Catching Up

It's Saturday night and I'm realizing that I have quite a few days unaccounted for on this blog. I'm not going to bore anyone with details, but Wednesday was a day off (hence nothing exciting) and Thursday was our first exam. So those two days we did absolutely nothing for the vast majority of the day.

As a treat, Friday we took rail, tram, cog car, and boat to the Chateau de Chillon, a castle nestled between the edge of Lake Geneva and the Alps. It was this site that inspired Lord Byron to write his famous Prisoner of Chillon, about an imprisoned prior who opposed the Savoy rule. The castle itself is wondrous to behold, as it sits on the very edge of the lake. Water laps at its base, which evokes a certain sense of awe and majesty that one would not get elsewhere.
The group in front of Chateau de Chillon

As an added bonus, the latrines opened straight on to the water! Guess those 17th century guys didn't care too much for health or hygiene.

View from latrine seat down into lake

The castle was spectacular, but a close second was the journey to get there. After a two hour train ride, we arrived at the foot of a mountain. From here we mounted a cog car and rode it most of the way up the mountain to 1057 meters elevation (somewhere around there) to have lunch. Although the day was dreary, the views from the cafe were lovely. Instead of taking the cog car back down, we opted to take a cable car down the mountain. It was arguably the most frightening thing I've ever done, but definitely a lot of fun (and beautiful). It's so interesting that the cars work on gravity... as one goes up, the other, down! We got to the bottom of the mountain and found a giant lake in between us and our castle, so we jumped the next boat available. It was just a water taxi, but it seemed like a luxury liner to me. Next to the castle, the boat ride was my favourite part of the trip. The wind at my back and lake spray in my hair... it could only have gotten better if I were in open waters.

Today (Saturday) has really just been a day of catching up, buying last minute items, and packing. We head out to Scotland tomorrow (2:00 flight out of Geneva), and I can't contain my excitement. Although I've looked at the weather and admittedly did not bring warm enough clothes. Perhaps that gives me an excuse to buy some warm clothes.... ;)

Bernese Mountain Dogs

This week has gone by so quickly. I keep turning around and it's a new day. So for now, we'll talk about... Tuesday's excursion to Morat and Bern!

Morat is a town 30 minutes away from Estavayer and one of national importance. It was here in 1476 that the Swiss ousted the Burgundians, led by Charles the Bold. Charles had wanted to rule France and the Swiss cantons, but to his surprise they fought back with a nasty vengeance. To this day, they run a marathon to/from this town in remembrance of the man who ran from the town to Fribourg to announce the victory over the Burgundians. The "castle" and city walls are still up and saving the town, so we decided to do a little wall exploration.

Wall of Morat, inside

Graffiti from some hooligan from UGA

The second half of the day was spent exploring Bern, the capital of Switzerland. We had a delicious lunch of Chinese stir-fry, followed by a lovely afternoon in the Museum of Bern. It housed so many artefacts, many of them from Medieval and Renaissance times- including several manuscripts. This lucky girl got to touch!

Manuscripting

And the school day ended with a trip to the bookstore, where I bought Pillars of the Earth. It's been my reading companion now for a few days, and at 1100 pages I'm sure to be reading it for another few days at least =)

Monday's Adventure

I'm in the parlor of My Lady's Manor, admiring the 19th century decor from a chair in the corner. You can just imagine this being a waiting room for proper ladies in their Victorian dresses and cups of tea. The closest we can get is drinking tea and coffee, which we do quite often.

Monday's adventure took us away from our comfortable parlor and whisked us to the town of Avenches, about 20 minutes away from our home in Estavayer. Avenches was a Roman town (called Aventicum back then) with an impressive wall circuit of 5.5 km, an amphitheatre, theatre, baths, and temple complex. Now would be a good time to mention that all Roman towns had these features- not just this one. As per the Roman ideal, the walls were built to the maximum extent possible, which meant that they probably never filled up. Indeed, Aventicum never grew near to the size of the walls, taking up only half of the land that they encompassed. But you could never tell that from walking around the site, because one look at the amphitheatre and you're sucked into the magic and mystery of Roman times.

Amphitheatre of Aventicum, still working. Being set up for an opera show here.

And yes, Aventicum has been one of my favourite Roman towns for a few years now. So getting to see it firsthand was a dream come true.

