The Swiss October Holidays

British schools get one week off in October. Swiss schools get 2, so naturally everyone takes off as the weather starts to get bleaker. This year apparently, foreign travel was up 10% here, due to the awful summer. I know 3 people who went to Tunisia! We took the opportunity to see some closer places.

AOSTA (Aoste for the Francophones)

Walter had some business in Pisa at the beginning of the holidays, so we decided to meet up somewhere in Italy (exotic sounding, eh?). Aosta is only ~3 hours from here, so Walter took the train, and I drove the boys to pick him up. I cleaned the car inside and out, put the "CH" sticker on, filled it with the requisite toys and books and packed a picnic. I had all my maps and music on hand.... and passports. We left at 10:15 (I had aimed for 10), got gas and tootled on. By chance I stopped at a lovely rest stop with picnic tables, park and nice loos. We had a tasty packed pizza lunch and set off again. I was a bit trepidacious about the Tunnel Grand Saint Bernard, as the Gothard is long and has a bit of a dangerous reputation. I also had to get us through the passport and customs checkpoints. Well, it was a doddle- we were waved through and there were few cars, except for the crappola Berne drivers that get everywhere, driving up one's bum and behavign badly. Berne drivers are for another post. The boys were very good indeed, the trafffic was easy, the views were stunning and I was feeling very proud of myself. We were wending our way through the Alp roads, getting closer to Aosta, and I was looking out for the hotel (which according to my map was very close) when Toby started doing his "I'm going to be sick" moan. He was tired, hot and the roads were twisty. I wasn't paying attention (looking for hotel in land of many, small signs) when he started barfing EVERYWHERE. Now, I had prepared for puky Tobe by putting sick bags (that Walter collects on his trips) in all the seat pockets and beside me. I tried handing one back, but he wouldn't take it and just kept going all over himself! I pulled over at the first opportunity into a restaurant parking lot and proceeded with clean up. After I was done, I started to pull out when I saw our hotel just exactly opposite us! Every time we went out after that, we got a wee reminder... bleurk.
The hotel was really nice and reasonably priced. I highly recommend :)

The boys play in the garden ouside our room. The clock tower in the background did all kinds of weird ringing: At one point in the middle of the night Walter heard it ring once, then 3, then 5 then 7 times....

There was an orchard below the hotel, where the boys picked apples and ran around. Idylic I say.

Spot the boys!!!!

The center of Aosta had lovely food stores (ofcourse), boutiques and cafes. Probably a good thing the boys were there, or we'd have come home skint.

The Piazza at the last flash of sunset.

Wee boys enjoying the insanely rich and thick chocolati. They buzzed around a bit after that.

The Roman ruins were a high point.

Naturally, religiosity was around every corner.

Forte di Bard

We were lucky enough to be there for a festival in a neighbouring town of 'Bard'. Taken from buzzle.com: "The medieval village of Bard is fairly close to the northern border of Piedmont. In addition to its historic homes perched on a mountain overlooking a gorgeous gorge you can visit the Twelfth Century Forte di Bard that held up Napoleon’s military progress for almost two weeks. He had it destroyed. The fort was reconstructed in the Nineteenth Century. " And what a fort it is. 3 funiculars, and lots of uphill walking.

There's where we's gotta get!

One the way up to the fort, we stopped at the first (of many) of food stands for a top up...

...and an interesting view. We never got to see this group perform.

One funicular, two funicular, three funicular, four.....



The boys' interest was kept occupied enough to get up without too much moaning.
Cool views down the valley towards Aosta.

Can't caption this one!

On the other side of the Grand St Bernard on the way home.

Our first "family holiday" was tops. I want to to go back for skiing... and summer... and spring!

Pisa Addendum.

The photo above was taken by Walter in Pisa. It's a dispensing machine that gives one pasta dishes instead of coke. The dishes available were carbonnara, pomodoro or SEA FOOD.... It was right beside a really nice restaurant, and eating in Italy isn't that expensive (unlike Switzerland with its 50 CHF pizzas from take-out). The Italians with Walter were horrified! Did he buy one for the sake of reporting on it? No. So you'll have to search it out syourself.

