Hi to Everyone.
Thanks once again for all the replies we received from the last Blog. It was great to get so many. As we said - it is wonderful to hear from you, so keep them coming. It keeps us in touch with what is happening - all over the world. Isn't this electronic age we live in wonderful for this sort of thing.
Well we have now cracked the half way stage of our Swiss Sojourn and we sat down and gave ourselves our mid term debrief. All in all it has been such a positive experience. Firstly - we haven't killed each other yet, so that's a very positive sign. We have seen and experienced some things we just could not have imagined if we hadn't chosen House Sitting as a mode of
accommodation. And the thing is still we have Northumbria and Spain yet to go!Anyhow here is an update of what has happened in our lives over the past week.
The long awaited Volksmusic Festival was a fizzer. The opening night gala event was booked out and we didn't book. Not that it stopped Phil trying it on though. She brazenly fronts up to the girl checking the yellow wrist entry bands and pleads her case as an aficionado of Swiss Folk Music but the girl was not to be swayed. As the girl at door was distracted by guests walking in, the crowd started showing Phil their entrance bands as they thought she was one of the usherette. She was seriously tempted to tell the ticket holders they needed to handover there yellow wrist band upon entry so she could get a couple, but fortunately common sense prevailed.
Then we found out that the last bus back to Wald was at 8.10pm and missed that. So we asked a bus driver heading to the nearest town what the story was but he didn't speak English and our Schweiz Deutsch is pretty sketchy so we were at a stale mate when in stepped a kindly young man who could speak English translated that there was a connecting bus back to our village, but he didn't know what time this bus ran till. We thought it best to take this bus back to save a long walk back on what was becoming a very cold night, thus missing other acts that were yet to start in other venues.
So while waiting for this bus we went into the "Bahnhof Buffet" for a glass of wine which was a bit of a sad ending for the big night out. As it turned out the connecting buses ran until midnight, so we didn't have to panic. It did put a wee bit of a dampner on our big night out though.
On the upside, we had been to the local market earlier in the day and had stocked up on a heap of divine goodies and made a late dinner feast of it when we got back convincing ourselves that Folk Music was not really our cup of tea anyhow.
Some where in amongst that Phil had a disagreement with a public toilet which wanted to charge her to do her business. I also needed to do the same so went in and did what one does. I.e. read graffiti. Same stuff - different country. You know - Hansel loves Gretal, Ring Heidi on ……. for a night to remember with her and her two goats etc etc. When finished I was lurking about outside the women's when out pokes a wee woolly Scottish head saying "got any change?" " Why - are they having a sale on in there or something". "No, I have to pay to pee". "Go into the mens - it's free" Well - that was not the news she wanted to hear. She let the toilet have it at full volume. I thought I caught "Bloody sexist Swiss shithouse" and lost the rest in other noises that resembled a riot. I and a few other nearby commuters quickly left the vicinity!
One of my more embarrassing moments was a breakdown in communication that deflated my ego a bit. Phil was asked to translate what I was saying. I went into a shop and asked the lady behind the counter "Kann sie English sprechen". "Ja a leedle bisschen". "Good - can I have two flat white coffees and two of them there little bun thingies please". She just looked at me with that sort of look that said - "You poor man. Fancy having to live your life with such a speech impediment" while throwing Phil pitying glances as if to say "You poor dear. Fancy having to put up with his speech impediment".
Phil steps in and says "Och aye hees gote a shocker ocker accent hisn't he"? Amazingly the girl understood her perfectly!! Perfectly! WTF? And this is from a woman who has caused the Telstra voice activated help line to have a melt down. You know the one. "In a few words can you please tell me what your problem is "Aye. I'm tryin ta gie mah wee brither a wee tinkle an yer phone wilnae lee mh da it" Long silent pause. "In a few words can you please can you please tell what your problem is" This usually goes on for quite some time till the voice activated girl cops something like "Noooo listen here lassie, it's the ulliventh time a'v telt' ye. Hae ye got an ear ful o' wax thats causin' ye ta be such an eejit"?. "Sorry I'm just not getting that. Hold on while I put you through to a consultant who will assist you". Then some poor young underpaid consultant in the Philippines is subjected to Phil for the next two hours after which he / she requires some time off and counselling. I thought this may have been a one off, but it has now happened on a few occasions. The Swiss understand the un-understandable version of Phil's Scottish / German / English, where as I (supposedly of German origin) ended up with a very deflated ego indeed.
Volker got a few more decent walks in this week, exploring more of the scenic delights of the Wald / Sonnerland area but unfortunately Phil's knee still isn't up to scaling peaks, so she took the time out to catch up on reading, relaxing, going for short walks around Wald. Spring has definitely sprung and the area is looking absolutely gorgeous with the flowers on the alpine peaks, the new foliage on the trees in the forests and the blossom on the cherry and apple trees in full bloom in and around town. The waterfalls created by the melting snow on the higher peaks are wonderful and being immersed in the whole thing is just gorgeous! The photos taken of the Wald from the above the village shows the changes in the past month.
Phil's Sister and Brother In Law (Ann Marie & Jean Daniel) came down from Paris for a visit and we spent a couple of days seeing and discovering more of the awesome scenery this area of Europe has to offer.
