Vals

Before all the excitement of having family here, we spent a weekend in Vals - a tiny
Swiss town with natural spring water being bottled on sight (Valser water).
Our agenda for the weekend - sleep, eat, soak in water - in any order and combination.
We stayed at the Rovanada - a nice little hotel with an excellent buffet breakfast that even allows you to make your own egg should you choose.
We ended up fulfilling all criteria on our first night there including a nap when we arrived on Friday afternoon, a nice long dinner,and a swim in the indoor pool later that night.

On Sat we got up late enough, enjoyed breakfast, went for a walk in the sunshine, and came back for a wee rest before our scheduled Therme time. The afternoon was spent at the Therme vals soaking in all 6 pools. The range went from 14 degrees to 42 (Celsius). Let's face it, I didn't really get into the 14 degree one, but it was there! There was even a pool with petals in it which was scented. The architecture of the place is fascinating and it takes a while to discover exactly where everything is. We played with the pressure showers and poked our noses into the steam shower areas. What we did not do was roll in the snow and then jump back in the warm water. I couldn't quite bring myself to that point. We did have fun in the outdoor pool watching our heads steam as the rest of our bodies stayed nice and warm though. The area is stunning - this time of year completely blanketed in snow of course.
Three and a half hours later we emerged, thoroughly pruned. Of course that night was a wonderful 4 course dinner to savor and after all our hard work, an earlier night for us. Well we needed our beauty rest so that we could get up early in the morning for a massage!


Yes, we had 8am massages. I wish I could say it was as glorious as everything else, but really it was just alright. James felt the same about his. I guess we are a bit spoiled (miss you, Karen!). Still, it was relaxing enough and a good way to start the day. We enjoyed one last extensive breakfast and headed back to lugano. Probably the funniest thing was seeing the season change from winter back to fall as we came through the mountain pass down towards Lugano. We are lucky to have such mild weather here!

Ahh, Venice

View from our bedroom window

What a beautiful city and what phenominal weather we had! We left for Venice on Friday just over a week ago. Taking the train is definitely the way to go, though we discovered that the direct train without changes is actually slower than switching in Milano. None the less, seated in first class with no particular agenda to get to, we were happy to doze for the 5 hours it took. We arrived after sunset and so we thrown right into the bustle night life of the city. As it was a holiday weekend for many one of our trickier tasks was finding places to eat that would take a late reservation or none at all.
Our accommodation for the first night was a very nice apartment a little off the beaten path but right on a canal. I am passing on the info for all of you because we highly recommend it both price wise and niceness wise. It has been recently renovated and feels homey and clean. The owner, Eva, met us at the apt and was great. The place is well equiped and has a kitchen, living room or 2nd bedroom (pull out couch), main bedroom with queen bed, and 2 bathrooms. If you ever want to go to venice email Eva and see if it's available. For the same quality in a hotel you'll be paying close to 400 euros, she charged us 110 for the night. We were only disappointed that we couldn't stay both nights, but unfortunately she had already booked Sat and we were lucky to find it available for Friday night.
evasoranzo@ngi.it

James outside the entrance to our apartment

After finding our apartment we were hungry, and just enough to be slightly cranky about the reservation issue. Eventually we found our way to Alla Madonna - a place that thankfully doesn't allow for reservations. Even so, we had a good 20 min wait to be seated, but at that point we weren't trying to wander around and find some place else. The place came recommended by a couple of people. It was decent but neither of us were over the moon about it. Lots of fish and seafood, so if you like that you're in the right city.

The apartment is the bottom floor

Saturday was truly the most glorious day weather wise. Sunny and warm enough to be comfortable in a light jacket - you know I couldn't ask for more! We spent the whole day walking and eating - with the exception of our over priced gondola ride at sunset. I think if I'm ever really pressed for money I'm moving to Venice. Those guys charge anywhere from 80-150 euros for a 40min gondola ride! wow. I've discovered that hot chocolate in Venice is like hot chocolate pudding. It normally is so thick you have to eat it with a spoon. For those of you who know it - it reminds me of sheer neshaste but chocolate flavored. Yum. We seriously walked the whole city I think and only stopped to eat or go into little tourist trap stores. We saw more Murano glass than we possibly would have liked, but then that's all part of the experience I suppose.
Dinner was at Al Piron which we thought was this little hide-away place that we came across in our wonderings through the Ghetto. We were a bit mistaken but we still had a very good dinner. The menu is pricey but tasty and we made sure to enjoy the moment.

