The Happy Bavarian

Lake Oeschinen seen from the flank of the Bluemlisalp

In a remote corner of Alberta filled with tall, jagged mountains, I spent a week decades ago skiing with a group of people that included a gentleman we all referred to as “Erhart zee Happy Bavarian”. Erhart was one of those ageless life-long skiers, as calm in his bearing as his skiing was smooth in a way that belied his many years well-spent in the mountains. A native of Garmisch-Partenkirchen in Germany, he could have been 65; he could have been 85; his actual age was unclear and utterly unimportant.

Erhart alpine skied in randonnée boots — we’d call them “alpine touring boots” now — at a time when they were uncommon in North America outside the guiding community. When I asked him why that was, his response embodied his whole approach to the sport: when there was a line for lifts at home, he would just start walking uphill instead (“Ven der iz a line for zee leeeft, I chust valk up zee moun-tain”). We shared many stories on that trip, as you do, and one of Erhart’s has been on my mind a lot lately.

Erhart did a lot of business in the United States throughout his career, frequently flying across the Atlantic to do so in that blessedly analog time. The very first thing he would do each time he arrived in the United States was to buy a Hershey’s milk chocolate bar before even exiting the airport. Garmisch-Partenkirchen was among the first German towns liberated from the Nazis by the U.S. Army in the Second World War, and to this day has a large U.S. military presence, and the distinctly American appearance of the Hershey’s bar and its particularly American taste and texture triggered vivid memories of the GI’s who handed them out to the local schoolkids, including Erhart. With each saccharine sweet chocolate bar, he was reminded of those young soldiers from our Greatest Generation, filled with the infectious optimism and generosity that inspired Erhart throughout his life along with countless others in post-war Europe. Buying one right off the plane, unwrapping the brown paper and foil, and savoring the sweetness of it was his way of paying tribute to those GI’s and of reminding himself of the modern, liberating democracy they brought to the world.

I’ve recently returned from an exceptional trip hiking in the mountains of the Bernese Oberlandt in Switzerland. I stayed in a small, remote town, just busy enough for the local folk to look forward to the slower pace and quieter weeks of autumn but without any bitterness or a lack of genuine welcome towards their guests. Though my mountain adventures are the premise for these trips I enjoy, without fail it is the distinctiveness of each place I visit and the opportunity to meet and get to know the people that stays with me long after I’ve returned home. My trip hiking in the beautiful near-vertical mountains around Kandersteg was no exception.

My German is terrible — I speak just enough to engage in a conversation that involves saying hello, ordering lunch or coffee and then quickly moving into English or French. The effort makes a difference in my casual interactions with people, especially if I am happy to take time and move and speak slowly — particularly important with the mountain Swiss who are just not in a hurry to do or say anything as though preserving their energy for what is really important is the regional pastime. On this recent trip, the locals in my hotel, in mountain huts, shops and tramways were curious to engage a little bit longer with me but only when nobody else was around.

“American?”, I was asked quietly and carefully. What followed my “yes” was usually a quiet nod and gently raised eyebrow, and it often included the sheepishly asked question: “Trump?”.

Obviously, I have my political views. It’s very important to me that I am a good, non-partisan ambassador for our republic and our people when I am overseas. For whatever reason, when traveling I frequently and politely have been put in the position of being the great explainer of all things American to the people I meet. This year, this trip, these interactions felt different. I felt as though the people who asked me about the current President in such loaded fashion really wanted to know whether their idea of America, the image they clung to in the same way as my friend Erhart, is still valid. It’s a question that I ask myself quite often at the moment, and I do worry very seriously that America’s deliberate abdication of leadership and advocacy for democracy and democratic values has left behind only a haze of constant, bellicose, selfish noise. It’s hard for us to maintain an informed and hopeful world view while drinking from a firehose, and it’s clearly challenging for our friends overseas to watch when they are accustomed to looking up to us and the society we created here.

I am not suggesting that we all start eating Hershey bars and eating them while binge-watching Band of Brothers in an effort to find a way to heal our nation. I do find the news of the day to be a severe challenge to my belief in the American Dream and my confidence in my own future and that of our Republic. Still, as I always conclude, I will not forsake the immeasurable effort of our preceding generations who came to America on whatever deck of the boat and in whatever status, and who made it the great nation our friends grew up admiring so much. I am not giving up. I am lucky to have Erhart’s memory and the hopeful inquisitiveness of the people I meet as a reminder that America as an idea still looms on the horizon and will always be a work in progress. There can be no going backwards, despite the consensus of the fire hose.

I bought some delicious freshly picked apples and beautiful corn at the farmer’s market this Labor Day Weekend. I did not buy any Hershey’s milk chocolate bars. Maybe I should have, and just maybe the idea of them and their sweetness is enough for now.

Thank you, Erhart. Enjoy your uphill walk, my friend.

Bonderalp ridge between Kandersteg and Adelboden

Farmhouse in Ober Allme; nice cow bells!

