Saturday Morning Mania

Spencer Kubin is synonymous with an alarm clock. At various times this weekend he acted as the wake up call to everyone. And, as kind as it was, I swear to goodness I shut my eyes and he was shaking me to get up at 6:30 to make sure we got to the mountain nice and early. Groggily and dehardratedly, we layered on everything we owned, from tank tops to Under Armor to those three new sweaters grandma got us for Christmas. With arms stuck straight out and a slight waddle, we grabbed a free breakfast, rented another layer of snow pants, and headed, cluelessly, to a train station to find our way to Grindelwald.

The boys had gone ahead, so we just hopped onto a train that looked like it was heading towards the mountains. Little to our knowledge was it the annual snow festival or something in the Alps and the world cup version of skiing was going on. Painted faces and people wearing flags squashed together in the trains, chanting and day drinking and excitement everywhere. We joined them and headed at a 90-degree angle up the side of the most beautiful mountains in the world. The half-hour train ride composed of gazing out the windows in awe, spotting yaks, and wondering if we wore too many layers.

Grindelwald was the most adorable and beautiful place I have ever been in my life. The hilltop town was spotted with wooden cottages, store fronts full of homemade chocolates, ski rentals owned by the friendliest people, and St. Bernard’s and Burmese mountain dogs everywhere. The backdrop to such an amazing place was the most astounding and awe-inspiring views, the Alps. These mountains just dwarfed everything around them and stuck straight into the sky. Can you say Christmas heaven? I could have walked around with my camera for four months.

After renting skis, we trudged to the gondola, and began our epic ascent of the mountains. Packed into the enclosed lift, we snapped photos and looked far below at the skiers beneath us. To my astonishment, the entire mountain was peppered with little log cabins, isolated from much of civilization but surrounded by such a view. It was my dad’s dream house.