European MFME — part 2 (Anita’s beauty wonderland and our paraglide right through it)

Loved having my Dad along doing is signature “side-step” up the hill.

After all that we headed over to see the village where Anita grew up and visit her parents.  But first we did a stop at her sister’s house who lives on the way.

We had had the chance to get to know her at the wedding a few years ago (HERE), and it was so fun to catch up with her and her husband and to meet their sweet kids.

This is the home she grew up in (to the left):

And THIS is her back yard:

For reals:

Wow.

We made her sit at her desk in her childhood bedroom to prove to our kids that she really lived there…

Not too shabby.

We got to talk to her parents for a little bit before heading to the hotel for our late night stay-up-and-discuss-the-world-even-though-we’re-jet-lagged time.

This is the lake in the tourist poster she had in her bedroom:

Julie carted little Dean all over creation on this trip, and he was just the best baby ever with that smile most of the time:

That Julie is one heck of a Mama, nursing and changing anywhere she needed to, and that little guy was a dreamboat to have along.

Love these sister-in-laws with all my heart.  Each so unique and wonderful putting up with us crazy Eyres in so many ways.

…stopping to check out the cows jingling their bells en route.

And then there we were, at the tippy top of the mountain.

Hearts pumping with excitement as we got ready to fly.

It was cold up there, and we knew it would be even colder in the air, so Anita had set me up with her fur cap, and my tandem paragliding guy whipped out a whole sweet purple suit for me to wear and started getting me all outfitted.

We were laughing so hard and I was SO grateful for that warmth!

Here’s the main guy in charge with Kristi:

And Charity with her pure “dripping with passion” excitement.

Here we are right after take-off:

That was our second try.  My sweet partner guy didn’t speak much English so I don’t know what happened but I guess the parachute didn’t make it all the way open for the first attempt.  But on the second try we were up and running and I don’t know if there are words to describe the exhilaration up there in that quiet golden sky with the slanted sun rays lighting up the earth so gorgeously.

I just tried sky diving last year and I fell head over heels in love with it.  I thought this would be kind of similar.  I mean, jumping into the air with a parachute had to be pretty much the same, right?

But I was totally wrong.

Sky diving was all about the sheer thrill (and it was pretty dang beautiful too), and paragliding was just all about the peaceful soaring.  We were up there for 45 minutes letting the wind lift us higher and further, just breathing in the breathtaking vistas.

Here’s my landing:

(Again, second attempt…something wasn’t quite right the first time we tried so we got to go on another spin and I loved every second of it, wishing it wouldn’t end.)

Even at the tops of mountains there are flowers spilling out of the pristinely kept houses intermittently standing between herds of sheep and cows, their melodic bells jangling in the breeze.

I love Switzerland.

Part 3 is HERE.