Welcome Weekend Day 2

The first day of welcome weekend was a lot of fun and the second was just as good! We were all pretty tired from staying up late dancing but we finally packed up our stuff and left the cabin. Philippe told us from the beginning to pack good walking shoes because we were going to be doing a lot of physical activities on Sunday. Well it turns out he was right because the first thing we did Sunday morning was go on a hike!

They took us on the Jura Peak Trail and brought us to this beautiful gorge called Creux du Van. And of course we passed a bunch of cows on our way over! I had seen parts of the gorge from our bus ride but it was spectacular standing on top looking out over Switzerland. I am blown away every time at how beautiful everything is here! It was a bit scary if you got to the edge because there was no fence so if you accidentally slipped you were in big trouble. I found out that the gorge was created by water erosion from a glacier a long time ago.

The NUC Volleyball team in front of the gorge!

How beautiful is that!!

Having some fun!

This picture actually has a crazy story attached with it. Lindsay, Sandra and I were having a lot of fun taking pictures and we were falling behind the group. Lindsay first took a picture by the sign so then I of course wanted to take one by the sign as well. Well since we couldn't really see the group any more I hustled over to the sign and on the way over I rolled my ankle on a rock... Ouch. I definitely was in a bit of pain but just walked it off for the rest of the day. On Monday it was bruised and swollen a bit. No worries though because I'm still able to play! :)

After our hike we took a break for lunch at a local restaurant. The neat thing was they had cheese fondu! Looks like Sandra and Diiva are enjoying it!

We were even more tired now but Philippe had one more surprise for us. He told us that we were going to Adventure Park to do some high ropes courses!! I was super pumped because those are always really fun. I had no idea what to expect but man I was in for a surprise. We got to the park, were told the rules and then where on our own. They had about six different courses ranging from beginner to advanced. We were told to go on a beginner course first to get adjusted to everything and then we could try some of the harder courses. I thought we were going to have someone always attached to our harness, who is on the ground, like I've done in the past, but here all you have to do is make sure your carabiners are attached to the cable. If you were moving from platform to a part of the course you always had to make sure that at least one was attached. The first course wasn't too difficult but the last couple I definitely worked up a sweat. Some of the courses were long and lasted over half an hour!

The beginning of the courses

I was pumped up and ready to go!

Lindsay and I on a platform!

There were all different types of things that you would do on the ropes courses. Most of them were walking on planks or even on some cable. The more difficult ones had some really interesting things! There was one where you had to swing across on a trapeze bar to reach the other side. Another one had a snow board that was attached to a cable so you could pretend like you were riding through the trees. A lot of them even had zip lines where you had to attach a certain pulley on your harness and you were good to go. My favorite one I did was a pretty difficult course. You first had to do a bunch of small balancing tasks like walking across different size planks. Then you had to climb a ladder which was suspended by cables so it would sway side from side when you climbed. Don't worry- they had a safety line just in case you fell. After that you had to swing across on this giant ball to another platform. This platform was my favorite! You had to climb a real tall pine tree!!!! They didn't have any special footholds or things to grab onto because you were supposed to just use the branches to climb up which was such a neat idea! Once you got to the top of the tree to another platform, a zip line was waiting to take you across a cleared out field. This was the longest zip line they had and I think it was about the size of two football fields. The whole experience was really incredible!

Just some of the courses! Many of them are scattered throughout the trees!

Bryn and her mom tackling the course! Look at the ladder she has to climb down!

Having a bunch of fun!

Look at the concentration!

The zip line!

The hardest course was closed because it was drizzling so I really want to go back and do that some time. It was a great way to end the weekend!