Lake Como

Mark and Colleen were able to join us for a second weekend, this time exploring the beautiful and storied Italian Lakes region. The Italian Lakes are in northern Italy, near the foot of the alps, but well above the Mediterranean. It used to be considered one of the places everyone needed to go at some point in their life (although I think that’s stretching it a little). Regardless, it’s a pretty cool area, as you have large lakes that run up to the foot of the mountains, snow-tipped peaks in the background, cliffs, and some of the most stunning villas you’ll find anywhere in the world. In fact, I think this area invented the concept of the villa, and if they didn’t, they should have.

I was a little concerned going into this trip, as the weather is right at that point where it could either be nice or absolutely terrible. Luckily, it was about as perfect as you could have asked for, and coupled with the fact that it’s pre-tourist season, the conditions couldn’t have been better.

Outside of the lake and mountain views, the villas are the main attractions in Como. Located on mountain sides, sporting well-manicured gardens, the villas were spectacular, to say the least. One of the villas has been used as a movie set on a handful of films, most recently in the latest James Bond movie (it was also used as the backdrop to a terrible love scene in Star Wars - Attack of the Clones, but I think the James Bond thing makes up for it.) Not that we’re into going to places where movies were filmed or anything…although I guess this is the second time we’ve been somewhere from a James Bond movie in the past year. Doh.

We stayed at Bellagio, which was a good central location from where we could explore the other cities. None of the towns here are particularly large, but they all have winding streets, narrow alleys, great sea views, and multiple gelato shops. Bellagio was probably the best of them, and when you add in the fact that our hotel had a ridiculously great roofdeck, and nobody else really went up on it, then you have a recipe for awesomeness. Yes, that is a word – I believe it’s derived from a Latin word meaning "total sweetness". Anyway - we spent pretty much every day walking around doing stuff, coming back and resting, having some Prosecco on the roofdeck, going out to dinner, then coming back and having more Prosecco on the roofdeck. Not sure there’s a better way to spend a day, really.

Once again, we want to thank Colleen and Mark for visiting; we really had a lot of fun traveling with them, and it’s great to see familiar faces in an environment so far removed from where you’re used to seeing them. The only downside was that Colleen couldn’t back up her gelato trash-talking. She was all like "I can eat gelato 4 times a day", but in reality, it was only 3 times a day. Weak!

Next weekend: Stuttgart, Germany!

Burgundy Deux

First off, we want to say thank you to Mark and Colleen for taking their hard-earned vacation to come and visit! As Mark stated, he did this solely "to make the blog", and as such I will give him the honor of being mentioned. "Mark Nester". There you go, Mark – you can now rest as a happy man!

All joking aside, it’s great to have friends along in your travels, as it makes the experiences that much better. This weekend, we went to Burgundy, France, for another shot at tasting some of the greatest wines the world has to offer. We started Friday with the whites of Chassagne-Montrachet and moved north through Puligny-Montrachet and Meursault. In Burgundy, the wine tastings are hit or miss – it’s not like California where you have a big tasting room, tons of people crowded in, etc. Burgundy is still a land of farmers, and regarding the wines, they have no problems whatsoever selling everything they produce. As such, the consumer is not particularly needed, which as a consumer can be annoying, but when you break it down into simple economics, you can’t worry too much about it.

Anyway, so our first tasting was pretty good, and we bought a couple bottles. The next tasting was disastrous, as the lady basically wanted us to just leave, which we quickly did. The final tasting, after enjoying one of the best lunches I’ve ever had, was conducted entirely in French (which I understood about three-quarters of) with one of the nicest people I’ve ever met. We bought a bunch of bottles there, which just goes to show you the importance of a good salesperson. Her name was Chantel, and she has now made the blog also. On another note, we ran into Chantel the next day in the market, and she came up and said hi to us and talked for a minute or two (in French). Kind of funny, and it’s one of those little, nice experiences that makes traveling fun.

