To Colmar

This morning I awoke lazily, and debated about going down to breakfast. I hadn't eaten dinner last night, because somehow I'd managed to hold off on lunch long enough to cover both meals with one fell swoop. It's a travel technique I've very much come to appreciate. So I still had the pasta I'd bought, intended for last nights dinner, in the refrigerator. I argued with myself that I could very well just eat that as breakfast at around lunch time, and sleep in. But the lure of a free meal was just too strong to let slip by. Why have one combined breakfast/lunch, when I can have both breakfast and lunch for free. Plus eating two full meals may mean I can skip tonight's dinner as well, and not have to pay for food all day. I rolled myself out of bed and headed down to breakfast. I ate a large enough breakfast to store up for the day, but tried to leave a little room because I still had to eat lunch in about 2 hours in order to be able to use the kitchen in my room, eat, and be checked out by 1pm. It was a complex sort of dance, but it all seemed logical to me in my head.

I stayed up in my room, enjoying it, and cooking up a storm until the time came when I had to pack up my things and check out. I made sure to relieve the place of any soaps or shampoo, stuffing them into my bag wherever I could fit them.

I checked out, and as she said she would, the nice lady at the front desk let me leave my bags behind the desk with her until it was time to catch my train. Now roomless, but free of baggage, I still had about 4 hours to kill before I had to start looking for my train. I felt I'd pretty much done everything a guy can do in Zermatt if he's not going to ski or go on a huge hike, so all that was left was just to relax. I walked over by the river again, and crossed it by jumping rock to rock. I was much more graceful this time around because of the practice yesterday. I found a lovely place right at the riverbed, under the shade of a rather large bush, and laid right down in the mud. The cool mud felt great on my back, and a rock supported my head. It was a hobo's paradise. As I laid there, I listened to the rhythm of the river, and watched the puffy white clouds overhead. As I rested, I hummed songs and hymns, waiting for my eyes to get heavy enough to sleep. Hikers passed by me on the other side of the river and smiled, I could tell they were envious of my very Tom Sawyer type situation, and content light heartedness. When I noticed them, I just tipped my hat and smiled right back. Life was good.

That lasted about an hour and a half, and then I felt the need to get up again. I started walking back up, trying to find a path I hadn't taken. When I got to one, I noticed it split off into 2 directions. One went up, and one went down. I remembered what I'd taught myself about paths that split off like this: Whenever you can, always take the high road first. The reason for this is that you want to take the road that's going to be a more difficult climb first so that when you get to the top, and you're tired from climbing, you have it all down hill the rest of the way. If you took the low road first, you're tired from walking, and now you have to walk twice the distance, all the way up hill. It's really just a good way to save energy. I took my advice, and climbed up the high path for a ways, but it didn't really lead me anywhere I wanted to go. It seemed to be following the ski slope back up to the top of the mountain where I'd have nothing to do but just walk down again, so I turned around and took the low Road this time. It lead me along a little bit prettier views, and eventually to a bench where I sat for a while and listened to my iPod. When that had eaten up another hour, I walked in large circles, through the town until my time was up.

At just after 5, I picked up my backpack and Mr. Windlehatpee, and caught my train on the first leg of my journey to Visp. In this trip to Colmar, because there's no real direct way, I have to change trains 4 different times; once every hour. It's kind of a pain, but at least it's only a 4 and a half hour train ride all together. It could have been a lot worse. I could have to do the same thing with a 16 hour train ride like the one from Dubrovnik to Budapest. I'd take this train ride over that one any day.

