Corporate Engagement Manager Meg Hardt was quick to admit that she’d been thinking about how she was going to use her five-year Trip of a Lifetime ever since she started working at Arthrex.
“I’d wanted to go to Europe for years,” she said. “I’d never been there before, and with a name like ‘Trip of a Lifetime,’ it was important to me that I use that benefit to do something big.”
With the help of a travel agent, Meg and her husband, Tyler, debated a handful of bucket-list destinations.
“We originally wanted to go to Paris and London,” Meg said, “but we timed our trip to coincide with our kids being away at summer camp, and that would have put us in Paris at the same time as the Olympics – which we worried would make everything crazy busy.”
Their next idea was to spend the first half of their trip in Italy and the second half in Switzerland.
“When we saw the first draft of our trip itinerary, we felt like we were going to be rushing from one place to another, and we really wanted to be able to explore things at our own pace and try to experience some smaller towns the way a local would.”
Meg said the more time she and Tyler spent online thinking about the places they wanted to see, the more they felt like there were enough sites in Switzerland to fill their 10-day trip without needing to visit a second country.
“And,” she added, “after spending summers in Naples, [Florida], we wanted to go somewhere that would give us a break from the heat and humidity.”
With their kids at camp – and Meg’s sister on call should the kids need anything – Meg and Tyler boarded their nine-hour flight to Zurich. Having never been on a flight that long, Meg said she bought “every gadget known to man” for the sake of making their travel as comfortable as possible: A new wireless headset, a highly-rated sleep mask, a neck pillow, a blanket designed specifically for airplane passengers, battery chargers and tons of snacks.
“I thought we’d just sleep during the flight, but the flight attendants kept coming around – first with drink service, then dinner service, then snack service, and then a follow-up drink service. They kept us up most of the night, and needless to say, I didn’t need half the stuff I bought.”
Upon arriving in Zurich, Meg and Tyler headed straight to their hotel, Storchen, which turned out to be their favorite hotel on the whole trip – in part due to the stunning views from the rooftop deck (where they relaxed until it was time to check into their room) and the black-out shades on their room’s windows (that allowed them to sleep for nearly 13 hours straight).
After enjoying a locally sourced breakfast at the hotel, Meg and Tyler set off for Interlaken, which served as their home base for the next four nights.
Between trains, buses and ferries, Meg and Tyler traveled the countryside, taking day trips to Lauterbrunnen, where they strolled through the idyllic town and visited the largest waterfall in Europe – Trümmelbach Falls; Thun, where they toured the Thun Castle after taking a scenic boat ride across Lake Thun and Grindelwald, where they rode mountain carts - which Meg described as “adult big wheels.”
Then, each night back in Interlaken, they sat and watched the paragliders land in the center of town.
“Interlaken is known for paragliding,” Meg said, “and we probably saw, on average, 100 of them a day, flying around like birds.”
Meg and Tyler’s next stop was Lucerne where they hiked Mount Pilatus and then rode a toboggan down the mountain. They also hiked the famous Stoos Ridge, the summit of which they accessed by taking the world’s steepest funicular, followed by a ride in a chair lift.
“It was breathtaking,” Meg said. “Every turn on the trail revealed another amazing view.”
Without a firm itinerary, Meg said she and Tyler were able to linger over long lunches, visit with locals and make game-time decisions about what they wanted to do next.
“By day seven, I was exhausted – and you know that is saying a lot. But everything was just so beautiful, I kept telling myself, ‘Keep going. You can rest on the plane on the way home.’”
(With her travel pillow, sleep mask and airplane blanket.)
Meg expressed her gratitude to Arthrex for the Years of Service benefit that took her to Europe for the first time.
“I think we may make this a tradition – using my Trip of a Lifetime benefits to go to Europe,” Meg said. “I have a whole list of places I want to go, so hopefully we can just keep checking them off the list.”
For every five years of employment with Arthrex, employees are eligible for a company-paid Trip of a Lifetime to recognize their dedication. Look for more Trip of a Lifetime highlights on the Arthrex Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and LinkedIn pages.