A Long Walk Off a Short Pier

The MBTA ferry docked in Hingham,MA

Domestic air travel in the United States this year has become, ummm, shi …, nope won’t say it. Let’s just say that it’s become an expensive, unpleasant and very uncomfortable way of bookending any trip. I’m certainly not old enough to have experienced the pleasures of having walked up a staircase, welcomed into a gleaming new aircraft by designer-clad and remarkably skinny, uniformly white staff resembling residents of Stepford in a pillbox hat, and handed a cocktail in an actual glass while placing my fedora in the ample storage space above my luxurious seat in a two-by-two row. If that was the “Jet Age”, this is something quite different. We get to wait alongside throngs of equally grimy fellow travelers wolfing down fast food while waiting for our non-egalitarian group to be called by a barely audible announcement so we can sit in an inadequately air conditioned over-crowded aluminum tube for three hours before even leaving the gate while praying that we’ll make our connection to the next flight. To be fair, my experience over the last few years usually includes a cabin crew doing their best to ameliorate the circumstances. Thankfully, my standards have sunk commensurably with the experience and I muddle through it all with good books and a prodigious ability to nap on demand while sitting bolt upright and strapped to a chair.

There is something I do that successfully mitigates the damaging effects of air travel on my mind, body, and spirit. It works like magic, never failing to snap me into a low blood pressure relaxed reverie and positive-minded contemplative nature. When flying back East to Boston for whatever reason, personal or professional, after deplaning and collecting my baggage, I get on the bus that transports travelers between terminals and then exit the vehicle at … wait for it … the ferry terminal. With luck I have enough time to stand still on the wharf for a few moments, breathe the sea air, feel the wind in my face, and gaze absent-mindedly across the sailboat-filled harbor at downtown Boston. And then I get on a boat.

Boston’s Logan International Airport sits at the at the end of a long, narrow peninsula immediately across the harbor from downtown, and it is surrounded by little islands. The Boston Harbor Islands National and State Park includes an amazing number of stunningly gorgeous and remarkably interesting spots to explore in a way that feels quite removed from the urban hustle and bustle. It’s far too easy to visit Boston and not have the seafaring life of the city as part of your experience or to rush off to Cape Cod’s celebrated and very busy beach towns without seeing these close-by gems. I can’t recommend visiting the harbor islands enough (https://www.bostonharborislands.org/).

Yeah, yeah; sorry about that. I promise, I am not about to recite “Sea Fever” by John Masefield (although I could, just to make my ninth grade English teacher happy). When I’m able to plan my travel so I can take the Massachusetts Bay Transit Authority ferry from Logan to the little port town not far from where my parents live, it works every time. I immediately feel as though I am on vacation. While waiting for the ferry, I even sometimes get to watch the seagulls catch clams, fly high up and drop their prey onto the ferry docks to crack them open for easier dining. The place is littered with clam shells like some seagull’s fantasy Las Vegas buffet, all right underneath the many unsuspecting flights coming and going from the busy airport.

I can’t quite explain why it is that traveling by boat is such a compelling and relaxing way to transit from one place to another, and it most certainly is the antidote to the current challenges of domestic air travel. It’s quite different from paddle boarding or canoeing on a river, it’s certainly not a cruise, and why isn’t important. Take the ferry to Nantucket rather than fly; take the mail boat from Portland to visit friends on the islands of Casco Bay; from Greenwich Harbor to the islands in Long Island Sound for a picnic with a view of Manhattan; or from Seattle to Whidby Island for dinner at your favorite seafood restaurant. Watch the commercial fishing boats or pleasure craft float by as the people on board waive and, abracadabra, that little bit of transit becomes a calming, restful nugget of vacation in a way unlike anything else can achieve. The people on passing boats do waive in a way that is a noteworthy distinction from the drivers in Boston traffic who flip the bird or just cut off other vehicles while listening to the talk radio shows that make them angry at the world while speeding ever faster. Maybe those people just need a slow trip on a sturdy vessel to relax a bit (https://www.timeout.com/boston/news/boston-drivers-ranked-worst-in-the-nation-for-the-10th-consecutive-year-062625). I for one will remain happy on the slow boat.

I’m genuinely grateful to be out of the shoulder season doldrums and into a busy summer season even though I am up to the gunnels in work. Still, if the Hades-hot weather forecast proves to be correct here in the landlocked middle of the continent, I will eagerly anticipate the joys of a long walk off a short pier and into some cool mountain water. Followed by an ice cream sandwich in the shade of a big tree. Because it’s summer, and these things are important to keep me on the right tack all season long. I will look forward to my next travel plans that can include the gentle rocking of a boat in the harbor, the salt spray, and the wind in my face, and I feel better just thinking about it.

Typical fisherman's shack near the Nantucket ferry terminal

View of downtown Boston from Logan International Airport

Not Just a Nametag

The view from the sun-baked patio of the wonderful Hotel Eiger in Mürren, Switzerland

Imagine this: You’re sitting in the dining room of a lovely little hotel in a famously picturesque mountain village in the Swiss Alps. Outside it is pouring rain so the large brightly colored awning covering the entrance and the umbrellas that ordinarily protect patrons from the sunshine are all put away. Most of the diners in the lively room with stunning views through the panorama windows are on a half-board, pre-fixe meal plan, as am I. It includes several choices of delicious main courses that follow a range of exceptional soups, a fish course or salad, and fresh bread. The wine is plentiful, the atmosphere convivial, and the staff are friendly, efficient, and engaging in numerous languages.

