More piste

Each morning, after rolling out of bed, eating a whopping bowl of muesli and chugging down some nuun, I embark on a fifteen minute walk to the tram. From there, it is a two tram, one train, (under the mountain!) thirty minute journey to the top of the glacier. Today they opened up the terrain under the second tram, creating a gigantic run from the top of the glacier. As it was too windy to set gates, we did a skiing and skating mix. The run was so long (and we skated so much) that we only needed three runs to fill up the entire day.

The sun!

For many weeks, I didn't think it existed in full force. Week after week of cloudy or partly cloudy skies made the sun's full appearance today a welcome sight. As you can see, the team was just as happy. From right Amelie, Bastien, Martin, Nikolay, some random person, Rheto, and Morgan.

Fajita night in saas fee!

During training in Saas Fee, the team takes turns making dinner and tonight was my turn. Veering away from the traditional Swiss breakfast potatoes for dinner, I cooked up some fajitas, complete with homemade tortillas, guak, salsa, and refried beans. As you can see, Bastien is a bit out of practice as he committed a rookie mistake: piling his fajita like a burrito, then finding that he couldn't keep it in one piece!

Bon apetite!

Another nice day...

So it was time for a photo op!

Morgan and I are standing on top of an old, preserved grain hut. Mmm grain stored in an old rotting house! Sure makes me hungry!

Fall hike in Saas Fee

Me and another Swiss Junior took advantage of the nice fall weather (for the moment) in Saas to take a nice hike in the woods. Not exactly the wilderness, as there is a kiddy park or restaurant at least every 100 yards! Just another bizarre fact of life in Switzerland.

INTRODUCING:

Not Slim Shady, but my host family, who are, by the way, the BEST!!! Today was Francois' birthday, so we threw a surprise lunch party complete with horse-meat and hot stones! I bravely stepped up to the plate and threw a piece of "cheval" on the stone and it was pretty dang tasty. After steaming up the entire house and finishing off a vineyard's worth of wine, we still have five platters of various sliced meat.... Looks like we'll be having hot-stone dinner for a few days. I'm definitely not complaining!

Third from the left is my host dad Frederik, who drinks almost a whole bottle of dole every night and teaches tennis (unless my french is so bad that I still don't know!)

From left:
- 2 unknowns
-Geraldine: the daughter who owns a restaurant and has Francois come down almost every weekend to help feed the masses
-Francois: my host mom who is a self taught french chef (I saw her one lunch "whip together" a flaming pan of cognac-beef!)
-more guests

Some lone halloween pumpkins

Although Halloween is almost nonexistent in CH, my good friend, Jeff Graves and his family carved some pretty dang good ones, if I'm any judge! At left Henryk demonstrates the product of a kid + apple corer. The other one is Jeff's (the dad) masterpiece with a slug adding the right amount of creepy Halloween ambiance.