Switzerland Trip Day 6: Bodmen

Today we went to go and see family friends. Graeme had been with his parents when he was Samuel’s age, so it was very special for him. 

We started the day with some banana pancakes 🥞 - just banana, egg and flour since Joshua can’t have milk. They were really nice and filling 👌

We then went up the chairlift to Giw to play in the pool of water we found there. It was such a lovely day and we had just enough before a friend was driving us to the family friend’s house to go up. 

We found heaps of frogs that lived in the rocks at the pool, and Graeme kept catching them to show to the kids. 

We also found little tadpoles. I put my feet in and let them swim around my legs which was very cute and also slightly wierd 😅

Daniel enjoyed splashing his feet in the water as well, which was very cute. But he splashed so much that he started complaining that his clothes were all wet, so we had to quickly change him when we got back down before the car came to take us to the house 🏡.

We then got the chairlift down and got the car to the friend’s lovely wooden house that was made in 1942. 

We had a lovely barbecue with the family.

Samuel and Joshua had some older kids to play with. I overheard one of them asking Samuel what his favourite food is - and he replied, as usual, tuna pasta 😂 Even though he doesn’t always eat it when I make it for him when he asks me 😂😅

Samuel was really wanting to interact with them all - even though only the kids spoke English. He mentioned to them at some point randomly how he saw really big ants 🐜 😂 To which they replied that they were called forest ants in German. 

When the kids started playing up we went for a walk to some piles of logs. 

When we returned to their house the kids were so tired. Joshua has actually fallen asleep in the pram and would not wake up, and Samuel pretended to sleep 😴 We had then had an amazing dinner of cheeses and home cured meats.

We (the parents) got home super exhausted, while the kids were super hyped up annoyingly. Hence, we all had a later night. 

Tomorrow we were meeting Graeme’s mother’s sisters for a walk and a picnic 🧺 

Switzerland Trip Day 5: Rest Day

Today we all needed abit of TLC and spent the day lounging around at home. Sometimes it is a struggle to think about “wasting a day” by just resting, but I need to remind myself that it is needed and not a bad thing.

The day started very slowly, and we had breakfast while talking to my grandparents in Australia. It is such a blessing that we can call people from all parts of the world so easily! I remember when we relied on post - what a way to learn patience 😂

We then went for a walk to the local grocers to get some essentials (including a large chunk of raclette cheese). We had to stop to say hello to the local cats 🐈 🐈‍⬛  The boys adore cats just like Graeme 👌

We were delighted on the way and way back to be spraying by the sprinklers from someone’s garden 🥰 Everyone has their time slots when they can take water from the stream that has been diverted along the side of the mountain. 

We then got back, the kids watched The Snowman and some more shows, and we made a cheese sauce with pasta for lunch. 

Afterwards we played some games, ate some fruit and went for a short walk to give some gifts from Scotland to Graeme’s family’s friends. 

Tomorrow we are going to spend some time with some of Graeme’s family’s friends. 

Switzerland Trip Day 4: Gibidumpass

We really stretched the boys today! And ourselves too really 😂👌 I got to see some amazing alpine flowers for the first time. We crossed the pass between the mountains Gibidum and Rothorn. Pretty epic!

The red dot is where we are staying

We started the day with a normal breakfast of overnight oats and eggs, I was so excited for normality 😂 We then started the long task of getting the snacks and lunch ready for our walk and all other essential items. I hung up the clothes that we managed to finally get washed 🙏

Firstly we had to get up the chairlift to Giw, which was such an amazing way to start our walk! I don’t think I would ever get tired of the view 🤩 Before heading up we made the mistake of letting Joshua play in the playpark, because he did not want to leave 😅 

When we arrive at the top of the chairlift we started on up a forest path that was leading to the Gibidumpass. The path to begin with was super steep, so we had heaps and heaps of sweet breaks for the kids. Graeme chose fizzy sweets to give them because he finds them most effective for immediate energy. 

Then we got to a lovely meadow full of forget-me-not flowers, buttercups, daisies etc. There were heaps of little orange butterflies that flew from flower to flower and the kids loved finding them 🥰

Suddenly an icy wind blew as we came to the pass and we all became absolutely freezing! We also made the mistake of stopping for a snack break 😅 We had packed swimmers, so the kids wore their swimmer shirt over their clothes and Joshua had his towel on like a poncho. We also convinced ourselves that when we reached the top the wind will die down. 

We reached the top and met a lady and man walking their dogs and so Graeme said hello and they had come from Austria to look after the animals up on the mountain. What a job! 

We then started going along the side of the Rothorn mountain along the Heido stream and started enjoying the alpine flowers 🥰 Samuel mustered the energy somehow to run, although we had to tell him to not run and be extra careful of the edge. I don’t know how he suddenly had all this energy 😂 Must have been because it was flat and super epic. The wind, however, did not die down 😅 Although we did get a treat of the sun shining every now and then to warm us up before the next ice wind 😂😅

Daniel was asleep at this point, so I covered him with a towel to keep him warm and so he didn’t burn. Joshua was delighted that we were following the stream again!! In this photo Joshua is so happy because he is having a sausage to give him much needed energy.

Graeme had wanted us to reach a hut so we could shelter from the wind and have our lunch. Also because that was where he used to go as a kid when he came on walks up here, but we soon discovered that it would be wiser to not go all that way because the last chairlift down was at 5:30 and it was 2 at this point and we had started after the chairlift at 11. So if the walk had take 

 us 3 hours to get there, we should plan that for the way back (although it was downhill and would probably be much quicker). So we stopped beside the stream for lunch. 

For lunch we had meat, bread, cheese, nuts, dried sausage and various drinks. It was very nice 👌 Daniel woke up but was quite happy lying like this and Samuel fed him. 

After that the kids ran back 😂😅 Graeme and I had to run to hold their hands 😂 Subsequently we made it back super fast. And Old Macdonald has heaps of cats on his farm 😂😂  I was singing it to

Joshua most of the way down and he mostly always chose cats 😂😂

Here we are having one of our few breaks on the way down of my ginger cake I brought from Scotland. 

When we reached the chairlift, in plenty of time, we decided we all needed to reward ourselves with sorbet 🍨 We ordered a raspberry sorbet for Joshua, a caramel icecream for Samuel and a raspberry, pear and apricot trio of sorbets for Graeme and I. We all loved the pear sorbet best 👌

We then made the mistake of letting the kids play on a play area there, and they did not want to go down the chairlift 😂

What a day! We had a lovely soup with sausage for dinner, put the kids down to bed (they were surprisingly hyper and took ages), and then dropped asleep ourselves. 

Tomorrow will be a rest day 👌