Because we were taking the day easy, we were able to sleep for eleven hours, and enjoy our breakfast of bread and butter. The owner recommended we walk to the bus stop via the Wasser Wanderweg (about a 20 minute walk)—past waterfalls, and over brooks, very very lovely. It made me wish we had more time to explore this enchanted area. I loved that it was lush, wet, with trees everywhere—a much more welcoming place for humans than the higher mountains we had been in the last few days. This area, though uncrowded, also seems to be very organized in terms of tourism—there are several different themed car tours (if you had a car) that you could go on, and several easier day hikes too—all of this information was listed on our place mats at breakfast and dinner!

But alas, we had reservations, and so we made it to the bus stop. Our book neglected to mention that you take the bus to Frutigen, then take the train to Kanderstag—it takes several hours.

We ran into some English-speaking climbers that we had also seen near Lauterbrunnen. They were nice enough, but seemed frustrated that the bus driver couldn’t understand their English. I’ll admit I was a little surprised that, once you leave the tourist center of Grindelwald, it was true, the bus drivers only spoke German (and French in the Valais). However, his experience also made me glad that we had a phrase book, and that at least we asked (when we were too tired to speak German) “Do you speak English?” It’s good to appear polite and ignorant in someone else’s country, rather than just ignorant, launching into tons of English questions without asking first, as these climbers did.

The day was certainly overcast and cloudy with drizzles of rain—it felt good but strange to be zooming along on twisty roads and then on buses. We arrived in Kanderstag, a perfectly nice town, right when the stores closed up for their lunch break (a tradition I will never understand, as it left me hungry many times!). No yogurt for today.

The clouds had settled in by this point, as we began a gradual ascent up to Oeschinensee (about 400 meters). At first, it was enchanting, to be hiking for the first time in the thick gray of the clouds, where you couldn’t really see much in back of you or in front of you, but after a while…I’ll admit it, the gray clouds looked gray, I wanted to see the views. From the little we saw, the area looked beautiful, with some streams and smaller waterfalls rushing past us—lots of water.

Once we reached the lake, on our shortest day of hiking since we began this trip, I was so glad we had still made the effort to reach Oeschinensee : the lake is a pure turquoise, with towering mountains all around it extending 2000 meters, and larger waterfalls at the other end, and a path that wanders halfway around the lake, and rowboats you can rent to explore the lake…it really is like a playground of the afterlife, and a perfect place to rest Harold’s sore ankle and enjoy the clouds that would cluster then part to give us a few seconds of a view.

What a magical afternoon: we decided to rent a rowboat, and Harold kindly rowed us all the way across the lake (I had no idea it would take so long—about 30 minutes!). I also had no idea rowing was so difficult, so I was able to row for about 5 minutes, then gave the rowers back to Harold. We visited the waterfall that we had seen from a distance, and pulled the boat onto land and explored a small creek. This area was deserted, since you could only get to it by boat. When the clouds moved in, we couldn’t see more than 30 feet in front of us, so our lodging had vanished by this point. I loved the feeling of isolation in this place.

The kitchens close early at the restaurants here, since most of the visitors head back down to Kanderstag relatively early, to catch the lifts. We had dinner at 5 p.m., and it was here that I overdosed on cheese (the meal was bread and cheese put in the oven, plus a few pickled onions for the vegetable). I’m sure everyone has this on every long vacation, but that night Harold and I tried to figure out how to escape Switzerland. Where could we find things other than bread and cheese to eat? Where would the trails be less steep? Poland? Italy? Germany? France? Everything seemed so close in Europe….we had been gone for about 11 days total, and still had 11 days to go! It seemed a long time to be away, and I was missing home, and missing being able to small talk with people at the grocery store.

Despite our crisis of homesickness, we did have a lovely evening of exploring. Dinner was done at 6 p.m., and we weren’t quite ready for bed yet, so we wandered along the lake to the far side, as far as a gentle trail would take us, and just explored the woods. The clouds had settled again, so we couldn’t really see anything other than us and the area right around us. We skipped rocks for about half an hour until our arms got sore, and just stood and stared at the lake a while. Then it was getting dark, so we walked back and tried to plan our exit from Switzerland as explained above….

We stayed at the Berghaus Am Oeschinensee, though I’d recommend staying instead at its next door neighbor perhaps, the slightly larger and slightly more modern Berghotel (hotel Restaurant) Oeschinenensee. Our Berghaus definitely had the more ornate structure, and it was a beautiful old building on the outside– but it didn’t have the friendliness of the other places we stayed (we only saw the distant owner once, and the place seemed run by teenagers, albeit friendly ones, who listened to rock music). The rooms were old and dark with small windows. We were the only ones staying there again this time, but if there had been other couples, things would have gotten rather crowded. At night, the owner or some of the employees stayed below us, and we could hear their TV and conversation late into the night (thin walls!). The food also wasn’t spectacular.

But it was wonderful to fall asleep and wake up and have the lake to ourselves. The next morning, the weather cleared, and we could see the huge mountain cliffs in all their tall glory. It was a scenic ending to our hike through the Bernese Oberland, with even some wildlife thrown in…the cows, sometime this morning, had returned. One wandered its way into the eating area of the Berghaus, and we watched an employee try to shoo the cow away.

We had a pleasant and easy walk back to the lifts, which whisked us down the mountain side into Kanderstag, where we immediately bought a large quantity of chocolate yogurt to enjoy on the train ride to Sion, the capital of Valais, where we’d have a few rest days as we prepared for stage two of our hike!