PIKE BROTHERS Bundesländer Tour 2010-2011

[swiss-jeansfreak]

We made it to the top. My friends wife and me, were the only one on the summit. To make it easier for her, I had carried all our stuff in one back pack to save some time

The view was fantastic and we had really warm weather

View south in direction to the Wallis and to Italy over the glacier:

View to Mont Blanc the highest mountain of the Alps over 4800 meter

And the Dufourspitze, the highest Swiss mountain (4636 meter), witch I first ascended in 1. of June 1985 just with jeans too

And of course the Matterhorn (the black one, around 4500 meter)

[swiss-jeansfreak]

Continuing view from top of the Oldenhorn:

Now let's have a look back on to the other side:

So looking north directly to good old Germany!!!

In front you can see the little Swiss Voralpen (up till 2500 meter above sea level), then the fog in the Swiss lowlands followed from the Jura (up to 1600 meter) further behind Vogesen on the left and Schwarzwald with Feldberg on the right hand (up to 1500 meter).

And far behind somewhere in the dust and fog and dirt, yeah welcome home German guys. I'm sure, you can point out somehwere Kassel, Hamburg, Berlin Chemnitz and so on!! It's all there but just not visible!!

Hiking down was a little bit complicated for her. It was quite steep going down!!

But peanuts for me

I love to slide down steep snowcovered hills. In a few minutes I came down the whole hill quickly

Some heavy use of the jeans:

and the boots:

But it was fun.

After that we hiked back home

2011-10-17

The friends wife had to recover from the yesterdays hike.

So I made a 3 hour race over 2 mountains up to 2500 meter above sea level. So sorry no camera with me and no pics. But it was really great to run a long distance.

I was feeling like offyatree who had done a Marathon I have read some older posts back

[beatle]

Happy Birthday ..amazing leg

[tvshooter]

wow that was great! i see how you got your name now- swiss jeans-freak! Happy Birthday! that was fun.

[ThinFinn]

great update there ruedi...! and a late Happy Birthday from me as well ...

[swiss-jeansfreak]

Thanks mates for your comments. And sorry about my bad english. It was a friend who turned 53. I had my 52. birthday last September 8. So I'm still very young, ha ha ha.

But now some more updates crosspost from Mynudies including the Chocolate contest from there as well. So anybody who wants to get some Swiss chocolate for free, hurry up and send me a PM now. The first ones will be the lucky ones. More infos below:

From Mynudies:

We really have to do a second turn after that, i´m so ashamed of my leg that i want satisfaction!:mrgreen:

Let´s rename the contest: "Ruedi blames the PB Bundesländer Tour 2010":wink:.

Ha ha, good idea for having a second round.

And best of all: Compared with my usually quite rough raw denim stuff I'm wearing myself, those Pike Brothers still look like brandnew to me. So still some more years possible to go around with them.

But there is no renaming of the tour necessary. I really loved the earlier updates as well and I have learned quite some great stuff from Germany

But anyway, many thanks for your comments despite my massive pictures overflows.

And yes, despite my age of 52 I'm still feeling myself quite crispy.

When I was last time at the Gasherbrum 2 Basecamp around 5000 meter above sea level in Himalaya, we measured the oxygen in the blood.

And in our group I still had almost the same amount of oxygen in my blood as I had in Zurich just 400 meter above sea level.

And that's amazing, because on 5000 meter you have half of the oxygen in the air only, as you can find on the sea level.

Probably got this from my mothers father, who was still strong till his old ages.

So I'm happy as long as I can walk, hike or do some skitouring without any stops over several hours without any troubles

And I heard Kayos, Flos and 501lovers chocolate cryings:

I alraedy bought one kilo of chocolate bars (501 lover knows witch ones) for sending them to some running out of chocolate people here

So let's do another speedy chocolate contest here:

Anybody who is reading this thread now, can send me a PM with your address.

And I'll send out the first 5 people some chocolate bars for free at your place.

I just had to warn people living in real hot areas will perhaps receive some chocolate cream instead of bars. Ha ha ha

Seriously:

This little chocolate race is open to the public now till five PM's have hit my mailbox.