On my way to Visp, I sat next to this awesome Scottish man named Ken. We got to talking while on the train, and eventually became friends. He was just in Zermatt meeting up with some old friends who get together every year, or every other year, I can't remember which. Evidently, they used to all be a folk band together. He noticed my fiddle, and asked me where I'd gotten it. When I told him I'd bought it in Ireland, he frowned and said I should have gotten it in Scotland. I told him I'd figured the fiddle was more of an Irish instrument, and Scotland had the Bagpipe. He was dismayed to hear the fiddle being called an Irish instrument, but granted me that Scotland does merit the Bagpipe. "The thing about the Bagpipe," he said "is that it really only plays at one volume: f**kin loud. The fiddle is a softer, more intimate instrument, which plays at a multitude of different volumes." I said I agreed with him, and that's why I love the fiddle so much. He joked with me that since I'd bought a fiddle in Ireland, I should have bought a Bagpipe in Scotland too. I expressed to him the obvious difficulty that would present, even just beyond the Bagpipe costing at least 3 times as much. He agreed, and we talked about the awkwardness of the bagpipe, and how it's not an easy instrument to play. He said it's not so much in the strength of forcing the air through the mouthpiece, but keeping the bag up and inflated while working the part where your hands go (I can't remember what it's called). He stayed with me through 2 train changes, and then he helped me find my next train, and we said goodbye.

On the last 2 trains, I just sat and listened to my iPod until I'd finally reached Colmar. I wasn't exactly sure how Randy was supposed to find me. He said on the phone that he was just going to be waiting for me at the train station, but it occurred to me that he hasn't seen me since I was 2 years old. I think we can safely assume that I no longer look anything like I did at 2, so I thought there might be an issue. I looked around at everyone at the platform, trying to find someone who looked like they were waiting for someone, but everyone with this look had just found who they were looking for. I remembered that When Mark and Deb picked me up in Naples, they weren't waiting at the platform, but just outside waiting for me to come out of the station. I walked out of the station, and as soon as I got outside, I saw a man get out of his car about 25 meters in front of me. He looked something like the picture of Randy I'd seen, but I couldn't really tell because it was too far to see without sufficient light. He wandered towards me, seemingly wondering the same thing, although neither of us wanted to yell the others name, and be wrong. We moved toward each other, until finally he took the chance. "Tyler?" He asked, "Randy?" I said back. We quickly closed the distance between us, and shook hands. I was relieved it was in fact, him. We caught up a little on the way back to his home. There was a lot of ground to cover for 19 years. He asked about my parents and sister, and I tried to catch him up on a very brief overview of where they all are now, and what they're doing. He told of some things he'd been doing over here, and explained to me what the next couple of days were going to be like. Apparently, I'd arrived just as 3 different groups of college kids were also arriving to stay with them. I apologized for the terrible timing, and assured him I'd be as little trouble as possible, but he told me it was no trouble at all. On the way to the house, he tried to show me some sights as we passed by, but it was too dark to see much of anything, so he said I'd see it all tomorrow in the light. He mentioned some of the history of the area, and pointed out the fields where trenches still stood from WW1 in the time when this particular area was the main battlefield of the eastern front. He said that this land has changed hands 4 different times since the late 1800s, and as of now is officially still controlled by Germany even though its technically part of France. Jan and Randy's home was occupied by the Nazis in WW2. Randy showed me the building next door which was blown to pieces by an Allied air raid. The house absolutely does look like it could have housed Germans in WW2. It looks like the houses you see in old WW2 films, and it carries that feeling of history with it as soon as you walk through the door. The room they've made up for me to sleep in tonight is in the attic, which they've converted into an entertainment/guestroom. The stairs you walk up to this old attic is like something right out of Anne Frank. It's so awesome! Randy gave me a tour of the house, and then since it was already pretty late, we said goodnight. As I was getting ready for bed, Randy popped in real quick with a glass of white wine from this area, which is said to be the best white wine in all the world. It was indeed absolutely delicious. For sure the best white wine I've ever had. I'm so thankful for Randy and Jan (whom I'll get to meet tomorrow). Randy (and I'm sure Jan too) is a wonderful guy, and is so generous to allow me to stay in his beautiful home, even despite the crazy time I've arrived on.
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