We started our day with a bright and early train ride from Venice to Bern. Given the distance from our bed and breakfast to the train station, we were overjoyed to find out that our water taxi passes were still valid for a few more hours that morning, so our day started as any Venetian would hope: rocking on the water with 20- or 30-pound packs, looking out over the unique city of more than 100 islands as tourists started milling around.

The train ride was lovely, and the first time either of us had ever seen the Alps. We passed through rural Italian towns that blended slowly into Swiss villages, and then--seemingly out of nowhere--came the peaks of the Alps themselves. Having grown up with the low, rolling Appalachians in all their ancient glory--and even Ryan, having been raised with relatively low peaks considering the huge shelf of the Colorado Plateau on the way to northern Arizona--these were unlike anything we'd ever experienced. A low elevation (about 1,800 feet for Bern and Interlaken) paired with towering peaks (in Jungfrau's case, 13,642 feet) created such a stark contrast that we could barely comprehend the sharp turn from flat terrain to harsh, craggy mountain.