Quarterly adventure

Four times a year my housemate and I try to have an adventure. It could be as far away as the Baltic or two villages over, but it involves staying overnight. We always start out with breakfast at a Boulongerie in Cologny where Byron and Shelley once lived. I doubt that they ate at this award-winning bakery, but if they could have they would have. I can just imagine the poems they could have written with these goodies for inspiration.

With Michael Bubblé and il Divo in the DVD player we and the new car were off. Our first stop was Grandson, for no other reason than we could. The château was impressive but not as impressive as the 12th century church.

The renovation of the church combined the old with the ultra modern.

Nice to see puppy friends taken care of the first warm day since I can't remember.

Lunch at a restaurant where we stopped just because we were hungry.

Then up over the Jura mountains. The Toblerones still exist not just to inspire chocolate but are to stop tanks of any invading army.

This was the house where I first lived in Môtiers Switzerland and where I fell in love with the country I would adopt or maybe I should say, I was lucky that they adopted me.

Never come between my housemate and her afternoon coffee.  But what better place to feed her habit than this café which has hosted Jean-Jacques Rousseau and Voltaire.

Then to our destination: Mauler & Cie which produces champagne (method according to new laws that no longer allows any champagne made outside Champagne country in France to use the term champagne) since the 1800s. The building was occupied by monks during the Middle Ages. When I lived in Môtiers, and I had dinner guests and we would go down for a degustation (sampling) then buy whatever we liked to go with the meal.

Our final stop was a B&B along the Bern lake where we wandered through the village noticing they were very interested in witches, admiring the architecture. There was buvette along the lake where families were eating fondue and other local dishes. We sat and watched a family of ducks.

Our final stop was this B&B, which had been a girls' school dormitory in the late 1800s.  We imagined what the young women were like. Had they worried about not having done their homework? We're they looking forward to a summer holiday?

 

Then on the way back, where we ate lunch, we watched a family of miniature goats. Baby stayed pretty close to his mama. 

What will be out next adventure? We've talked about Lyon, Dijon (we started out there once, but ended up in Arbois, very happily), Annecy, Southern Germany? 

Malta is on the list too--but that was a trip we promised ourselves to raise our spirits when we were dealing with very sick relatives.

Doesn't matter where we go...we will find something interesting.