Me with the most famous gilded bronze bust of Marcus Aurelius

View from the top of the theatre. At the top left-ish of the photo you can see a column from the temple complex

Le Week-end

So I've been gone/ not-blogging for a few days... because I spent this past weekend in Sion with Ian! A perfect weekend. Let me take you through it... but be warned! It's a tad long.

Friday morning, we all jumped into Bernie (our bus) and trucked it on down to Sion- about a 2 hours ride from home in Estavayer. The ride- yes, through the Alps- was breathtaking, and probably hundreds of pictures were taken along the way (most of them not so good, but there are a few acceptable ones). So we get to Sion around 10am and immediately hike to see two dolmen/menhir tombs, both built around 2500 BCE. They're probably 10-20 meters long and are triangularly shaped with a main burial building in the back... the closest shape I can describe it as is an arrowhead. But waaay bigger. And they're just laying around- one under an apartment building, the other in the schoolyard.

Neolithic Tomb in Sion

After a lunch break at the tomb in the schoolyard we made our way to the MARKET! Sion, unlike other towns in Switzerland, has its weekly markets on Fridays. We passed an hour just wandering up and down the streets and perusing people's wares. I didn't find anything to buy, but not for lack of merchandise. More for the costliness of the area. Switzerland isn't the most expensive country because of the exchange rate- ooh no. It's the most expensive because they have to import over half of their food and because they get paid so much more to cover the cost of living. To give you the best idea, I'll compare McDonalds prices (everyone knows those). At home, McD's has a dollar menu. Here they have a 2.50 franc menu (~ 2.75 or 2.80 USD). And those are the kids burgers. A "big tasty meal" (the equivalent of a Big Mac) is 13 francs. The big mac meal here is... $6 or $7 maybe? And the meals run up to 25 francs. Yes, it is like that here- everywhere. Restaurants are terrible to eat at as an American just because it costs so much money.


Anyway, returning to Sion- after the market, we wandered up to a tiny museum where quite a few dolmen (carved rocks that flanked tombs) were housed. And then we were done! On the walk back to the van I ran in to- who else?- but my lovely boyfriend Ian. So we picked up my gear from the van and walked around the town. Our hostel didn't let us check in until 5pm, so we found ourselves a quiet spot in the middle of the only "park" in Sion and relaxed. The people of Sion are so diverse that it was difficult to separate the tourists from the locals- if there were any other tourists around, that is. According to a worker at the museum, there are very few tourists in the area until mid summer (June-July). Seems odd to come here then. We finally got to check into our hostel and were kind of embarrassed to find ourselves in Room 1, right off the main hallway and next to the reception desk. The flipside to this is that we had a private room with a bathroom, so no complaints there. We spent the rest of the night wandering around the town, attempting to buy dinner (my French is poor and Ian's nonexistent). We wound up at Antayla Express for some kebab, which apparently turned out to be delicious (I ended up eating at McDonalds because of a miscommunication between me and the kebab man). Watching movies and hanging out turned out to be just what the doctor ordered for that night.

Our room in the hostel, Sion

Saturday morning- erm, afternoon, we woke up and got going. Ian and I both wanted to climb the mountains that led to the castles that the city is renowned for. A quick lunch of bread and cheese settled as we hiked up the streets and onto the plateau between the castles. We chose to visit La Tourbillon, a 13-14th century castle, first. The climb really ended up being not bad at all- just scary at times when you look off the side of a mountain and into the river below. The views from the top were inspiring... we easily could have spent all day just sitting up there, watching the town below us. But we had other fish to fry, so to speak. We climbed back down and got some cool, clean Alps water before taking on the other (smaller) peak. The second castle turned out to be 10-12th century with a church in the middle of it that boasts the world's oldest working organ (dates to the 1400s). To my surprise, there was another museum here! Tickets are reduced (as usual) here for students, so for a mere 4 francs each we got to witness the town grow from prehistoric village to modern sprawl. It really was amazing- I definitely recommend it to anyone who might visit Sion in the future.

La Tourbillon, Sion

After more strolling through the town, we took a quick nap break and decided to eat a nice dinner. A place a little down the road from the hostel advertized Mexican food, and we all know no amount of willpower could keep me away from mexican food. Unfortunately, the prices were just astronomical, so we settled for pizza instead. It was delicious, but trying to communicate with someone who speaks no english and trying to decide where to pay was a little ridiculous. Perhaps we should write a quick culture guide to Switzerland for Western visitors- just so no one else has to feel as ignorant as I do sometimes.


Our last morning together we spent at our spot in the park. It was just...blissfully perfect. The entire weekend. Minus the bird pooping on my bag, of course. But isn't that supposed to be good luck?