And this unique offer expires at the end of October 31 2011, 12 PM MEZ if you lazy bones havn't ordered them till then

So come on hungry people.

Don't let me sit on this huge chocolate mountain.

Otherwise I'll just eat all of them by my own!!! (And I have to tell you: It wouldn't be the first time I had done this!!)

[swiss-jeansfreak]

Crosspost from Mynudies:

Here some teaser to catch you guys. To get an impression, I have used some of those chocolate bars to decorate some raw denim stuff

Sorry about thos crappy flash light pics

[swiss-jeansfreak]

Crosspost from MNudies continuing:

Some more little updates:

2011-10-18

Now the mountain holidays are over. Unfortunately we couldn't climb some real mountains over 4000 meter height, because too much new snow. So I have to wait for the next season.

But it was great fun on the lower mountains too.

And on the Oldenhorn glacier tour I had to wear the Pike Brothers the whole day, because you should never walk with shorts on a glacier. So on that day (and another one, where I forgot my shorts) the jeans had to swallow quite a lot of sweat during the long hikes. But they are still fine and no problems at all on them

We cleaned the chalet and I had time to open some walnuts we have collected behind our house in Zurich:

Then just heading back to Zurich and change all my stuff and gear

2011-19/20-2011

Just doing some stuff like washing all my clothes (except my raw denim stuff) and doing some shopping and other daily work at home

Nothing exciting for the Pike Brothers

2011-10-21 Visiting my parents home where I grew up

Today I catched the first train to help my parents doing some work for them.

And I wanted to escape the fog from the Swiss low lands.

Excellent weather in the Swiss alps as usual. Here my home mountain Piz Beverin 3000 meter height near Thusis, a 3000 inhabitant village :

Close to our village is the oldest womens monastery north of the alps founded in the 7th century, the Kloster in Cazis.

In the background you can see the Ringelspitz mountain 3240 meter height:

Here we finally go. The famous world known village called Ratitsch with around 40 people living there. We even have a large sign since some years and even the road to our place is paved now since many years;

Werv have a little waterfall too (15 meter height):

and a little pond behind our village:

And here the village Ratitsch, my hometown, where I know all parts from the surrounding by heart:

As you can see all paved road although single lane only.

Now you have to be carefully with driving around, because around 10 cars are

driving down and up this road every day and you have to avoid

a crash during the morning and evening rush hours (ha ha)

This was no problem untill 1975, when the first car hit our village.

Nobody here could afford a car before then, so no car crashes then

Looking down to the village from a hill.

On the other side of the valley is the Domleschg, well known for Europes highest castle and ruins density.

Over 13 old castles and ruins from the middle age were spread over 6 kilometers

[swiss-jeansfreak]

Crosspost continuing:

My school house, where I started my first schooldays with 20 other childrens.

Just six classes in one room with one teacher only

Most impressing new stuff for me was the introduction of a toothbrush, where our teacher learned us, that it was necessary to clean our teeth.

This was in 1967. Untill then toothbrushes was unknown to us.

We cleaned our teeth using the water from the little creek flowing through the village.

But we also used this creek to drink water for us out of it.

That's why I still have quite a strong stomach and never having any problems, if travelling around in poorer countries in the third world

My sweet home where I grew up. A 200 year old little farmhouse, where my parents still live there.

And at this place I started collecting raw denim stuff after we got some cloth donations with 2 pairs of Levis jeans at the end of 60'ies from a richer family:

The entrance of our little cowhouse. There was just enough space for 2-3 cows and 2-3 pigs. We couldn't afford a horse then

Looking out of my room

This is something most important above our village, where our little creek started coming out of some rocks. It's a reservoir, so we always have fresh mountain water in the village since over 50 years

The creek just starts here and it's super great mountain water:

The fresh mountain water in Downtown Ratitsch:

This water place was very important.

My mother had to clean and wash our cotton made diapers daily on this place also during winter time with frozen water and ice around.

I have no idea, how my mother could manage this with all her 10 childrens (I was number 4)

At least we already had electricity, a radio and cold water inside the house from the mid sixties

But in 1975 a real big change came to us and civilization reached us.

