Hotel Minotel Cecil Chexbres

... it was. The radar detector only works when plugged in!

We got to drive through some very twisty mountain roads. Conrad had fun with that. I imagine that this is what the Blue Ridge Parkway looks like this time of year, only a bit more colorful.

We passed a sign for something that Conrad wants to look into when we return, the Gouffre de Poudrey. We also passed a Chateau that we pulled over to take a ...

The past few days have been pretty much all work. The training is going well but it's far from entertaining. Our teacher is this woman from Germany who I have nicknamed "Das Furher". She is very serious. She has this "You vill lissen to vaht I teach and you vill learn it." type of personality. Actually she's OK once you come to the realization that it's just a cultural thing. I made it a point to ...

I decided to change hostels because I really didn't like this one. I am not fond of the international hostels. They're like hospitals, although the buffet breakfast was nice and I liked their cat. I was woken up by screaming, unruly kids. Some parents aren't parents. I was happy to change. The sun had also come out and so I snuck on the train from Montreux Tilletet to Veyvey which is only 5 minutes away. The place is much nicer and has free food and a kitchen. I actually got an entire 6 ...

... in the egg cup, big end down. Then you take the elf-spoon and gently tap on the top of the egg, just barely breaking the shell. Then, ever-so-gently, you peel off the top 1/3 of the shell. Once the top part of the shell is removed, you can take the spoon and begin to eat the egg, by continuing to dig it out of the shell.

It's not a process to be rushed, particularly by those in the early a.m. who are barely conscious to begin with ...

... s purse being snatched as the train pulled away. It was kind of odd because the thief was well dressed with shopping bags and wearing expensive high heeled boots, which made me really despise her. It was almost funny watching this little old lady charge after this worried woman trying to run, if it had not made me feel so rotten inside to see it. When I arrived in Lausanne I was unapproachable, I did not want to see another human being.
I did see Geneva lake as I sat in the rain.

... the level of the lake which actually drove them crazy.

One of the most interesting rooms was the dining room which has been restored to its medieval look. The oak columns are originals from the 13th century. The ceiling and chimney date from the 15th century. It was really easy to imagine a medieval feast happening here. The latrines which empty into the lake were used for waste, either human or refuse. There was also a small room beside a bedroom which was ...

... to have a kitchen to cook in, so went of the Coop to stock up. In the kitchen, we met some Aussies who were from Ulladulla. Katelyn thought the hostel was lots of fun.

We had been so absorbed in working out what to do in Paris, that we weren't really organised for Switzerland. So we were madly reading up and trying to organise what we were doing.

... the curved tracks winding through the mountain valleys between Basel and Lausanne.  It is engineered with mechanisms that banks each train car through turns (I am just amazed to find a Wikipedia entry on the subject: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ICN_%28SBB -CFF-FFS%29). It can go 125mph (200km/h)...pretty good in this terrain! We arrived in Lausanne before lunchtime. It sits at one end of the Lavaux wine ...

... get to school by 8:30am. I didn't get up that early to go to work. :-) Nonetheless I made it through and I was even moved up in my French level. Yeah I still got a ways to go as far as speaking but I ended up in class with Suisse Allemagne (German Swiss) students who have been studying in school for some years----they already know English they start that in the early years. In fact I guess I hadn't ...

... near the beach and this a-hole decided that he owns the place. It was really inappropriate. Being someone who was attached by a swan as a 7 year old (?), I know how damaging a swan attack can be...I've been in counselling for years to discuss it. I was hoping that the swan would bombard this mofo but it didn't happen, the passive swan swam away. The ******** European won this battle. And unfortunately, this was not the only scene involving animal cruelty. We saw a kid basically ...