After a long, vigorous day of hiking I am ready for the wonderful plate of beef stroganoff when it arrives, piping hot from the kitchen and made with care. And then it happens. It really did; and I wish it hadn’t.

From somewhere behind me, I hear the uniquely loud and nasally voice of an American. She says to the dining room manager (the always hilarious and quite amazing Carla), in specific reference to the meal just placed in front of me, “The smell of burning flesh is disgusting to me. We’d like to sit outside”. I did not turn around. I did hear Carla ask gently whether they realized that we were in the middle of an enormous and quite terrible rain storm, only to be dressed-down by the nose-talker about how it can’t possibly be hard to pull out the awning, dry off the table and chairs, and turn on the heaters. The American and her companion promptly walked out and waited in the hotel lobby, toe tapping, while the staff scurried to make them happy (or at least less miserable). I went ahead and dove face first into my stroganoff with vigor and more than a tiny bit of amazement. The staff bit their tongues.

I wish this had been an isolated incident. On that trip, I had several other encounters just like it.

After the few worst of the COVID-19 pandemic, I tip-toed back into travel and eventually swan-dove in with vigor. In each of the last three years, I’ve sought out and found some exceptional experiences hiking in mountains far from home and getting to know some wonderful people. In my recent travels, I have always been made to feel welcome without exception or qualification and I have never felt as though I was being served by the people who staffed the hotels where I stayed, the cafes and remote mountain huts I visited, or the shops in which I poked around. Wherever I have traveled, the local people have been universally hospitable in the best sense of the word.

This year, in advance of my trip to the Bernese Oberlandt in Switzerland, I’d had in mind an article about the distinction between service and hospitality. It was a perspective that I kept in mind as I roamed around the car-free streets of Mürren and the surrounding villages perched on the cliffs above the Lauterbrunen Rift. It’s as beautiful a place as you can imagine, and yet it was the welcome of the people I found throughout the area that elevated it into the realm of the “I wonder if I could stay here for a long while” places. What stopped me from writing my article, what surprised me the most, was the realization that many, dare I say most, of the Americans in the bustling little village quite obviously did not share my view of how to experience the place and the hospitality of its people.

Among my compatriots, there was a clear expectation of being in receipt of service in Mürren, of being served, of experiencing the place just enough to be able to say that they’d been there and to show off their photos. There’s no other way to say it: the other Americans were noticeably and loudly disinterested in the people of the area, in their language and their culture. Their needy and entitled voices frequently interrupted my quiet reverie. I’ve been telling the uncomfortably numerous stories of my run-ins with cartoonish Americans to my friends here at home, selectively of course, and we all understand that underneath the entertaining tales about ugly Americans is a dark reality and a valuable signpost for the rest of us.

To be clear, I have zero issues with people preferring to modify their experiences for personal preferences, comfort, health or welfare. I do have an issue, a quite significant one, with people who treat the staff of exceptionally welcoming places like servants. It makes my skin crawl, especially when that staff is so committed to making all who come to their corner of the world feel at home in their home. Ours was among the first nations to cast aside social class as an essential component of how society is ordered and I would hope that egalitarianism is a part of our DNA whether we are at home or abroad, so this behavior really is challenging to my beliefs about who we are as a people. Thankfully, when I gently confronted Swiss villagers about whether this was a new phenomenon, their warmth with me remained unabated and they often shared their frustrations in a way that was always kind and made clear that they understood my own angst – their optimism about Americans remained unqualified even when tinted by polite consternation. Having the trust and confidence of the people there and being made to feel like one of their own was exemplified by the resident dog of a mountain hut invariably laying on my feet while having these conversations in French or my terrible German, and it did make me feel good about the world and my own place in it.

In Aspen Snowmass and in mountain resorts throughout North America, the common practice of staff wearing name tags that have their hometown on them is a subtle but effective way of humanizing each of us. The staff that work hard to keep the place clean and shovel the sidewalks, the wait staff in restaurants and everyone else are named and identified as people, not anonymously hiding like a nameless and faceless palace staff around the confines of a formal dining room, invisibly and silently serving their masters. The hometown on nametags indicates that we’ve each arrived here for a reason that often is similar to that of our visitors, and that our geographic diversity invites mutually respectful conversation and enriches our guests’ experience. I do hope that it keeps all of us, guests and staff alike, feeling and being squarely on the hospitality rather than the service side of the equation.

So, to my newfound friends in Mürren, danke schoen. Gracie mille. Merci beaucoup. Thank you for having made me feel welcome and for reminding me that true hospitality is neither transactional nor can it be rehearsed, and that its effect on the people being made welcome is far-reaching and quite wonderful.

I’m already looking forward to my next overseas adventure. For now, I may just have to treat myself to another slice of apfelstrudel at Bonnies on Aspen Mountain – it may make me feel soft around the waist but it does always make me feel good about the world.