Beside the first car, the following completely new and fantastic items arrived our village in 1975:

- The first telephone

- The first fridge

- The first bathroom with shower and tub and flushing toilet and hot water

- The first TV

- The first washing machine to wash clothes

- The first vacum cleaner

So a new life has begun here then and now it's well developped like in almost all other places in Switzerland

And now I can't imagine how our 12 person family could handle this without all this stuff untill 1975

At least I'll never forget, when our neighbour drove in our "town" with a brown Ford Taunus in 1975. Our whole "city" was checking out this car

And now even our place has the daily rush hours with this 10 cars

Luckily we don't have any through traffic since our place is a dead end. There is just forest and mounain behind our village

So much about the good old times

[swiss-jeansfreak]

Crosspost from Mynudies

Thanks a lot for those updates again and letting us look inside your private life! That's not very common.

(did I make it on the chocolate list? ;-) )

And Tilmann: Don't worry about my privacy. I grew up in a very open minded family, so I'm not so used in having a big privacy. And don't forget how I grew up:

In my childhood, we were 7 children and my parents sleeping in one single room and only the 3 other sisters and brothers in a second room. So there was literally no privacy at all around at that time.

And yes you made it on the chocolate list

There are still some spaces left

3 PM's have hit my mailbox so far about the chocolate for free thing.

Another teaser since the chcolate bars are growing out on all kind of raw denim stuff at my place:

[swiss-jeansfreak]

Crosspost from MyNudies

Some more updates of the Pike Brothers on holidays in Switzerland:

2011-10-21

Working at my parents home:

My current downgraded Edwin work pants have a day off today since the Pike Brothers will have a hard day today as a work pants

Just a quick look of the Edwin pants having a break:

First doing some compost work (biorganic stuff) used as fertiliser later in the huge parents garden (you know my mother still tries to feed all of us 10 childrens even now!!!) with the help of my 80 year old father

Then sawing some wood into smaller pieces for the parents oven for heating and cooking with my parents still active there too

Just one log lost, so I picked it up with my bike. Too much work to get them with the machine:

It was probably the hardest time of the Pike Brothers: After some hours I was really really completely dust covered and dirty like a pig. I couldn't see much out of my glasses anymore:

Luckily I could clean the pants quite well with slapping them strongly against a wall. So I can use them further on without any washing

So much about using the Pike Brothers as a work pants. But they are still in perfect shape now

[swiss-jeansfreak]

Crosspost from Mynudies

2011-10-23

Today was my big day:

A mountain race about 19 km and 750 meter altitude through the Viamala gorge,

where the Hinterrhein (one of the two river branches) of the Rhein River flows through it

It was a beautiful day and after 1 hour and 35 minutes I finished the race on a good ranking

http://www.transviamala.ch/index.php?section=home

After a local meal with Spaetzle I couldn't resist to check out the Dessert buffet:

And I have eaten quite a lot of this sweet stuff. Bad boy Ruedi

It was a perfect day. After I have eaten too much dessert, I drove home one hour with my bicycle.

And now I need just some sleep. Because tomorrow I have to start working again after 2 weeks of holidays.

I have to earn some bucks, to keep the raw denim river flowing towards the Jeansmuseum

[beautiful_FrEaK]

And again a great update. I don't know how many of us guys would manage to finish that 19km race...and we are only half as old as you!

[swiss-jeansfreak]

Ha ha. You just have to run a little bit and then it's easy to do this for most of you. In fact I'm just running twice a week about 50 minutes each time, so nothing much behind this. But I like to run uphill since my childhood.

But seriously, it seems that I'm a lucky guy. It must be in my genes or jeans?

Probably the raw denim rags who are flowing through my body in stead of blood makes me stronger and stronger

[kayodic]

gotta say it again, you kick our butts the young people here swiss jeans daddy!

think we need the indigo injection or maybe moar chocolates to keep us as happy as you're... dont stop inspiring us!

[Max Power]

wonderful updates again. Thank you. You are one active and athletic guy, Kudos to you!!!

[swiss-jeansfreak]

Thanks guys for your comments.

