J2PPUdv0KcX64QSVgoHAAw

BUT, the best part was the Nestle Chocolate factory. The tour was ok, but the all you can eat Chocolate section left all of us feeling sick. We tried to go around and sample all the different kinds of Chocolate pieces and we were not even half way around when I started to think that I would never eat Chocolate again. But I carried through and tried them all, felt sick the rest of the night, drank a lot of water and was fine the next morning! 

7. So I have already touched on a few of the Swiss food specialties. From what I have gathered there is a lot of cheese and chocolate. There is a lot of potatoes, and creme, coffee and dairy. The food is extremely heavy and is meant to warm you up. The Swiss invented fondue, and consume 59% of the Gruyere cheese they produce. The rest of the 41% is consumed by the rest of the world (America 10.3%). I have not eaten many meals out, a few pizzas which were good. What I have sampled most is ice cream and coffee. Cappuccinos are fantastic I highly recommend them! There are two things I have found that are cheap in Switzerland compared to back home: Gelato and Swiss arm knifes. The Gelato is fantastic, Swiss army knifes I have yet to try...

8. One of my favorite night programs is international night! This last event was girls from all over the US, so it was not that international. However, what made this event special was that their was a troop from NC! They were from High Point. I have only been to High Point either for soccer, or when I was younger I went against my will for *shutter* furniture shopping with my parents. Furniture shopping with my parents is a type of torture no child should be put through. They endless couches. The hours of discussion. The miles of fabric to choose from.The never ending indecision! It is a total nightmare.Whoever decided to put the furniture capital of the world so close to my house has a special place in hell. So my memories of high point may not be so fond. However, the girls were lovely and their leader reminded me scarily of my own girl scout leader. Two of the girls in the group were going to UNC in the fall and one leader had just graduated from State. It was nice to talk about NC barbecue and have someone know exactly what you were talking about! Felt like home :)

9. On my most recent off day I went to Luzern with two other vollies. The day did not start off well due to the fact that I was not four minutes away from the bus stop going to meet a bus that was coming in nine minutes when I realized I had left my wallet up at Our Chalet. Which was up a Mountain. At least a 15 minute walk up let alone back down again. So I just caught a later bus which was whatever, except we had not really made a meeting place in Luzern... But! We seemed to have telepathy because I found the other vollies straight away coming into Luzern. Luzern is very beautiful you just want to sit at a restaurant all day and stare at the water. That of course is not what we did because we had places to see, but if I had more time that is what I would have done. We went to the first Barque Church in Switzerland:

We visited an ice age museum and we walked along the historic district looking at shops and buildings! Finally we crossed the historic bridge that was built in like the 1300s and it was still pretty sturdy looking.

 

10. So I have talked a lot about what I have done. Now time to talk about the next plans! Me and another vollie have bought tickets to go to the eurockeennes festival in... Belfort FRANCE!!! Yay new country! There I will be seeing both Two Door Cinema Club and Phoenix!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!............... I am only a bit excited..... nope totally excited, can't wait!!!!So more on that front once I actually go to the festival. Speaking of which next week it will also be an update on Saturday because I will not be near my computer Friday because I will be jamming out to Two Door Cinema Club and Phoenix!!! yayayay! 

Have a great week everybody!!!

Hey Everyone!

So I know two weeks no post... so bad. But I will post a Saturday 10 tomorrow to make up for it, I promise!

Have a great weekend! and chapel hill people look out for those t-storms, and be safe!

The Bling Ring clip doesn't work... Here is one that does! (I think, if not there is always copy and paste)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BkQrqwWr9zI

:) 

Hello all!

This has been a very intense week as we have been training for program. Here are my Friday Five!

