Wasserauen-Ebenalp and the Seealpsee: our Saturday hike.

I've heard rumors that the Swiss hiking times and classifications are exaggerated, usually against you. Despite knowing that, I've been wanting to try out hike #2 for awhile. The summary said easy, and although it said steep in some portions I figured we (read: Brian) could just carry Marion for those portions.

We totally underestimated this hike. While it is easy for adults, not so much with kids. And "steep in portions" is actually about 50% steep.

Despite that, we went with some friends, completed the hike, and had a lovely day. The weather was perfect, the kids helped each other along, and it was a perfect way to spend a Saturday.

We began our day with a cable car ride up (take your half fare card if you have one, they accept it).
Once at the top we admired the view, tried to count how many people were going to paraglide (a ton), and started on our way down to the Wildkirchli cave.



The cave wasn't far from Ebenalp. Marion LOVED the cave but was sad that her friend, the big hungry bear, wasn't there.



After the cave there has a little hut and church followed by Ascher, a small guesthouse and restaurant.



We stopped there for a short snack and then continued down towards the Seealpsee where we planned to have lunch.



This was the steep part. Doable with kids, but proceed with caution!

Towards the end of the steep portion of our hike, we came upon a turnstile. In the middle of the woods.

I got nothing. If you know why this is sitting in the middle of a hiking path, please share!

My favorite part of this portion of our hike was when Marion's fear of ants (came out of nowhere) sent her into hysterical fits that made it impossible for her to walk. We took turns to try to console her, reason with her, move her along, but this girl was so over the edge nothing really worked. Finally the ants subsided and she was back to her old self. Finding a flower patch helped.

Eventually we made our way to the Seealpsee Gasthaus, settled in with drinks, and let the kids play on the playset.



Happy kids with ice cream!


Have I mentioned how gorgeous it was? I can see why the Swiss spend all of their time outside when the weather is nice.


We left the Seealpsee and continued down to the cable station. On our way, we realized that there were a TON of paragliders above us.

Yes, those aren't birds. Those are all paragliders! Insane.

We were not 10 minutes down from where we had lunch when Marion announced that she had to go pee. Brian helped her out and I just couldn't help but to document the process.

Sometimes it sucks being a girl. And poor Brian, Betti's on his head and Marion's taking her sweet time!

Betti finally passed out on the way down.

And then Marion decided she didn't want to walk. So Brian carried her on top of our sleeping baby.

What a man :)

The cherry on top of our day were the cows we ran in to at the end of our hike.

The one on the left checked out Brian's bum.

I'm not even lying.

It was a full day and the kids were pooped once we got back to our cars. So we left pretty quickly to get them home to bed. Great, great day. I hope for more of these in our future, if only the weather would cooperate!