That night, we stayed in Beaune, a walled medieval city that is fun to walk around, although I wouldn’t recommend driving 3+ hours just to see it. It’s pretty cool though. Anyway – we hit a wine tasting there before dinner that boasted 15 Burgundian wines, which after a day of constant tasting, turned out to be quite a bit; in all, we tasted 32 wines that day, which will probably go down as my all-time record. Also of note is that fact that every single one of the 32 would be a $20+ bottle in the states (and some of them would push triple digits), so if that isn’t a crash-course in fine wine knowledge, then nothing is.

The next day, we hit red Burgundy country. We drove through a couple of the villages, stopped on the hillside holding some of the most expensive vineyards in the world (the grand crus of Corton), and ended the afternoon at one of the more authentic caves we could have imagined. Due to insider knowledge that Colleen was able to procure, we were welcomed into the "caveau" of one of Vosne-Romanee’s producers, where we tasted a handful of their best wines. Of course, we bought even more wine from here, which at this point was just getting silly.

After that, we dropped Colleen and Mark off at the train station in Dijon. No, we didn’t tour a mustard factory, although that would have been a great idea. While they headed to Paris for the rest of the weekend, Soph and I decided to explore the Burgundian countryside. And can I just say, as far as countrysides go, there can’t be many that are more beautiful than Burgundy? Rolling hills, green fields, medieval towns…really cool stuff. We hit a couple of old towns that were literally in the middle of nowhere, completely forgotten by time and off the beaten track. It boggles the mind that some of these places exist, and that hardly anybody goes to see them. Sure, they don’t have stores or tourist shops or the cutesy things that draw people in – rather, they are desolate, untouched, sometimes downtrodden, but completely authentic. The one town had a number of buildings you could tell had no inhabitants, but the stone houses and streets held up well, still in the same state they were hundreds of years ago. The only downside to these towns is that they are clearly inhabited by zombies. In one situation, I tried to make Soph crawl down a zombie hole so I could get a picture, but she smartly declined. Regardless, the towns did have an eerie-ness you could feel on the wind, which I thought was cool, but Soph thought was, well, eerie.

So we drove all over the place, finally staying outside a town called Avallon, at an old Mill on a creek. I’ve decided I really like creeks; this one, in particular, was one of the best I’ve ever seen. The hotel was pretty sweet, once we navigated our way to it – don’t get me started on French country roads, or the one-lane stone-lined 50 mph streets that qualify for roads there. Anyway, we had a great dinner, even considering they served some milk-like substance as an aperitif that neither Soph nor myself had any idea what we were supposed to do with (of course we ate it, but it was probably a sauce meant to go with the bread or something). In their defense, the escargot was amazing, so they can get away with serving all the random stuff they want outside of that.

Lastly, I think I’ve found my calling in life. No, I’m not going to be a circus clown – although their work/life balance is arguably better than mine. Rather, I’ve started my life of crime, specifically – smuggling! Yes, due to the fact that Mark and Colleen left their wine with us, and we also had quite a bit of wine ourselves, we were well over the limit of bottles of wine we were allowed to bring back into Switzerland. So, as we drove through the border, Soph put on her sunglasses and I put on my eyeglasses, as that was about the extent of a disguise we could come up with. And you know what? The border guards fell for it! So we got through without having to pay a huge fine, and now I’m thinking of making a career of this; armed with my glasses, I can’t be stopped! (I’m totally getting stopped next time for saying this, by the way…)

Here is the link to all the pictures: http://www.flickr.com/gp/14460611@N03/1S9PP4

Next weekend: Lake Como!

Cinque Terre

Cinque Terre…if you’re into beautiful natural scenery, the sea, mountains, great food, hiking, cute towns, and basically just enjoying life, then it doesn’t get much better than this. Cinque Terre is a series of five cliffside villages in Italy – and when I say "cliffside", I mean "hanging on the edge of a cliff". Each village is essentially built into the side of a mountain, dangling precariously over the Mediterranean, making them almost inaccessible by land, and almost as hard to get to by water. Between the separate villages runs a series of hiking trails that have the sea on one side, and steep hillside vineyards on the other, making for amazing views the entire way. However, Cinque Terre has so much more…

"When life gives you a lemon grove, make limoncello." Can I just say how utterly amazing the lemons were? Easily, the best lemons ever. And I don’t just throw around the "best lemons ever" title. In the same vein, all the food was amazing. First, you’re in Italy, so the pasta is, by default, really good. Then, you’ve got the pesto, which Liguria is world-renowned for. (Note: due to the famous-ness of Ligurian pesto, I risked life and limb to eat it, as one of the key ingredients are pine nuts. After some scientifically-monitored taste-tests prior to the trip, I determined I am not, in fact, allergic to pine nuts, and can eat pesto without abandon...which I did…but that’s another story.) Lastly, the seafood is all freshly caught, a fact Sophia used as a reason to order it for every dish. The verdict? Unbelievable food, for 4 days.