1. One of the programs we offer is a trip to the adventure park. This is just your regular run of the mill high ropes and zip line courses that everyone should do at least once. I was first introduced to the idea at Earth Shine, a lodge in the NC Mountains that my family visited. Their high ropes and zip lines are very similar to the ones at this adventure park, however the one main huge difference being that while the instructors for the Earth Shine lodge always handled your equipment, here in Switzerland they believe that you can handle un-clipping a carabiner So we (and soon the girls) handle all of the getting on and off the zip lines while the instructors stay at either end of the course. Apparently law suits are not as big a thing in Switzerland as they are in the states. The most challenging bit I did was the pendulum swing off a bridge. I could describe it… but I think I will just give y’all a link to a video on YouTube:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fFENwCXvolc

2. On my day off me and a few other vollies visited Bern, the capital city of Switzerland. Bern is famous for fountains and Bears. There is literally a fountain on almost every street/corner of the city and you can (and I did) drink from them. Bern also has bears in the middle of the city. When I first heard this I thought statues of Bears, Bern means bear is German. BUT, no there are 3 live bears living in the city. They were a gift and they were also stolen and then returned at some point, I think by an animal rights group because their original pen was really small. Now they have a great pen right by the river. Two of the bears were wrestling in the water while we were there! Very exciting. There were also lots of shops and restaurants. We saw parliament, under construction like the rest of Bern, apparently they cannot do construction in winter, maybe all the snow? We saw where Einstein lived for a few years with his wife and two sons. He had a very dramatic life, much more so than I thought. He never knew one illegitimate daughter, renounced his German citizenship in his teens, and he eventually married his cousin.

3. On Friday we (the vollies) climbed Bunderspitz a very tall Mountain behind the Chalet. The hike up was long and at some point scary when the wind picked up near the very top. 8353.02 feet above sea level. However, the views were spectacular! On the way down was great because there were a lot of snow patches still. We all took out our water proof pants and slid down the patches like we were sledding. The vollie from Hong Kong had never seen snow before, but was sledding down this mountain like a pro! It was lots of fun, but by the end everyone's feet hurt and we were all ready for bed.

4. One of the things I miss most in the States is going to the movies. I know the movies are not the most fanciful of places however, especially in the summer when it is all hot outside, stepping into the cool movie theater to see a good show is one of the best things ever. Here in Adelboden there is a movies theater that I plan on going to on one of my days off. It mainly plays in German and French, but I am hoping that there will be a movie where they use subtitles rather than dubbing so that I can see one in English. The movie I really want to see that came out in the states recently was the Bling Ring. Here is a clip:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BkQrqwWr9zI 

(Looks good right?!?) 

5. And finally I just want to tell my Dad, happy Father’s day! I know I kinda missed it by not writing this blog till Tuesday, but I was busy! Kinda. My dad is always super supportive, and he always brings me chocolate after being away on a trip. He helps with all sorts of problems whether these are life, computer, or decision. Though he won’t come visit me in Switzerland (part his dislike of travel, part someone has to stay home and comfort Lacey who misses me dearly) I am excited that next Father’s day I can be there to celebrate with my dad!

Have a great week everyone!

Hey Everyone!

So I am super tired tonight due to hiking up an ALP MOUNTAIN. It is called Bunderspitz if you would like to look it up. So my friday five will be more likely to come on Saturday.

but before I leave you I just wanna do a big shout out to Eliza Salkheld who turned 20 today!!! Happy Birthday Eliza! Hope the skys are blue for you in carolina :)))

Update tomorrow!

Hey guys!

So it has officially been about a week of me here in Switzerland! The time as flown as they say. At Our Chalet we have mainly been learning about guest services, however I have learned so much about Swiss culture, the background of Our Chalet, and the other guides in my group!  Here are my Friday five!

1. Before I went on this trip a lot of people have asked me what Our Chalet was. It was a hard question to answer because there are only 3 other places in the world like it. It is a girl guide and girl scout world center where anyone can come and stay. There are both day and evening programs which is what I will be helping with! Here are some links that might help:
The Our Chalet website: http://www.ourchalet.ch/en/home
The WAGGGS (world association of girl guides and girl scouts) website: http://www.wagggsworld.org/en/home
The other 3 places are the 3 other world centers Our Cabana, Sangam and Pax Lodge.