PPS- I'm not writing again till the beginning of December. Too much to do. Trying to sell stuff in a Christmas market.

Quince... quickly!

Around here, quince trees abound. When I was little, I remember my grandma (she lived in the south of England- nice climate for it) and mum doing things with quince, but I don't remember what they looked like. For a while, we thought the quince trees here were ugly pears, till Toby's teacher put us right. In French it's "coigne", and I tried my hand at making jelly.

Dem's da quince.

After boiling the chopped up fruit ALL day, I had to hang the resulting 'stuff' in a bag all night.Then I had to boil and boil the juice till it looked like it would set.
The resulting jelly was the most beautiful colour of red, smelt heavenly and tasted scrumdidlyumptious. I highly recommend.

!!!!!!!!Archie Alan MacDonald!!!!!!!!!

Archie was born in Glasgow, on the 29th September 2007 at 12:38 pm (BST), and weighed 8 lbs 9 oz. Yay for Susan and Jamie!!! He was born into a homeless family who will hopefully be moving into their new home tomorow. hehe. He also shares his birthday with Walter's mum, Helen :) I can't wait to get my paws on him ;)

Jamie, Susan and wee Archie.

Jamie's a daddy!

It was exactly 2 years ago on the 23rd Sept. that we moved into our Saint Blaise abode. Since then Allie has started school, Toby has started creche, Walter has become a European travel expert and we've been swallowed whole by Swiss culture. Now it's not such an inconvenience that the stores aren't open on Sundays or Monday mornings or closing at 5 on Saturdays. I have navigated the following in French: the insurance company about a fender bender, the emergency room on a few occasions, meetings with school teachers, dealing with customer 'service' and my favourite- telling off the local nyaffs for being mean to my children (Walter's good at that too). We can now count Swiss people amongst our friends, and Allie and Toby play with friends in French at the park (they also correct our pronunciation). The Swiss Kiss thing is still a bit of a mystery- If you see someone later in the day, that you met (and kissed) earlier, do you do it again? I would say no, but it's happened on occassion. Do you or the other person initiate the kiss? If you see someone every day do you do it? Sometimes is the answer to that, but I can't see any consistency in the circumstances. I've noticed that expats love to do it, though hehehe. Driving here is so much more relaxing (unless you rear end a German- see above), and even going into Neuchatel is like visiting the big city.

Tidbits of what we're up to.

Let's start with indoor pursuits when it's raining. Allie prepares to launch Toby across the room in his rocket on wheels. Toby had some sense for once and put on his helmet.
Allie likes to put sparkles on his face. And go to school like that.
Still enjoy lounging around.
Allie's first day back at school. He now has French class every week with the other furnurs.

Allie and his friend Batiste enjoy a board game after school.
The only time that Toby sits perfectly still is when he's doing this:
Our latest visitors were Vicky and Willoughby. Vicky is the mum of Steve, who went to Berkeley with Walter. They were visiting friends in Lucerne and popped up for the afternoon. We had super weather and a lovely time. Toby took a shine to Will :)

Fete de Vendanges 2007

We didn't make it out for the evening fun this year, but took the boys for some quick daytime fun. Allie said all his friends were talking about the rides at the fair, so next year we'll have to finally let his see what all the fuss is about.

On the 'special' bus into town.

Some of the marching band action.

We ran into friends, who's children were in the same frame of mind as A n T: Pick up some of the tonnes of confetti and throw it.
The cause of most of the confetti. See that black tube? That's a confetti canon. I got blasted full in the face by one of those last year.
The new tradition: candyfloss.

The best gauffres (waffles) I've ever tasted.
The boys have invented a way of taking a break while we're walking around. They sit on our feet like wee penguins.
Allie looks naughty because he's about to bung a bunch of confetti on me. I had (honestly) only just gotten rid of the last confettin in the cupboard at home!

Now I've broken a dry spell in blog updates, I'll be telling you all about Quince.... after announcing the latest MacDonald!!!!