How do you get to Cinque Terre? For us, we took the train. Yes, it was a 9+ hour trip, but we left at like six-something in the morning, so the first few hours don’t really count. Besides, train rides really aren’t that bad. Training through Switzerland is almost a vacation in and of itself, as you pass through great mountain views and some cute little podunk Swiss villages, not to mention the Italian part of the trip, which is basically a trip through beautiful lakes and insanely green fields. For some reason, the greens in Italy are simply more green than they are anywhere else – not sure how else to explain it. Anyway, we took some cheese, a bottle of wine, some dried meats and fresh bread, and not only had a pretty easy train ride, but an enjoyable lunch as well. You just can’t do that on an airplane…

As this was our first trip to Italy, we had to brush up on some Italian before arriving. Once again, I lament the fact we’re learning French, rather than a cool language like Italian or Spanish or even Slovenian. I think after spending four days in Italy, my Italian is already better than my French, of which I’ve been attempting for eight months now. Seriously – it’s so much easier! Anyway, it was actually fun butchering Italian, and I think we did okay with it.

If there is any downside to Cinque Terre, it’s the sickening amount of tourists that go there. Yes, we’re tourists, I get the point, but there’s a difference. When it’s us, it’s cool. When it’s other people, it sucks. I know it’s a double standard, and I fully embrace the fact that I am flaunting it so openly. However, the fact is, there are a lot of tourists that hit up the towns here, and they all suck. Except for us. That being said, the reason this is a problem is because the towns are insanely small to begin with. We’re talking one main street that goes for maybe two, three blocks, and that’s it. That’s part of the appeal – that you have this really small town, in the middle of nowhere. Unfortunately, when it’s crowded with hundreds of people, it loses that small town appeal. The bright side? Most tourists don’t come out in the mornings or at night, so if you’re up early, you see the locals, and if you’re up later, you see nobody.

Lastly, there’s the hiking. Hiking here is, simply, extraordinary. Of the four paths, two are extremely easy and very beautiful, and give everyone the chance to see some amazing sea views and vistas of the towns in the distance. The other two are winding and challenging, allowing you not only the amazing sea views and towns, but hills and valleys, creeks, old forgotten walled gardens, olive groves, hillside vineyards, a huge amount of varied vegetation, odd rock formations, and all sorts of cool stuff. The other great thing about the hikes is that you get to explore the towns in between, meaning you can rest and, in our case, get a gelato and / or lunch, before moving on to the next hike.

Which town was our favorite? Hard to say. We stayed in Vernazza, and therefore got to explore it the most, so in the end we probably liked it best. It was just the right size, meaning it had two gelato places, four or so restaurants, a plethora of winding alleyways, and you could explore it multiple times without getting bored. We also liked Corniglia, although its appeal is due to the fact that hardly anybody goes there (tourists shy away because of a 300+ step climb from the train station, and the only other way to reach it is by hike). Corniglia has that quiet air about it that makes you really feel like you’ve gotten away, which is nice. Monterosa is the main town, and while it has the best shops, it’s completely overrun by tourists at any time of day, which makes it feel like more of a spectacle than a vacation. Lastly, Riomaggiore and Mannarola are both small little towns that probably have a little too much tourism, and not quite enough room. However, they both have spectacular views, and once you get into the hills behind the town, there is good casual walking to be done, and some of the best gardens and terraces you’ll find anywhere.