 First before this gets confusing let me explain that America has both boy scouts and girl scouts, however around the world there are girl guides (which are like girl scouts) and then scouts which is a co-ed program, and more like boy scouts.

So the history of Our Chalet is actually pretty interesting. In 1929 WAGGGS committee met in The Netherlands and decided that a world center should be built for Girl Guides and Scouts. Helen Storrow, an American Girl Scout, said she would donate the money for the construction and the first five years of operation of the center, on the condition that it was built is Switzerland. So she must have been super rich. The Committee agreed and appointed a Swiss Guide, Ida Von Herrenshwand, commonly referred to as Falk, to help Storrow find a spot for the Chalet.
Here are the places they looked at:
Grindelwald: (haha harry potter reference kinda)



but did not like the way the Chalet smelled like Cheese....

Kandersteg:








But the Scouts Center was already there (look up more pictures though, this town is amazing)

Storrow wanted to build the Chalet in Aeschi



But Falk wanted a more adventures site, higher altitude with better access to hiking and skiing etc.

So when the World Committee met again in 1930 in the UK, Falk told Lord Baden-Powell (creator of scouts) that she wanted to find a more adventures spot for girl guides. So Falk returned to Switzerland and found a hill near the town of Adelboden. Falk instantly fell in love with the place. Our Chalet was built and then opened in 1932, the first World Center of WAGGGS.


2. Okay that first post was a little long apologies. But I now want to talk about Recycling. They LOVE recycling in Switzerland. The main reason being that for every bag or bin you throw away here you are taxed a certain amount. For example if you were to fill up a glad normal sized white trash bag and throw it away it would be 25 Swiss Francs or about 27 dollars. Our Chalet has its own big garbage bin at the end of the drive way and is charged every time the bin is filled. Therefore Our Chalet tries to recycle everything. Used tissue? Paper recycling. Broken glass? Glass recycling. Aluminum foil? Metal Recycling. The only thing they don't recycle well is plastic. They only recycle PET bottles, but all other plastics go into the trash. Now, especially the American Vollies, were asking what prevents the Swiss from just throwing away their trash into public bins with out paying. They have certain trash bags with tax numbers on it to make sure they know whose trash it is. Okay yeah, but what if they use any old trash bag and throw it way in the public bins? Michael, the grounds maintenance guy explained, oh the Swiss just trust each other. You can tell this type of system would go so well in the US.....

3. We went on our first hike this week. It was called the magic tree house hike because of this really old tree vollies are supposed to climb up. The tree was great and everything, but  on the way to the tree we passed by several houses. Outside the house there are several signs with cartoon characters and children's names. For example I saw one that was a painting of Flounder (from Ariel) and then Emily written on it. They hang outside the houses right after the children are born and then stay there till the kids move out. Also we passed a house with a lot of cowbells hanging on the side. Our guide told us that these cowbells can go up to as much as 1500 dollars. This farmer looked like he had bout 15... Our guide said it was to show off the farmers wealth. Then we heard noises from the back of the house. Turns out the front is the house and the back is a barn. It is to keep the cows warm in the winter we were told. Ummm still don't think I would enjoy a barn at the back of my house....



4. On my day off yesterday me and four other vollies took a trip to Frutigen by bike. It was a long trip by bike, about two hours. Which I am pretty sure is the longest I have ever been on a bike... But it was great views. We were told the road was down hill the entire way, which was super not true. There was this one hill that felt strait up for like, forever. Now when your pushing a bike up a steep hill it is not the most fantastic thing. However, the down hill was terrifying, the last part you shot down and yeah there were fences, little barb fences made for keeping cattle off the road, not girls on bikes flying off the side of the mountain. So these fences along the path were really no comfort. I was on my brakes the entire way, unless I was pushing the bike up a hill. We parked our bikes in town (no bike locks of course) and then walked around for a bit. We took the bus back!

5. Finally we (the Our Chalet summer vollies) are kinda official because we are on the website!!! Check me and the other Vollies out!

http://www.ourchalet.ch/en/people/Staff

Have a great weekend everyone!!!