And Flo: Yes I'm still feeling myself sort of beeing an active person. But I think, with my 65 kilos weight I'm not such an athletic guy. More a common person

In case of not boring you too much, here some more updates crosspost from MyNudies

I already have some people for getting some chocolate, but I still have some more to give away for free.

Or do you want me to eat all those unhealthy sweet stuff by my own??

The bad thing on this is: I would really do this, so help me out of this asap.

So let's go ahead for some more updates (But really let me know, when times has come to go one step further and stop stealing your time here and getting too tired about this boring stuff):

2011-10-24 untill 2011-10-26

A serious day is coming:

Back to work at 8 am in the early morning. I'm working as a geographer with Geographical Information Systems. I'm doing this on environmental data like water management, flood risks, and other stuff about rivers and lakes in Zurich. I also support other people in GIS and check out about mistakes, or plotting some maps,......

Or just let's say: I earn here some money for my raw denim life.

At the end, I'm sitting the whole day in front of my two computer screens. So no much actions for the Pike Brothers jeans.

But why do you think, I'm smiling at work on a monday morning? Let's check it out what's going on on my 2 computer screens. And keep a special eye on the left hand screen:

As you guys can see, I have many good raw denim pics on my left screen, witch keeps me motivated doing my daily GIS work.

Every minute another pic is showing up on the left side. And I can tell you: I have a thousands and thousands of raw denim pics here, so never boring time during work.

Those pics keep my raw denim heart and the raw denim rags flowing through my body instead of blood alive every day.

2011-10-27

A day with some shopping and a meeting and some cleaning up at home.

Decided to skip doing pics from this, for saving you some time.

Or do you really wanna see a man vacum cleaning his home??

Ok, at least just one self explaining pic. And of course you can't find any raw denim stuff there in the fresh washed laundry:

2011-10-28

Today some more interesting actions for the Pike Brothers and doing some gardening around the house:

On the left hand side, I'm pointing on some real tasty figs. I really like them

In the evening we went to a theatre (no pics)

[swiss-jeansfreak]

2011-10-29

There is a weekly flea market in Zurich every saturday, called the Kanzleiflohmarkt with about 300 people selling all kind of stuff.

There is almost no chance to find any raw denim stuff there. But many urban cowboys are showing up here and walking around with some good raw denim stuff. This is always a good time to inform those people about my Jeansmuseum and encourage them, to keep all their raw deim stuff alive for ever. And before trashing them, they can donate them to the Jeansmusuem, where all your beloved favorite items can survive forever in peace on a safe place, what they deserve after a long and hard life.

After visiting the flea market I drove with my bicycle steep uphill to the local hill of Zurich called Uetliberg from 400 meter up to 900 meter above sea level.

From the tower you have a nice overview to the greater Zurich area

We are looking north and far behind (just 40 km away) you can imagine again Germany, but obviously hidden below some fog and dust.

But luckily still there!!!

On the right hand is the beginning of the eastern part of the Swiss alps.

But you have seen enough mountain pics in this thread I assume

Me on the Uetliberg tower. I really like this place, where I can see my beloved mountains quite close from here (70 km away only)

At the end of afternoon I was visiting my sister nr. 4, who is celebrating her birthday turning 50 years old now.

You can find her beside my parents with her son

Perhaps you noticed the size of my parents and sisters compared with my size.

With only 175 cm I'm the tallest person in the whole family, so my brothers and sisters are quite short people.

In the later evening I have switched to another invitation. A nice couple (both geographer and cartographer) are having a birthday party too.

After those 2 events I had eaten too much, so I'm almost exploding.

And now bedtime, it's f****ing unreal late!!!

[swiss-jeansfreak]

Hi guys

Sorry for missing updates. Too much work atm in my job.

But don't worry I'll be back in a few days and I don't wanna overload this thread with too much pics anymore like before.

[tvshooter]

Your pictures have been awesome Ruedi. my favorite tour thread atm. i showed these pics to several friends and they all commented on how happy you are. and crazy too! but in a good way.

[Max Power]

Your pictures have been awesome Ruedi. my favorite tour thread atm. i showed these pics to several friends and they all commented on how happy you are. and crazy too! but in a good way.