Our 1st outing led us into the Principality of Liechtenstein which borders Switzerland and Austria. Now THIS is a must come to place, if your into opening up a dodgy bank account, investing in secret transaction you don't want your partner to know about, or if you are into fairy tale castles and some absolutely breathtaking mountain scenery. Unfortunately the weather was not all that flash with rain for most of the day, which stopped us from wandering up to the main castle in the capital of Vaduz perched up above the main CBD where Prince Hans-Adam 11 and his wife Marie are able to look down on their subjects and makes sure plenty of dollars are coming into the banks. Geez - it is one very impressive place for a Prince to live. As was another restored medieval castle nearby. That one was perched up even higher with stunning mountains back dropping it that looked surreal with the low clouds drifting through the towering peaks.
After a delightful lunch it was back into Switzerland, then past the Austrian Border which we didn't cross as Phil & I has forgot our Passports, its so easy to forget that an outing of a couple of hours can easily take you to another couple of counties. In future passports will be packed in our backpacks. Then it was on to Appenzeller a small town renowned for it's cheese and brewery as well as its faithful maintenance of the Alte Stadt (old town) which has kept a timeless piece of history in it's buildings etc. It was just lovely. Unfortunately due to the rain and the late hour we were unable to explore too much, but have promised ourselves a return trip before we leave.
BUT - we did get enough time to get to the brewery which also had a Still tucked away out the back making Single Malt Whiskey which put a rosy smile on our little poppet! Despite it being closing time, Phil's Scottish accent charmed the ladies behind the counter enough to let us sample their 3 Malts and our Scotch Tasting Expert gave them a thumbs up which is a pretty good recommendation seeing as how precious Scots are about "their" nectar of the gods. A bottle was purchased and taken home to share with Ann Marie & Jean Daniel.
Next day it was lunch in Luzern. This is one city all travellers must put on their wish list if heading to Europe. We were here two years ago and I didn't get to see enough, so coming back to it was wonderful. Lake Luzern (Vier valdwaldstattersee) backdropped by the snow capped peaks dominated by Mt. Pilatus is just stunning. Sitting down to lunch beside the River Reuss complete with castles, swans and same view is a pretty good way to enjoy the heart of the town.
Wandering about with Phil as our tour guide was interesting to say the least. She was like a blowfly zipping about showing us where she lived, where she was employed, which pub / church / alley ways she frequented etc etc when she was working here way back when Adam was a boy!
While zipping about she ran into a bloke she used to work with some 30+ years ago. Amazing! He recognised her, but she was too busy pointing things out that she walked straight passed him till he reminded her of who he was. He invited us back to the shop where he works. Bucherers! This is one of the premier high end Watch and Jewellery stores and it is a place where long pockets and short arms are a must if you don't want to mortgage your house. For example - he recently sold a watch to a Russian "businessman" for 800,000 Swiss Francs which in Australian Dollars equates to mere 1.17million. FOR A WATCH! Phil pointed out one that she wanted - dream on dear. Your house isn't worth THAT much.
What was interesting was the number of Chinese in the shop. Phil's mate reckons these guys spend - and big time - unlike most Westerners who come to look, take high blood pressure tablets after looking at the prices and dream. We saw one guy with a roll of notes the size of a toilet paper roll about to purchase a watch while the love of his life was eyeing off some bling that would have made the average person faint clean away when they saw the price tag. Very educational and very, very amazing. However, I did come away with something - a town map with lots of pretty pictures of hopelessly unaffordable watches.
We consoled ourselves with finding a tea shop where we purchased some divine tea to take home and had a cuppa to get over the high blood pressure caused by such astronomical figures we had seen in Bucherers. It was about the best we could afford. On the way back to the car we dropped into the Jesuit Cathedral in the heart of the town for a jaw dropping display of Catholic finery. WOW! It was absolutely mesmerising. From the outside it was just your average larger church, but stepping inside took your breath away. We also snuck into the Fransiscan one which looked positively 3rd world and Spartan in comparison to the Jesuit one.
All in all it was a great couple of days spending time with JD & AM catching up on who's doing what, seeing some wonderful places courtesy of JD Tours, dining in some exceptional places with views to die for and all in all having a grand time. Big thanks to you both for coming down and sharing our little world and showing us more. See you in Paris soon.
The sleeping arrangements in the small flat while they were here were interesting. Phil and I used one of those electric inflating air mattresses and gave them our bed which was fine by all of us. It all went well with the inflation except that it was the proportional size of a helicopter landing pad in the confines of the small bedroom which constricted movement a bit, but it looked pretty comfortable, so no worries. Until bed time that is!
Volker's in getting comfortable, then in comes Phil forgetting the restricted space which caused her to resemble an elephant tripping over a tree trunk and land smack on her face across the bed. This high impact landing created a trampoline effect which propelled Volker toward the ceiling, narrowly missing the light globe. He came back down which it turn recreated an opposing trampoline effect and Phil was projected skywards and this went on for a bit until we crashed together in a tangle of arms and legs. "This is taking foreplay to a new dimension dear". When the trampolining had subsided, Phil then had to get her head up to the right end of the bed which created the feeling of a life raft being tossed about in a stormy sea. Both of us needed motion sickness tablets after that little adventure.
Fortunately Phil had learnt a lesson from this and next night she used the reverse Crouching Tiger Technique, then the third night used the Praying Mantis Preying Technique to enter the bed which made for far less intensive but equally amusing entries.
So - that's it for another week. Never boring that's for sure. With 3 weeks left to go, there many more adventures to be had and we are looking forward to the challenge.
Have a great weekend, take care and above all - have fun.
Best wishes and Cheers
Philomena & Volker
