Le Premier Août

The first of August is Switzerland's fête nationale (national holiday) which dates back to 1291. We are living in an old country! They celebrate their "independence day" similar to how we celebrate ours: lots of flags, food, fireworks and bonfires. We celebrated by going to our neighbor's party on Tuesday evening and then going camping on Wednesday night. The party was fun, though it is very difficult to make small talk when everyone is speaking either French or German. Many people spoke English, though, so we managed to communicate to some extent.

The next day we went South to the mountains in the Valais area. A couple we met at church (Dan and Rosalie) invited us along, and we made a group of 12! We had a good time. We helped build a dam in a FREEZING cold stream (ok, I barely helped and just put my feet in), ate delicious food, sang praise songs and set off fireworks. I even got to light a few off - my first ever! We were in a valley, so we could see numerous bonfires all up the mountains around us and were surrounded by fireworks. That night it started to rain, but our tent kept us nice and dry. However, the next day was rainy, so instead of staying another wet night, we came home. It was a good time to get to know some other people in the church.

Both Dan and Rosalie's parents stayed in the bungalow to the left. It was nice to have somewhere dry to retreat to when it was raining as well as have a real kitchen (since we were cooking for 12)! And check out those pretty mountains.

Just a pretty view! I believe that the house is an actual place people lived many years ago.

The camping grounds - notice how close the tents are to one another! Our tent is the red 0ne - Tom noted that it matches our car. The rest of the group was staying in the the yellow tent.

Link to more pictures...

Spiderman?

One of Tom's new co-workers, Peter, is an avid climber. As he is new to the area as well (he's from Britain) he asked Tom to go climbing with him one afternoon after work and Tom talked me into going to take pictures. We went to a
place the guide book suggested, and it turned out to be holds drilled into the support of a bridge! It's a well used bridge (on top) and I suppose someone decided that the bottom of it shouldn't go to waste. There were lots of people there (all decked out in the latest gear) and then us. We felt a little conspicuous, but pressed on anyway and the guys did well. After abandoning an attempt on a really hard section (it wrapped around a 90 degree corner) they found one that was straight up. They fared much better on it and ended the day tired but happy.

It was fun to watch the two of them and the other people - they made it look so easy! One guy was even trying the up-side-down part of the course! The area was also enjoyable. We were outside and the sun was setting over a river right behind us.

Early Morning Visitor...

Our most recent adventure came early (5:30) Friday morning. I woke up to Maggie going crazy out in the hall and grudging got up to go calm her down. However, when I reached her, it was obvious (even in the dim light) that she was after something. Though I didn't have my glasses on, I could make out a dark shape swooping through the hall which I took to be a bird. After retrieving my glasses, Maggie had managed to corner the bird in the spare bedroom, so I opened a window, hauled her away (against her wishes!) and shut the door. By this time the commotion had roused Tom, so he came out, looked in the room and said, "Katie, that isn't a bird, it's a bat." Eek! For some reason a bat in the house worried me a lot more than a bird. Tom was brave, however, and went in to open the remaining windows so our unwelcome visitor could fly out. Then we went back to bed with Maggie standing guard at the closed door. The bat was still flying around the room when we got up and then found a good place to take a nap. It finally left, though, to my great relief.

We did learn a few things from this experience:
1) French for bat is chauve-souris meaning bald mouse
2) Apparently bats can get in through our windows, though they are only cracked open
3) Maggie is a good bat alarm
4) Per one of Tom's co-workers, bats in your house here are analogous to mice in your house in the US

Hiking L'Argentine

Today Tom went hiking in the Alps with a guy he met at church. He's really been wanting to do some intense hiking, so I was more than happy for him to go with someone else! They hiked about 10 miles and came home sore but happy. They ended their hike by wading and dunking their heads in an cold glacial river. Tom said their feet got numb after just ten minutes.


I spent the day tending our little garden on the porch and enjoying the sunshine. It has been cold, rainy and windy here for the past few weeks. Since Thursday, the sun has been out and temperatures have gotten into the 80's. I've been soaking up the heat as much as possible in preparation for the winter!















The views here are just incredible ... I still can't believe that we live here!

I thought the flowers were really pretty - Tom says the picture doesn't do justice to how blue they were.

After his hike, Tom and I went downtown with Dan and his wife, Rosalie to enjoy the Jazz Festival. Even in a small town like this, they have a two-week long music festival. It was neat. We listened to some music, got some food from the street vendors and finished off with an ice cream cone. I'm not quite sure why it is caled a jazz festival though, the music we heard was not jazz, but fun to listen to all the same.

Pictures of the Car

Tom picked the car up yesterday, so here are pictures!

4th of July Party

My friend Cristina sent us a care package containing all sorts of 4th of July decorations. It had flags, a banner, candles, plates and cups and even a bald eagle! So we invited our American friends as well as some Swiss ones over to celebrate the day. We grilled hamburgers and hot dogs, listened to patriotic music and just enjoyed being American instead of trying to be Swiss. It was an overall success, although the Swiss version of hot dogs does not do them justice, and the Swiss hot dog/hamburger buns weren't quite as sturdy as we are used to. Still, the food was great and Tom enjoyed using our new grill. This is the first place we've been allowed to have our own, so we're going to make the best of the opportunity! Last week, we christened it by cooking one of our German-bought American steaks. It was delicious, and affordable!

Pictures!

Check out some of our pictures...

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