One last thing about Cinque Terre; parsley grows wild here. That is, you know how if you look at the cracks in cement, or stairs, and sometimes there will be a weed growing out of it? Yeah, in Cinque Terre, that weed is parsley. No joke – it’s definitely parsley. How ridiculously awesome is life when, if you want to add a little flavoring to your latest meal, you just go out and pick the weeds, and put them on your food? It doesn’t get much better than that…

Link to pics: http://www.flickr.com/gp/14460611@N03/4DP99W

Next weekend: Burgundy + Visitors Deux

Our Last Ski Weekend

Our last ski weekend has come to a close, and I have very mixed feelings about it, considering I had set out to hate this sport, the very first (and thirtieth) time I fell flat on my face. But now I’ve actually come to like it a little, gasp! So I’m sad that we won’t be skiing anymore, but also happy that we won’t be skiing anymore, if that makes any sense at all.

We decided to pack into a car with a few of our friends and spend the night in the Chatel area of the Portes du Soleil, as one of the friends was able to hook all of us up with a place there for a night. The weather was beautiful (we had to take our thermals off and I skied without gloves at one point), and the skiing there was pretty good the first day, although I think I psyched myself out of the belief that I had in fact gotten better, so proceeded to fall as soon as I put my skis on. But then I realized it was in my head (it seems that skiing is as much about your mental disposition, as it is with your balance), and went on to conquer my fears of crashing into a tree (which Tyler actually did, don’t worry he’s ok), and basically made the slopes my slave. Well, I wouldn’t go that far, as I did fall a few more times, but I actually began to enjoy going fast, because I knew that I could semi slow myself down or stop. And the falls were more attributed to the fact that I wanted to look cool like all the other skiers and make sure my skis were parallel and close to each other at all times. I should know better than to get ahead of myself! The really fun part of the weekend though was being able to go back to the apartment, hang out on the balcony with some bubbly, and chat and laugh with good company while our dinner was cooking on the stove. And then go to sleep at 9 PM.

The skiing on Sunday was not as good as Saturday, as the visibility was very poor from the fog, and the snow whipping around us. There was new powder, which was kinda cool, as you could hear that neat squeaky snow crunch beneath your skis, but the area we ended up going to did not have much variety and the infrastructure was not set up very well, as we had to basically cross country it from point to point, which made my knees feel like they were going to pop out of their joints. Or maybe I’m just old. On the flip side, the place we stopped to rest at had 22 flavors of hot chocolate, so we were slightly mollified. We also saw the best mullet ever, pulled off by a man who was stuck in the seventies, with his neon blue and yellow snowsuit, and we realized that mullets will never cease to make us giggle and stare like ten year old children. Ah, mullets. Oh, and we scalped our tickets since we left the slopes around 1PM, and were able to get back ten euros each by selling our lift passes. Although it was funny to see us standing around, waving our lift pass and saying, "dix euros, dix euros." You could see the mixture of amusement/fear on some of the faces of the French. Not sure if they’ve been exposed to scalping like we Americans have.

So we pack away our ski gear, thankful that we didn’t fall off any cliffs, but also grateful for the experience of skiing in some of the best slopes and in the shadow of some the most beautiful massifs in the world. We do look forward to some adventures that hopefully involve weather that doesn’t make the snot freeze on our nose.

Next weekend: Easter in Cinque Terre, Italy!

Korean Bday Dinner!

One of the biggest material things I miss about being away from home, is being able to get some yummy, authentic and cheap korean food, in restaurants, or in the asian grocery stores. I have to admit that some of the ethnic stores here blow the socks off of the ones that we had at home, if you want to cook yourself up some good thai curry chicken, or pad thai; however, the supply of korean products is definitely lacking. As a result, I’ve had to try to whip myself up some of my own kimchi, but have failed in each attempt (to Tyler’s glee). Although the saying is even bad kimchi is good kimchi, so he nearly fell out of his seat when I decided to eat some of the last batch I made, exclaiming that I had hated this batch, and WHY was I eating it (especially considering it was 5 weeks old)? He knows not the depths of my desperation. And the salt acts as a preservative. He was still disgusted.

