This is a conversational travel vlog by Nate and Kara Buchanan documenting a difficult multi-leg journey across Switzerland caused by a storm-triggered rock slide/landslide that destroyed road and rail access. They describe hiking a glacier to the Monterosa hut in bad weather, discovering the landslide at the station, using alternate trains and buses (including long waits and crowding), arriving in Interlaken about 17 hours late, staying in a shared Airbnb, and planning to continue to Liechtenstein the next day. The episode emphasizes travel disruption, improvised logistics, and light-hearted personal commentary.
Chapters
Why does this always happen to me?
We have had an epic week here in Switzerland. Yesterday we decided to cap it off with a super intense hike over a glacier to the Monterosa mountain hut. This morning we woke up in a thunderstorm which made safely navigating our way across the glacier without falling into any deadly crevasses much more challenging. But we eventually made it back to Zermatt and celebrated with some well deserved pizza with new friends. That evening we headed to the train station for what we thought was going to be a short two hour train ride to Interlaken.
I think I understood there to be a falling rock that has taken out both the train track and the road.
He just said sleeping in Japan, which is where we currently.
Dang it. Now I have to go.
The rain. The one time I book our accommodations ahead of time. Oh, what a pain.
We've already been in the rain all day and don't want to go home.
Well, I guess we're going back to our hotel. Although we already had a room booked in Interlaken. So now in its fits of Switzerland, we're paying for two rooms and one night.
All the train, all the trains are leaving in the next two hours. Just say to the next station and I think that's as far as they can go.
So we just talked to a guy who spoke pretty good English and seemed to have a good handle on what was going on. And apparently there has been a rock slide that is covering both the road.
And the train tracks.
So he said for sure, no more trains tonight, maybe tomorrow. But it is a landslide.
I would just like to point out that the landslide was caused by the storm that we were hiking in today. It's basically ruined our morning and our evening. I'm sorry.
We had a bunch of stuff for the train.
You were right.
Carrying it down the road. What a mess.
Thankfully we had the coolest hotel lady ever. I called the number that was on Google and it was her cell phone.
And she's literally sending somebody to give us a key. So we can stay tonight and we.
Only one day in Interlockin.
Yeah, that's the saddest part is. Yeah, Interlockin probably isn't happening unless they clear the landslide out. We can get a train early in the morning.
It is currently 10:15. We just got word that there's a train leaving at 10:30 that's gonna connect to a bus that should take us around the landslide and maybe we'll get to interlock in today. This is crazy.
There are so trying to get on this train right now. Obviously, everybody else was stuck in Vermont last night as well.
All right, we made it on the train. We're using our luggage as a seat, and we're going to Tashk, where we connect to a bus that takes us to whatever the next station is.
Guessing that's our bus. That could be it.
Or this one. I bet there, too.
Okay. Apparently, the road is still closed. There are a whole bunch of buses here ready to take us as soon as it opens. Hopefully soon.
I was wrong. That wasn't our bus. But it is a good thing that we got here when we did, because we're in the very front of the line, and look how many people are here. I feel like we're never the people in the front of the line.
We were early to the lady at our hotel, not because of our plan.
Yeah. She was like, you need to leave right now.
No one's in control. Chaos is breaking loose. Everybody's making a bad dash towards the bus.
All right, back drawing. Which means we have to get on this bus.
We're pretty sure this is the right bus. We just followed the crowd.
Okay.
We made it to Vis. Everything should be normal from here. Just two more drinks.
Well, it is noon. The last two days have been hard, so I'm eating chocolate for lunch.
Oh, I'm very happy. Bad things happen when Nate isn't here to stop me. He went to the bathroom, but I'll try to save him.
One more train. We are almost there.
I just wanted to tell you that I was blown with the chocolate.
That is never. That is never a good thing. But I'm very impressed.
Well, our train has been delayed by 20 minutes, but there could be worse places to wait.
All right, we have arrived in Interlaken just 17 hours after we planned on getting here.
Now we just have fun. Airbnb.
So clean. Unfortunately, this whole place isn't ours. We're doing something that we haven't done in a long time, which is sharing Airbnb to save some money. Neighbor, neighbor. Neighbor. Barber.
Yay. Actually, pretty spacious.
Yeah, it's just for one night. Not too bad.
Why does this always happen to me?
Well, it's a bummer that we didn't have more time here in Interlaken, but it is time to get back on the train and head to Liechtenstein.
For those of you who didn't know, Interlaken is the adventure sports capital of the world. So the fact that we just sat in our Airbnb last night.
I was kind of at my max capacity for Adventure for the week anyways. But it's just one more reason that we need to come back to Switzerland one day so Nate can skydive a.
Helicopter or jump off the mountain with a.
We just arrived in burma. We have 10 minutes to connect to our next train. Two more to go.
Getting across Switzerland to a train should be really easy. Somehow this just turned into, like, the longest journey ever.
We're back in Zurich, but only for nine minutes.
Our train leaves in seven minutes, and Nate's going to find his coffee.
Here we go. Last train of the day.
We get a whole room.
One more hour.
Welcome to Liechtenstein. Just kidding. There actually was only one hotel available in the capital city because tomorrow is national day. So we're staying at pretty much like the last train stop in Switzerland, just across the port. We won't actually go into Liechtenstein until tomorrow, but it's just like a short bus right away, really close.
Maybe hotel.
Hello. Hello.
Hello.
Hi.
Problem is your English to your moment. Yeah, sorry.
Yeah.
Welcome home, Mr. Boukman.
We made it. That's the second time when I've walked in, I'd be like, Nathan Buchanan. And they've been like, huh, Bukman.
Do you realize that this video started at the top of the glacier?
All we did was travel, like, not even all the way across Switzerland, and it pretty much took us three days. That dang rock slide.
So this is one thing that we haven't told on the video. But we had this discussion about what time we should leave Zermatt. There was a 6:30 train, and there was a 7:30 train. And Kara was like, let's take our time, get some coffee, and we'll take the later train. And I'm pretty sure that rock slide occurred between the 6:30 and the 7:30 train.
And we would be stuck on the train in the middle of nowhere behind the train.
I don't think it hit the train.
No, but I think.
I'm not blaming. I'm not blaming this on you. I'm just.
I think it would have happened in front of us and we would have been stuck on the train instead of stuck at the coffee shop, which was lovely.
Coffee shop was lovely.
Okay.
Tomorrow we go to Liechtenstein.
I'm hungry for national break.
I mean, I guess the only bright side is I can barely move my leg.
We were planning on mountain biking all day tomorrow after hiking for two days.
Straight, so maybe it's better.
Sounded like a good idea. Like several days ago before we hiked a mountain and a bike truck to St. Nicholas.
He doesn't care.
Maybe.
I am not holding my breath. There might not be any left for him when he gets back.
