Heather and Antje, both expecting, at Antje's baby shower in August 1999.
This adventure has been on the horizon for more than a decade. In a way it began in 1999 when I was pregnant with my daughter Aubrietta, and became friends with a Swiss woman who was pregnant as well. Just after Little Navina was born, but before Aubrietta arrived, my friend Antje returned to Switzerland. Our daughters were born weeks apart, and despite many miles, 9 time zones, and many years, our friendship has continued to grow.
Navina, Aubrietta, and Kelsey, enjoying coffee in Bellevue, August 2006
In 2006 my friend and her daughter visited us in Seattle, and the girls got to meet each other for the first time. During their visit we made a promise that 6 years later, when the girls were 12, we would meet again. Now it is our turn to visit them in Switzerland!
Another reason to take this trip is that in 1952 my mother and her sister traveled to Europe (by boat) with their parents, and my mom still talks about that epic trip as being one of the most amazing experiences of her life. She was 12 years old, just as Aubrietta is now. My grandparents were working class folks who scrimped and saved for years to make that trip happen, and that was an inspiration for me to do the same.

My mother, age 12, feeding birds at the top of the Jungfrau in the Swiss Alps, 1952
I have been to Europe twice. The first time I had just turned 17 and my dad and soon to be Swiss step-mom had relocated to Switzerland after the commune they had been living on in the US disbanded. They invited me to come stay with them for the summer. My dad's new wife was in her late 20's and wasn't quite sure what to do with a teenage step-daughter, so she decided to show me around her beautiful homeland, and for weeks the three of us traveled through the country, camping in tents, hiking in the alps, and exploring idyllic little villages. My dad's wife, being a teacher, arranged everything: tours of factories, visits to museums, farm stays, city walks, tours of historical sites, incredible meals, and more. I tasted my first wine, ate caviar, and swam nude in mountain lakes. I wanted to see more of Europe that summer, but instead I saw nearly every Canton of Switzerland, and got a more in-depth view of a single country than most travellers ever get. What a gift that summer was.

Me with the Matterhorn in the background, Switzerland, 1986. We had taken a gondola up, and were about to start and all-day hike back down to Zermatt.
My next trip to Europe was in 1997. My brother had just finished graduate school with a degree in transportation engineering, with an emphasis on public transit, and I had banked my vacation hours from my job for a few years so I could take a big trip somewhere... My brother and I decided to backpack through Europe together for 5 weeks, exploring public transit throughout. It was quite the adventure, let me tell you!

My brother and me on a train in Switzerland, 1997. Yes, we had some matching outfits. It helped us find each other in crowds.
Preparing for this upcoming family trip has been a lot harder. There are four of us. I am a parent and wife now, and have to take care of others and not just my own interests.
We have been saving money, and watching in dismay as the value of the dollar keeps plummeting. This trip is going to cost a lot of money, there's no denying that fact.
My car is 12 years old, and a basic model that I have to actually insert a key into the lock to open (no fancy electronic doors). I've replaced the transmission, timing belt, brakes, and more, trying to keep it going. My friends and neighbors have upgraded to newer vehicles 2 or 3 times since I've owned mine. I try to walk instead of drive, combine trips, and carpool when I can, to extend the life of my vehicle, so it doesn't need replacement.
I work odd jobs here and there but haven't returned to work full time because I didn't want to get locked into the American "2 weeks vacation when we say so" trap. I didn't want to have to quit or be fired from a job in order to travel, and have that black mark on my resume (but then again being unemployed all these years doesn't look so good either...). When I return from this trip I will seek full time employment to help pay off the cost. I wish we could leave for this trip knowing we'd fully saved for it, but it just isn't possible.
Several times in recent months we've nearly thrown up our hands and said, "forget it!" Like when we learned that we couldn't use our stockpiled airline miles for flights to Europe like we intended, and would have to spend thousands of dollars for airfare we weren't planning on. Our mileage plan credit cards boasted "no blackout dates," but the agent rephrased it by saying "mileage seats aren't released" for those flights. Sure, we could get to Europe on miles by taking 6 flights over 48 hours by crisscrossing the globe through obscure airports, but is that really how I want to travel with 2 kids? I don't think so. The costs keep expanding beyond our anticipated budget.
My husband wants to retire soon. We should be saving money for the girls to go to college. Our bathroom needs remodeling in the worst way (if you've been to our house and seen the hole in the ceiling in the front hall, beneath our leaking shower, you'll know what I mean). There are so many other things we should be doing financially, that we are putting on hold. Why do this trip? Why go now?
My view is that life goes by quickly, and we never know how much time we have with each other. This trip is a gift my husband and I want to give to our daughters before they leave the nest. A chance for us to be together as a family, 24 hours a day, for 6 weeks. My mother is not in the best of health, and it will bring her joy to receive postcards from us and know that her granddaughters are following in her footsteps, exploring the world at a young age. We are even going to try to visit our ancestral village in Switzerland, and find the "old family farm" where my mother visited with her family in 1952. We want the girls to have wide-world view, and to get a taste of other cultures and ways of life. More than likely this will be the last big trip we take as a family. Who knows what the future holds?
There are plenty of reasons not to go, but important reasons why we should... so off we go.
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