So for the whole month leading up to my birthday, I kept dropping hints that all I really wanted was to go get some good korean bbq, and eventually he gave in and agreed to taking me to a korean restaurant as my birthday present. I was ecstatic! I was even able to negotiate ordering two dishes, instead of one! I bragged to all my friends, and this past Friday, a group of us went to try Gaya, a korean restaurant near the Paquis district, that I had read pretty good reviews about. Warning flags should have gone off in my head when we had been sitting there for almost a half hour before even being given the menu or asked if we wanted drinks, but we were having fun talking, and I was high on the prospect of getting bbq AND kimchi chigae (kimchi soup). Actually I should have been prepared regardless, considering Geneva’s eating out scene is not phenomenal, although it is expensive. Well, to sum it up, the service was atrocious. I don’t know if it was because there were so many of us, or if it was because they were so busy, but they screwed up on our order, didn’t bring us enough food, didn’t bring the sauces that usually accompany some of the dishes, and basically was a huge disappointment to me. Everyone exclaimed that the food was delicious (it was ok, but I’m picky seeing as how I’ve eaten in a gazillion korean restaurants), it was just that the service was so horrible. Well, I wasn’t even able to come close to achieving that supreme happiness that I so often get when I’m eating really delicious food (you know that feeling!), and it just sucked b/c we don’t eat out often in Geneva, and to sqaunder the victory I had won from Tyler (and the money), was heartbreaking. Ok, I know I’m being a little dramatic, but those of you who know me, know how much I love food. However, our friend was able to negotiate a 25 franc discount (she did it with a huge smile), which is a miracle in Geneva, and we all did have a really wonderful time.

So now I’m trying to figure out another way to blackmail Tyler into taking me to another korean restaurant here, in the hopes I can still satisfy my craving, but the chances seem really slim until the next birthday (or in Tyler’s words, your 36th b-day). In the meantime, I think that if I try another type of pepper powder, the kimchi might turn out better…

Next up: Our last ski weekend!

Ski Weekend Cinq

Another weekend of winter, and another weekend of skiing. The question you may ask is, after all the falls and bruises and laughing, how do I continue to get Soph to go skiing with me? Well, let’s take a step back and look at the progression of Soph’s skiing adventure…

Jan 19th: Soph has her first European skiing experience; she falls within 8 seconds of the first run, has trouble getting up, and continues falling over the next 2 hours. We eventually eat lunch, and she quickly falls again afterwards, encouraging her to quit for the rest of the day.

Jan 26th: Rather than ski, she comes down with an illness. The jury is still out on whether or not it was real.

Feb 9th: We go again, and Soph tries to convince everyone to stay at the restaurant during lunch. We get her out a few times, but finally she has enough and leaves the slopes a little early.

Feb 10th: Soph goes out on her own and hits a bunny hill, but she continues falling and secretly decides she hates skiing. She tells me she will never be good, and that I have to accept it and love her anyway.

Feb 22nd: She has a nightmare about skiing. It involves her, well, skiing, which is why she considers it a nightmare.

Feb 23rd: We try to go skiing, but due to traffic, we turn around halfway into the trip. As we turn around, a noticeable happiness engulfs Soph, and she immediately starts having fun and being her normal cheery self.

Feb 24th: She has another nightmare about skiing, only this time, she’s being chased on skis, by zombies.

Mar 4th: Christina and Jordan are visiting, and express interest in skiing in the Alps. We take them, and Soph tries a few times to get us to turn around, but to no avail. Once there, however, she makes it down the first run without falling. This continues throughout the day, and suddenly she "kind of likes" skiing.

Mar 9th: She actually suggests we go skiing, so we venture on our own to a mountain that’s just about right for our skill levels. Throughout the day Soph is consistently heading down the hill ahead of me, making crisp turns, and even ventures onto a side path or two.

And that’s where we stand today; I have to say that I’m very impressed with the turnaround, as it came out of nowhere. By the end, we were skiing some moderate-to-hard blue runs and she was tackling them fairly well, and considering she’s only been skiing 4 or 5 days, without any true lessons, I think that’s pretty good. She might actually be better than me at this point, depending on how you judge skill levels, so I have to give her credit.

