Greetings from Murren!

Hello from Murren!
What a gorgeous part of the world. We arrived late yesterday after connections through philly, Frankfurt, and Zurich. Delay out of Philly had us miss our connection in Germany but we grabbed a later flight and had a lovely late afternoon drive through Luzern and into Interlaken and to Lauterbrunnen. We took the aerial tram up to Murren which sits on the edge of a huge cliff overlooking the Eiger and surrounding peaks. Waterfalls cascade from everywhere. We saw our first herd of chamois (Swiss deer) on the walk to dinner. We managed to stay up until 10 and then had a LONG night's sleep in thick Swiss down comforters.
Woke to rain and heavy clouds. Everywhere around us we could hear waterfalls crashing into the valley. After breakfast we took a funicular up the mountain and then hiked off into the rain and fog toward a distant farm rumored to make fresh cheese and milkshakes. An hour later in pouring rain we ducked into a little farmhouse for hot chocolate. The rain continued. So we changed course and made our way back down the mountain toward Murren. On the way we stubbled across a zip line in the forest and all had a go at it. 30 minutes later, completely soaked, we arrived back at our apartment. Bought cheese, fresh bread and hot soup at the market and went off in search of a clothes dryer. As Hannah and i type this, we sit in a corner booth overlooking the valley and surrounding peaks capped in fresh snow. The sun breaks through every few minutes to show the waterfalls and hanging glaciers of this magnificent valley. The smell of fondue is pretty strong. We may be here for a while. More in the morning. Aufsvederstain...!

Here is a link to some photos from today.

http://photobucket.com/albums/ae243/scottbybike

The final countdown

Welcome to our family blog!
This is our first entry as we make our final preparations for our European adventure. We're almost all packed. (I say "we" but I really mean "mom and kids". My stuff is still scattered about the house. We're so excited to escape together to such a beautiful part of the world and play as a family. This will be the longest trip we have ever taken and we can't wait. Our plan is to update this with journal entries and photos whenever possible. Thanks for joining us on our adventure!