There is nothing more to add.

[swiss-jeansfreak]

Thanks tvshooter and max. I'm glad that you like those updates although too many pics. I like my life between my beloved mountains, doing some sport and my raw denim world

Crosspost from My Nudies thread.

Just back from a two days visit at my parents house to cut some wood in our forest and to escape the fog in the Swiss lowlands.

The work was just too dirty, so I saved the Pike Brothers from this job and used my current third class work jeans instead. I didn't wanna ruin them just in 2 days.

Tomorrow I should be able for some more pics updates.

I have a little surprise for you (but not on the Pike Brothers, they are still doing fine)

My chocolate contest ended well and there are 6 people receiving at least a few chocolate bars from me for free to 4 german and 2 american guys so far. I was able to sent them out yesterday morning to 4 places where I already got their addresses and more will be sent out tomorrow morning.

[swiss-jeansfreak]

Crosspost from my nudies:

Now back again for a little update:

2011-10-30

My parents visiting me and we had a huge breakfast. But I don't wanna shock you guys with more pics with a lot of eating, so just a pic after we have finished breakfast:

And now ta little personal change as a surprise: I got a new haircut. I'm doing this twice a year in April and October, since many years at home. My last visit to a hair dresser was over 30 years ago.

Here we go:

At the end, both of us had a new haircut.

Quite short for the moment, but they will grow fast untill the next hair cut in April 2012

[ATTACH=CONFIG]3070[/ATTACH]

[beatle]

looking good, Ruedi

[ThinFinn]

yap...looking good mate!

[swiss-jeansfreak]

Thanks for your comments. At least I lost some weigth that way ha ha ha

But in half a year I will have gained that back

Here some more crossposts from MN:

The Pike Brothers are still doing well in Switzerland.

But I lost track who is next or the last one to get them. Almostnice?

And how about time schedule to send them to him?

I just have them for one month now.

Updates:

2011-10-30 and 31

A lot of work on my Geographical Information System projects in my office.

My left flat screen keeps me motivated at work every minute with a new raw denim pic:

2011-11-1

A little visit for the Pike Brothers in to the Jeansmuseum:

The Pike Brothers jeans are welcomed from the really first two pairs of Levis 501 and 505 Big E jeans,

our large family got donated at the end of sixties. Of course I still have all my raw denim stuff (pants

and denim jackets) from my last 35 years. I could never throw away any little piece of raw denim rags.

There was one exception, when I had in a sort of a ritual burnt my really heaviest worn out and strongly faded

Lee (200 series) denim pants from the mid 70-ies on my world round trip in Alaska in 1991. I covered the whole inside

part of the pants with some thick cardboard paper so they could resist much longer against the fire. Then I filled

them up with a lot of newspaper and I hung them up on to a branch. I set some newspaper alight at the inside

of both legs end at the meantime. And after some seconds really huge flames where coming out from inside out

of the top. Then I watched very exactly the fight from the pants against the fire and how they got destroyed more

and more. And after quite some time, nothing has left but some rivets and buttons.

I still regret this today.

2011-11-02

My 20 years old godchild visited me in the Jeansmuseum and after two hours of trying on about 50 pairs

of different jeans he left with two pairs of new jeans (Edwin and Nudies) and one denim shirt (Levis):

[beautiful_FrEaK]

nice post is he wearing "my" Nudie Slim Jim?

[ThinFinn]

nice post is he wearing "my" Nudie black coated Conny?

fixed for me

[swiss-jeansfreak]

Wow, you guys are amazing and you have damn good denim eyes.

And yeah, it's your jacket Rafa and your pants Tilmann!!!!

But he didn't wanted to wear them, since he know, that I only have just this single ones in good condition so far. So he chooses other stuff I have quite a bunch of the same kind around my place.

I'll try to post some more pics later this week. Too busy at the moment with my work and the Jeansmuseum. I'll let yoiu know later why about the Jeansmuseum.

And Rafa: Hurry up for meeting up the Pike Brothers as long as they are in my hands!!

[ThinFinn]

imo you should keap these another month mate

think i'll come to zürich again, by the end of the month. i'll hit you up again, before i'll do this...