That being said, what’s the lesson in this? Well – apparently, if you pester your spouse hard enough, they can learn just about anything, no matter how much they hate it. So keep pestering! Anyway – enough about Soph – she accuses me of making fun of her too much on this blog already, and the previous few paragraphs aren’t going to help my case…

So as I was saying, this weekend we went to the lovely Swiss village of Villars-Gryon for yet another wonderful day of skiing. This was our first "solo" trip, which was kind of fun, especially since we’re now at a point where we can stick together on the slopes. The weather was once again beautiful, with the sun shining brightly and amazing views of mountains all around. It’s really hard not to enjoy being up in the mountains like that, and while skiing is by no means the greatest thing ever, it’s still pretty fun, just for the fact that you’re outdoors and concentrating on something basic such as staying on your feet.

Anyway, that wasn’t the only thing we did this weekend, for a village nearby was hosting a Chocolate Festival! Gotta love chocolate festivals! So of course I made us go, and of course it was a complete letdown, but we did buy some good chocolate that we probably wouldn’t have gotten otherwise. There’s something about huge crowds of people expecting free things that turns me off; it was a complete madhouse. However, it did get us out of Geneva for a few hours, and the chocolate, while readily available from any number of boutiques within Geneva, was the best I’ve had so far in Switzerland, and possibly ever (as much as I hate spending 2 bucks, or francs, on a piece of chocolate, it really is good!) So that was fun.

One last note – if you haven’t been checking the currency rates lately – and if you’re normal, you haven’t – then you haven’t noticed the recent power surge of the Swiss franc. Yes, that lovely currency I use for all my daily transactions has had an increase the likes of which haven’t been seen since, well, for awhile. As of today, it’s trading 1 to 1 with the dollar! To put that in perspective, when I moved here, the franc was at 84 cents; now it’s at 100 cents. That’s a 19% gain! So while that’s bad news for all of you who are coming here to visit, it’s good news for me, since I have more exposure to the all-powerful franc than that third-world currency you call the dollar. As an added bonus, when I come back home now, I’m more likely to spend money, thereby helping the US economy – gotta love economics!

Next weekend: Final ski weekend!

First Visitors!

Congratulations to Christina and Jordan, who earn the honor of being our first visitors! We’re very happy to host friends and family who want to see a little of Europe.

Having visitors is great; it’s fun to see old friends in new surroundings, and we had a great time. The one thing that first visitors always bring, which I find interesting, is a sense of introspection. That is, you’re forced to approach your situation from where you saw it at a different point in time. For us, the things we’ve grown to really like in Geneva, might not appeal to people who haven’t been here for awhile, and it’s good to get that old perspective back every now and again. While you want to take people to the best places and get them the best foods, you also have to wonder if the places are really even that good, or if you just think they’re great due to the experiences you’ve had. For example – within the Geneva restaurant scene, what we think is great is anything that’s under $20 and fills you up. In the US, this is normal, so our favorite restaurants here are probably merely sub-par for anyone not used to the craziness that is Geneva pricing.

That being said, I do think there are some cool places around here regardless of what you consider to be cool, so we went to them. One of the favorites of locals and expats alike is Annecy, a medieval French town on what is considered the cleanest lake in Europe. Annecy is a nice little place with cobble-stoned streets and stone buildings, and it even has a canal running through it. It doesn’t get much cooler than that – I mean, canals are pretty awesome, and by awesome I mean "totally sweet". So we did that, had truly perfect weather, and just had a good time.

The next big item was Alpine skiing. We all piled into a rental car and drove the precipitous mountain roads to Avoriaz, France, where the fog was as thick as the French accents. So thick, in fact, there were times when we couldn’t see more than five feet ahead of us! That being said, Avoriaz was great for beginner skiing, and Soph really started stepping up her ski game, as she didn’t even have a true fall the entire day. The fog was a bit of a problem, unfortunately, but it cleared right as we left, so we did get to see the beautiful mountain scenery from the car. Hey, better than nothing!

As it happens, Geneva itself also has a couple things worth seeing. This week, the Geneva autoshow (possibly the world’s largest autoshow – I don’t know the true statistics, but apparently it’s a big deal here) was going on. Soph, Christina and Jordan all made the trek, and got to see all sorts of concept cars, as well as regular standby’s such as Ferraris and Lambs and Beamers and whatnot.