Scotland en Famille

We had a weeks' vacation at my parents' in Scotland a couple of weeks ago. Plenty of rain and fun!

The Edinburgh Military Tattoo

I managed to nab some tickets to the Edinburgh Tattoo for my Dad's birthday. It's a month long celebration of military pomp and circumstance, and is held at the beautiful castle, in the evening. It also goes on at the same time as the Festival. This is all we saw of the Festival this year (on the way up to the tattoo):

The chap holding the other up, went from lying to standing while holding his friend. They had to make 2 attempts. We missed a lot of the schtick.

My photography ofcourse didn't capture the spectacle very well, but here are some highlights.
It's lovely to hear the massed pipe bands, and apparently the whole Commonwealth was represented there. The blue 'thing' is the castle all lit up with thistles.
This is for Helen, Sherry and Anna. Hosses! They were all huge Clydesdales, and were very well behaved, even with cannon and pipes around them. Only one had to be cleaned up after.
When these 'bikers' first came out, Walter, my Mum, Dad and I all thought independently: "I didn't know you could train monkeys to ride bikes". We weren't expecting little children (some Allie's age) to be doing this kind of thing.

Kilmarnock and the seaside

On the warm day we had, Jamie joined us at the South Beach in Troon for a walk. It turned out to be so warm that the wee boys stripped and swam. The water here is sometimes warmer than the atmosphere due to the Gulf Stream that comes down the west coast of Scotland. It's also incredibly shallow out to a great distance.

What's this hairy thing?

Unlce Jamie walked and walked, and it only came up to his knees.

Uncle John came up to visit for a few days, and gave the wee boys endless entertainment :)

He even came for a walk to Dean Castle with us.

Grandma Cake stops for a tea break at Dean Castle.

We're exploring the area where my parents now live, and are finding new castle attractions. This is Dundonald Castle. Small, perfectly formed and near the 'rents :)


Another attraction, not too far away is Kelburn Castle, on the coast. It has lovely gardens, a wee animal area and 'stuff' to do. It's also home of "The Graffiti Project" (I couldn't find a working official url). The castle is actually occupied, so we couldn't go in, but walking around was nice.

This is the sight that awaited us when we arrived. 2 pooped boys.

Allie under a giant leaf. Since the castle's on the coast, things grow there that don't make it in other places.
This is a thousand year old yew tree!!!!

Kirkwall Fun!

Jamie's a pilot for Loganair, and he flies mainly between Glasgow and the Shetlands, Orkneys and Ireland. My Mum,Dad and Susan have already flown with him, and Walter and I jumped at the opportunity too. He flew us up to Kirkwall in the Orkneys on a Wednesday morning and then 'picked us up' again on the following Thurday. A whirlwind trip!

St Magnus Cathedral

A gravestone inside the cathedral. Most stones (~17th century) were rather lacking in the whole life after death thing, having inscriptions like "Death is the end" and "Remember Death". The Western Isles always have a feeling of religiosity about them (catholic and protestant), but it really didn't feel like it here. I don't know if it's the Norwegian influence, or remoteness. The town is quite pretty, but it's a bleak, treeless island. Nice for a visit!

Viking influences in the cathedral.

We can't remember who was standing on who here or why.

One must always stop for tea at the local shoppe.

Jamie dropped us off, we walked around Kirkwall, then met up with him for dinner, after which, we took a walk. This is part of the harbour at night. Sunsets are a prolonged affair this far north in the summer. I'd love to see the Northern lights.
The next morning Jamie had an early flight to Edinburgh, then back up to Kirwall to get us again. That's him waving from the plane :)

Captain Jamie and his co-pilot getting ready to take us home.

Jamie, the flight attendant Natalie and his co-pilot after we got back to Glasgow.
The capn' n us.

It was a super fun trip. It's weird hearing your wee brother doing 'captain speak' over the intercom, then flying you rather high off the ground for long distances. The plane flew low enough to see the geography of the north of Scotland. Lovely.
Next visit will be to celebrate my brother Robert's 30th and my Mum's 60th birthdays. Woohoo!