Bunch of Mountain Goats

Faithful blog readers...

Two weekends ago, Melissa and I were able to go on an 'excursion' with her work group, Surface Research.  So, for shorthand, the Swiss called it the 'Surf Excursion'.  I'm sure you can guess as some of the images that came to mind as we tried to figure out how we were going to surf in this country.

An excursion basically consists of the following: the group goes to some region in Switzerland.  They hike around some, get an expert to explain something scientific about that region, then they hike around some more the next day.

We went to the Wallis/Valais(German name vs. the French name) region of the country where they are famous for two things: speaking French and making wine.  While there, we learned about 'debris flows' (sort of a mixture between floods and rock slides) from an American (thus, spoke English and I understood what he said) geologist working in Switzerland.

And here we are walking through the channel that debris flows are funneled through. 

But hey, it's not like we were in any danger or anything.  Rocks weren't going to suddenly start flowing down.

We really were ok.  It hadn't rained in a while and rain is what triggers the flows.

We then hiked around some more and explored the geology.

 If you ever get the opportunity to go on an excursion with the Swiss that you definitely should.  However, please be warned that they are like a bunch of mountain goats.  There is a reason they get a reputation for being a hardy folk.  There was a woman there probably 7 months pregnant with all of her clothes, food and other gear on her back, hiking circles around Melissa and me.  I've never felt so inadequate in my life.  It was both awesome and embarrassing.

We then were shown an underground lake by a Swiss geologist that spoke French (thus, I had no clue what he was saying the whole time). 

The next day saw us hiking in the mountains around the town of Sion.  While up there, we saw one of the most unique things I've ever heard of - cow fights! 

So, what they do is stick a bunch of bulls into a fenced-in area and let them get all of the testosterone-filled aggression out of their systems by fighting it out.  Whichever one comes out as the alpha cow gets to lead the herd up to higher pastures.  It's kind of a big deal in this area.  We actually saw posters advertising the next cow-fight day.  (If the Swiss have rednecks, I'd say this is a redneck thing to do.  I saw many empty bottles of beer lying around the outside of the fence.)  Don't worry, animal lovers, the cows don't hurt each other - they just push against each other's heads until one of them yields his ground.

And of course, during the hike, we get the obligatory gorgeous scenery, which I must put on this blog to make all of you uber-jealous :)

Next blog post: Heading to Italy (sort of)