And since they were only in Geneva for 4+ days, that’s about all there was time for. One word of warning – don’t fly through Germany. As bad of flight experiences as we’ve had, theirs was worse. Three days without luggage; almost 30 hours of travel due to delays; bad weather following them; but, they took it in stride. They really got hit with the coldest days we’ve had in Geneva all winter! We even got a taste of the thrilling Geneva nightlife and it’s cheap $16 mojitos!
So thanks again to Christina and Jordan for visiting – we had a lot of fun, and we hope they did too. And look – you made the blog! It’s almost like being famous, except it’s completely different and not nearly as fulfilling.

Next weekend: Ski weekend cinq!

Let me just say how much I love not having to drive to work each day. No really – if you’re never experienced this, you’re missing out – I think my blood pressure has gone down a good twenty points based on this alone. It’s to the point where I actually kind of enjoy getting into a car again, which I never thought would happen. Apparently, the mind has a way of forgetting the bad things in life, and this weekend as we piled into a small European automobile to enjoy the fine skiing of Avoriez, France, the gods of traffic jams tried to catch up for all the time I’ve missed in the past six months.

To make a long story short, we got caught in absurd mountain traffic. Three hours into the trip, we realized the cost/benefit of skiing versus continuing on was not in our favor, so we called it a day and turned around. However, being as we were in France, we had the bright idea to stop at a bakery on the side of a road, where I single-handedly demolished a framboise tart, apple strudel, donut, loaf of bread, and something else that was ridiculously good. Greatest bakery ever! We also stopped at a grocery store to load up on red meat and wine which we could then smuggle into Switzerland (prices are less than ½ of what we usually pay for things like meat), so Soph was in heaven. Yeah – if there’s anything that Europe can’t do as well as the US, it’s grocery stores – especially Switzerland. Just not one of their strengths. Anyway – since the weather was a warm 60+ degrees, we then invited some friends over for an impromptu deck party, and sat in the sun sipping on French wine until the sun went down. Good times.

Winter in Geneva has been pretty much perfect so far, weather-wise. We’ve had to wear coats and everything, but we haven’t had the bitter cold or freezing winds I expected, considering our latitude is the same as Vermont’s and we’re only a handful of miles from the Alps. I probably shouldn’t jinx it until we’re at least through mid-March, but I also feel I should pay homage to it, so that it understands it’s appreciated and will come back next year. Something like that, anyway…

Couple of things on the blog I want to point out to the four of you who are actually reading it…first, it has come to my attention that pictures have not been uploaded for about, oh, five months or so. I hadn’t realized this until the other day, and I apologize – I’ll hopefully have them up by the end of the next week or two. Second, is the formatting. Blogspot unfortunately has a terrible preview function, in the sense that when I preview how it will look, it doesn’t actually end up looking like that when I post. The result is that it’s almost impossible to get the spacing, pictures, etc. to look how I want them to, which really bugs me, but probably goes unnoticed by everyone else. Anyway – I made the decision about eight posts ago not to let this bother me, and while it clearly still does, I’ve at least gotten over messing with it for more than a few minutes each post.

Here are some pictures of us goofing around while walking through Geneva on Sunday. Sometimes I wonder if we need to grow up...

Next weekend: First visitors!

Just another lazy weekend...

This weekend we decided to step up the fight against our lingering sicknesses, rather than our tactic of the past few weeks which involved not sleeping, hanging around outside, physical exercise, and just pretty much anything else that would be considered stupid. It’s unfortunate in that it turned out to be a nice weekend (yet again), so in some ways it was wasted. However – in order to make the most of it, we decided to go on a spending splurge at the local supermarket and outdoor market! Yeah, we are high-rollers when it comes to buying fresh veggies, and this time we prepared ourselves for the great fresh-made pasta cookoff! This involved buying a couple types of homemade pasta from the various vendors, to see if they were really worth the extra franc they charge. The result? Totally worth it – not even a question. Gotta love authentic Italian pasta! Then we bought some cheeses, sauces, and anything else that looked remotely appealing. Broke the rule of "not going grocery shopping when you’re hungry", but sometimes there’s just no way around that. Who says Sundays in Geneva are boring? Well, everyone, but that’s another story…

