Autumn walk

I thought I'd better get this post up since it's the last day of November and the weather here is quickly changing to full on winter!  It's raining today where we are at 400 meters but at just 600 meters it's all snow.  Hooray!!

Anyway,  last week I took a walk along a narrow path up to this beautiful, tiny chapel that is built into the rocky mountainside above our town.  I am always amazed at these locations and try to imagine the manpower it took to get the materials up to these building sites.  It looks like this place just required lots of good carving skills.

This is the start of the path.  It's a warning about falling rocks...

Below is the widest part of the path.  Lots of leaves to make it nice and slippery...

More climbing...

and more climbing...

finally made it to the top...

There is a very dark and narrow passage way between the church and the mountain.  In this creepy tunnel I found this...

I guess if you are brave enough to make the climb, enter the dark tunnel, and walk through that 

door then you're brave enough to accept any punishment your sins may warrant.

When you get to the other side of the passageway you can see how the church hugs the cliff.

and then you get the view of the east side of town into the Rhone valley

Hope you all enjoyed this as much as I did.

Saint Martin's Fair

Yesterday I went with friends to the La foire de Saint Martin's in Vevey.  This fair has been held every November 11th since 1496 .

It is really a giant market filled with delicious food and fun shopping.  The weather wasn't so great but at least we didn't get rained on like last year.  We shopped and then had a lunch of pumpkin & carrot soup with some quiche.  Below is a before and after photo of what some of the other market-goers were eating....

Before:  An entire cow on a spit (9:30 am)

After:  Nothin' but bones (1:30 pm)

In a strange juxtaposition, there was also an exhibit of farm animals.  Typically in Switzerland, the dairy cows wear these beautiful bells.  You can sometimes find them for sale at markets but these were just on display.  Aren't they so pretty?  These are so large I think they might be prize bells.

This was my favorite cow.  I didn't tell her anything about what happened to the one in the previous photos.

Lunch

I felt like posting something today but since we haven't been on an exotic vacation in like, three whole weeks (I'm sure you're all wondering how I cope) I don't have any new photos so I'm going to post Maisie's lunch menu for the week.

This is all prepared fresh in the school kitchen by a chef who moonlights as a clown.  What could be better than that?  And yes, I've considered sending a tupperware to school with Maisie so she can bring home her leftovers!

Bon appétit everyone.