Where has the time gone!! It is more than a month and a half since we have posted an update and a lot has happened. Perhaps I will do a summary here and then see whether other members of the team can help me fill in the gaps!! I know pictures are always nice so will try and add those as we go along. On June 8 we flew to Stockholm for an extended weekend. Dave had a meeting in Uppsala and we have some good friends in Stockholm who were keen on a visit so we zipped over on Easy Jet! We had a wonderful time. The sun never stopped shining (literally) and we had time to catch up with friends and see some wonderful sights in the archipelago that makes up Stockholm. I then flew home with the kids after a four day visit and Dave stayed on an additional week for his meeting. Dave has promised to give more Stockholm details! Suffice it to say that the museum featuring Pippi Longstocking was just one of many!
On June 25 (a Saturday) Dave and I dropped the kids off with friends in Nyon (on the shores of Lake Geneva) and headed off to the Valais region of Switzerland for a little weekend getaway to celebrate our 25th wedding anniversary. The actual date was July 5, but the opportunity arose for that weekend and we seized it. We had a wonderful time at a little hotel in the mountains just outside of Saas Fe. We hiked, ate wonderful food and drank the very excellent local wine. Only about 2% of the wine produced here is exported, so many people have no idea how good the wine actually is. Although it was a short visit, we felt happy and refreshed and congratulated ourselves on the excellent choice we made 25 years ago. Meanwhile, the three kids were off tree top trekking, swimming and generally having a whale of a time without us. All good!
Other weekend activities included a trip to Lausanne to go the Olympic museum. We had heard great things about it and were not disappointed. For those of us in the family interested in the politics of sport, it was even more fascinating. The museum is interactive and geared towards all ages. It is in the most spectacular setting of any museum we have yet encountered, on the shores of Lake Geneva against a backdrop of mountains. Sort of makes you want to rush out and be an athlete!
The kids got Wednesday afternoons off from school (something they found very civilized... in fact Rory and Holly had all day off while Elizabeth had the afternoon) and so one Wednesday we headed into Geneva to go the Red Cross Museum. It is a landmark in the city and provides a very comprehensive overview of the activities of the Red Cross and the Red Crescent worldwide since their inception. Rory was really bothered by the idea of land mines as a whole section of the museum focused on the challenges of dealing with them.
Another weekend expedition was a trip to Yvoire, France. It is a lovely medieval city that can be reached by car, but can also be reached by boat from Nyon. Since we had not been out on the water we choose the boat route and had a wonderful view of Lake Geneva as we crossed it. The crossing takes less than half an hour and so we had the afternoon to wander through cobble stone streets and peek into shops. There was a festival taking place while we were there, with people dressed in the most elaborate 18th century outfits. They wore masks as if heading to a masquerade ball. Fun to watch.
The end of June brought a flurry of school related activities. The kids really managed to settle into life here in France and made some good friends. Hopefully we will be able to keep in touch with a few. We have been overwhelmed by the kindness and friendship extended to us all, from our neighbors, work mates and fellow parents we have met at school.
Since school has now ended and holidays have begun, Dave and I are now working "off site". My work at the WHO is far from complete and I am looking forward to it continuing even after our return to Canada. We are now taking the opportunity to see some of Europe. Despite living just outside of Geneva for four months, we had not traveled as much as we would have wanted in Switzerland, and so in early July we headed off to the Bernese Oberland to do some hiking for several days. We stayed at a wonderful hostel called the Alpenhof, nestled at the foot of a mountain in a village called Stechelberg. The hikes were challenging but rewarding and we combined them with some cable car rides to get us even higher up. We took one of these cable cars to the top of the Schilthorn. It was made famous by James Bond, who apparently saw some action there "In her majesty's service", a movie we feel we really must see now!
From Stechelberg we made our way into Austria going to both Salzburg and Vienna. These deserve a bit more detail, so I will try and get back to them. From Vienna we routed ourselves through Bavaria (southern Germany) and spent a day at Dachau. Again, I think I need more time (and sleep) to offer some coherent thoughts about Dachau. Suffice it to say that actually standing in the middle of the place where so many atrocities were committed and lives lost, was heartbreaking and sickening. Tears were shed. How could it have ever happened? Please God may it never happen again. It was a sombre trip to Lucerne that night.
Now we are on the Italian leg of our journey. We have been joined by Christine (my sister) and Dana (my neice, daughter of another sister) and are currently in Florence. Oh what a glorious city!! Before arriving here we spent a couple of days in Cinque Terre which is a national park on the west coast of Italy, not far from Genoa. I will get one of the kids to tell more about that time. The village we stayed in seems to have been lost in time. Apart from the tourists, it has remained unchanged for centuries, perched on the coast, buffeted by wind and surf. Yet again, we were blessed by wonderful weather.
So now we are slightly caught up although we will try to give more detail, and of course, pictures! Stay tuned.
Heather
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