Hoogeveen Vacation - June 11

Zermatt! We were hoping for a few things in Zermatt: 1) views of the Matterhorn; 2) taking the cograils or gondolas up to see glaciers and do some hiking; and 3) enjoy the town by eating good food, namely pastries and chocolate. The good news: most of us got to enjoy all of these things except the Matterhorn which was typically shrouded in mystery. The bad news: Carsten was too young to go up any higher than Zermatt due to an increased risk of elevation sickness. We did not know this when we originally planned our trip, and thankfully, the ticket booth folks let us know. So my mom, Carsten, and I spent the day in Zermatt while the rest of the crew got to take a cograil up the mountain to see some glaciers and occasionally mountains, and then they did a bit of hiking down the mountain. It was a pretty cloudy day, so mountain sightings were rare unfortunately. Here's what the view of up top looked like:

glacier meltwater is so pretty!

pretty interesting sign :)

love this!

Andy!

We all found ourselves back in Zermatt for the afternoon where we got to try crepes, and spent quite some time searching for a restaurant. Since we were close to Italy, we wanted pasta. We found a good and appropriately priced (still amazing to me!) restaurant where the only bad food was mine. The seafood pasta had a bit more interesting seafood than I wanted (I was thinking shrimp and I got octopus). Carsten was having a rough meal, so Dad graciously finished feeding him and took him outside so the rest of us could enjoy our meal. Thanks Dad!

Crepes! YUM.

Swiss Andy Huisman?

Father-Son time :)

I should mention that Mom and I were given the chance to head up the mountain later in the afternoon without Carsten, but by the time we reached the transport up they weren't sending anything up anymore, so we called it a day. Sad part was the ticket lady still remembered us from this morning and I think she did feel bad giving us the news that we couldn't go up twice in one day... :)

We stayed in Zermatt again that night and at this point I should mention that Carsten no longer seems to sleep well in his travel bed. It's sort of a tent pop-up bed and I think the problem is that it rustles when he moves, which causes him to wake up. Needless to say I lost about 2 hrs of sleep from 1-3 am each night and Andy lost a little less, but we were both feeling a bit groggy when it was time to get up in the mornings :). My parents brought along our pack 'n play at our request, so now we have another travel bed as an option for later trips. Thanks Mom and Dad!

All in all, I think we all had fun in Zermatt and enjoyed the Alps. We could have wished for a bit clearer weather, but the company was great so that more than made up for it :).