One severe problem with Geneva (which might be solved with an upcoming referendum) is smoking in restaurants. Not only smoking in restaurants, but smoking in bars, malls, confectioner stores – pretty much anywhere you put up 4 walls, there is a problem with Genevans smoking inside of them. For instance – I went out to lunch the other day to get a nice pizza, sat in the non-smoking section, and less than a foot away was another table which happened to be in the pro-smoking section. No barrier, no fan, nothing, except my lone table had a small removable plaque on it with a picture of a cigarette and a line crossing through it. The result is that I had to go back to work smelling like an ashtray, meaning I fit in a little bit more. However – the bright side of this story is that I finally found a restaurant with excellent pizza. In Geneva, the proper way to serve pizza is to put an egg on top. That’s right – you put the pizza together, break an egg in the middle, and then cook it as normal. You may laugh, but I’m a huge fan – it’s one of those great ideas that someone should have imported to the states years ago.

In other European news, Kosovo recently declared their independence from some country that didn’t exist ten years ago. As a red-blooded American, I’m very happy for them in their quest to get away from taxation without representation. But seriously, all you Kosovoans - you don’t need to drive around Geneva honking your horns all afternoon. One pass around the park would have been enough – that would have even been cool. But five hours of it? Come on…take a cue from the Egyptians who just won the African Cup (soccer, I think). They went out and started a street party. Street parties are fun, and if it’s near me, I might even come out and join in. Driving around honking your horns is not fun, and I will not join you. So be warned…

Next weekend: Ski weekend trois!

Ski Weekend Deux

5:45 AM. This is when we had to get up to catch the train. Now, some of you may be thinking "wow, that’s cool they’re making the most of their time in Europe". Most of you, though, are probably saying to yourselves "they’re lying – we know those two, and they simply are not capable of getting up that early". Unfortunately, this appears to be the price of skiing, as we’ve had to get up before the sunrise a couple of times now, much to my chagrin. However, since this was going to be our first true "Swiss" skiing experience (the other times we’ve technically gone to France), it was worth the crippling pain of getting out of bed that early.

Anyway, Verbier is known as one of the top ski destinations in the world, by those in the know. At least, that’s what their website says, and as we’ve established the fact that the Swiss are light years behind in Marketing, then I think it probably has some truth behind it. Unfortunately for Soph and I, we were forced to start the skiing by going down a truly insane hill, and while she had the good sense to walk down it, I figured that going about halfway, doing a backflip, not sticking the landing, and then sliding down the rest with one leg bent under my head would be a better idea. Sometimes I wonder how I’ve made it this far…but once the initial hill of death was over, we were able to find a good spot to practice the rest of the day, which happened to also have a nice little restaurant next to it.

What is also great about Verbier is that it’s a true "ski-town"; that is, it has a pretty decent restaurant and nightlife. In truth, it puts Geneva’s nightlife to shame – but so does just about any city with a population of 5000 (Geneva, while it has a terrible nightlife, does have a thriving expat community, which makes up for that shortcoming). So after a long day of skiing, all of us met up together for some apres-ski, which is another great Swiss or French custom that needs to be brought to America (it’s basically just hanging out on a deck in your ski gear with a view of the mountains, but it makes it that much more fun when you use a semi-translatable phrase to describe it).

Now that we’ve gone skiing a couple of times, I think we’re prepared to give some opinions on it. The good? Well, first of all, the scenery is fantastic at all the resorts here – really impressive stuff. Then there’s the fresh mountain air, and of course the actual act of skiing in and of itself. Soph’s favorite part is the chair lift, because she can just sit and look around at everything, and I see her point. The bad? Definitely the act of carrying your skis back and forth, and just organizing everything. That part is really annoying. The ugly? Pretty much any of our falls, of which there have been quite a few. In my defense, I’ve seriously reduced how often I fall, but unfortunately now my falls are monumental in scope, and involve being airborne for some measurable amount of time, and often landing on my head – sort of like a reverse cat or something.

Next weekend: Sleeping in!