From 2011 to the Neolithic in 2.5 seconds

Today, we time traveled. No joke, stepped back in time a few thousand years to a Neolithic (New Stone Age) village. There were long houses, apsed on both ends, 20-60 meters long. Some were on stilts to keep away from the water and vermin, but the living quarters were usually just on the ground. Wattle and daub construction with clay and cow patties mixed to form the walls. We made fire... well, Francois made fire. The first time he used flint and a stone with iron in it to create a spark that could catch with kindling. The second time he used the bow and a stick and made fire on a piece of wood. Awesome.

THEN we got to chuck spears and use atl atls. An atl atl is a just a stick with a hook on the end that attaches to the spear that makes it go further. Basically an extension of the arm, it proves to be an effective weapon and can make the spear go up to 90 feet! After a delicious lunch of chicken with mushroom sauce (yum) came the best part of the day.

We got to make our own Neolithic knives. Most people chose to use the already created templates and just needed to sand it down, but I decided to make my own. From scratch. So I carved out some bark using a piece of flint, shaped it, whittled it down, sanded it. After an hour or so I was able to insert my actual knife into the base. Came out to be the coolest thing I've ever made.

More later.

My knife

Archaeology of Estavayer

Our off day- supposed to go to a nearby city to shop. Instead, we wound up staying in Estavayer and hanging out. And you know what we got to do? Hang out with the archaeologists who were digging up the skeletons by the church. Here's the down low on the info we got from them:

+ 31 individuals at present
+ At least 1 family (5 individuals) died at the same time of the plague
+ At least 7 individuals buried/stacked on top of each other
+ 1 family was buried holding hands
+ Ground around church used to be MUCH higher
+ The main site skeletons had no effects (jewelry, etc), but skeletons from a close site did have jewels

Child skeleton, 7-8 yo. Died of plague, Middle Ages

Excavation of man, 45 yo. Died of plague, Middle Ages

Close up of 45 yo man

Good Morning, Switzerland!

Waking up this morning was like waking up on Christmas morning, only there were no presents. Instead I got to walk out onto my balcony and say good morning to the town of Estavayer-le-Lac and Lake Neuchatel. A breathtaking way to start one's day, I can assure you. Along with a full breakfast and a minibus, life can't get much better. A quick run-down of the things we did today:

1. Archaeoparc and Museum Latenium on Lake Neuchatel
After breakfast, we headed down the road about an hour to get to the museum latenium on Lake Neuchatel. All sorts of Mesolithic, Neolithic, Bronze, and Iron Age artifacts resided there. We spent a good amount of time discussing Neolithic/Bronze Age settlements and the town discovered near there. The archaeoparc was just some reconstructed buildings, boats, and tombs that surrounded the museum that gave one the impression of being in a certain time period.

2. Visit to La Tene
La Tene is the name of the Celtic culture from 450-58 BCE, named from this site. Literally, saw what history is made from. Which was not much... just a trail in the woods and a river in front of it. No remains otherwise.
3. Visit to Furstengraben (Princely Graves)
After a half-hour journey, we made it to the middle of a random forest that housed the Princely Graves (and tons of ticks). These were just burial mounds of important people, most likely already looted. Otherwise they were unexcavated and looked just like mounds.


What's not cool is that my computer just informed me to quickly buy another battery. Fingers crossed that the lappy makes it through this trip...

First Impressions Are Important

When people tell you that first impressions aren't important, they're lying. First impressions can mean the difference between getting a job and being unemployed. It can also mean the difference between loving a city and tolerating one. Estavayer-Le-Lac, our home for the next two weeks, has made all of us fall in love. On a lake, with a castle, cute buildings...

And did I mention skeletons? Yes, on our first day we stumbled across an excavation with skeletons in it. Although the excavation was covered with a tarp, part of it had come off and there were quite a few adolescent bodies (my opinion on the adolescent part). So now we can say that on the first day, we really found skeletons. Awesome.

Another Year, Another Adventure

Well folks, today's the day. I'm leaving for another European adventure, this one in Switzerland and Scotland. A little over 3 weeks total and I'm so excited- how many people really get to do these trips? Not particularly looking forward to the plane ride/airport hoo-hah, but it'll be a nice change from the ordinary. My plane leaves at 9pm tonight, and I haven't started packing. So, in lieu of a longer entry, I'm going to get that settled! See you again from the beautiful country of Switzerland!