Me and my first hot chocolate!


Enjoying the day

Our second night was spent at the Hotel Dolomiti - a 2 star number right near the train station. It's a convenient location, but definitely not quiet and definitely not anything but adequate. Breakfast was blach. It's a place you go to when you don't want to spend too much and all else has failed. You know it will be clean but beyond that...
Finally, sunday's weather was good - not as good. We had just the morning to walk around - and so we did just that. Our mistake was to eat lunch in a hurry at a tourist menu joint - yuck yuck yuck. Don't eat at any of those places on the main drag - is my recommendation. If they're there it's because they never see the same customer twice.
Our train was delayed by half an hour which made us miss our connecting train in Milan where we had to sit and wait for an hour. Even so, we still arrived back only a half hour after our original time. Wierd.

Flying Pancakes!

It is a TASIS tradition to do "flying pancakes" one sunday at brunch. The proctors and teachers involved make pancakes on the balcony above the Denobili dining hall, and then fling pancakes down onto people's trays.
This year I was lucky to be involved and I can tell you from experience: it gets messy!

Jeremy Birk (12th Grade Dean) - getting ready to fling one down

Amandha (proctor in denobili) - catching it down below!

Group of students helping in the preparation

Amandha trying to throw one UP to Pete Arthmire (chem teacher) in his apartment!

In Pro - Day 4

Our final day was another early start. We had to be packed, have eaten breakfast, and be ready to go by 8am. Youser!
Our plan for the day was a walk through an open air museum. The buildings have all been transplanted to this one location and date back to 100 years ago. Inside the houses you find people at work in what would have been the typical trades and tasks of people in that time period. Among others we saw a weaver, a potter, a woman on a spindle and a meat curing house.
We also had an opportunity to try our hand at some tasks in the do-it-yourself building. James discovered his natural flair for the organ/pianoforte and I learned that wittling wood is actually quite satisfying.
After lunch we then had our very own mini Swiss Olympics. The games involved were:
Stone tossing
Metal disc toss - similar to horseshoe
Swiss Alp Horn blowing

And the finally - Cross bow shooting.

I was quite the athlete and ranked third out of all the girls. James beat everyone, but what else is new?

After a long week we were finally on our way home at 5pm. We arrived after 7pm, not to relax and unwind, mind you, but to head right into weekend duty!
Ah, lucky us!

In Pro - Day 3

We had an even earlier start on day 3 - 6:30am wake up, 7:30am breakfast.
By 8am we were on our way to Zurich.

First stop - crazy infectious diseases medical museum. The kids were a bit grossed out, but it really was quite interesting. It was a small museum and the pieces were all made from wax using molds from people with various skin conditions and then hand painted. They looked quite realistic and dated back from around the 1930's. A quick tour of that was all we needed to work up an appetite for lunch at some greasy spoon pizza/gyro joint. Yummeeh!

The real fun began in the afternoon. Around the ourskirts of Zurich, somewhere close to some airport, we arrived at the body flying company. That's right folks, you heard it here - BODY FLYING.
The gist: First you go through a brief training where they teach you the body position (much like bow pose in yoga without the foot holding) and they talk to you about safety and how to roll out of it. Then you get decked out in yet another suit that's kind of baggy, helmet, goggles and gloves and then you go out with 4 other people to this big cushioned ring. This is open to the outdoors, and in the center, underneath a grate, is the biggest fan you can imagine. The diameter must be at least 4 meters. There is an intstructor with you, and one at a time you fall into the center of the circle where he grabs onto your suit at the waist and leg and helps you take flight. Of course since he is a professional he does all the manuevering up and down and around. The highest we probably went was about 10 meters up. It's a pretty great feeling, and the wind is so strong it pushes your cheeks and makes you look and feel really funny. James wasn't so keen on it because he had a hard time breathing - I thought it was awesome! I think almost everyone had a go. You only get a total of 3 mins per person in flying time, but of course it feels a lot longer.




From there we were on to the highlight of the week for many of the kids - the waterpark - Alpamare. (of course us adults were hardly complaining as we got to do all these fun things too!)
Alpamare is an indoor waterpark with a wave pool, iodine heated pool and 9 or so waterslides of different natures - some where you sit in tubes, some without. We all had a great time and lots of bumps and bruises. Part of the fun was that the water slides started indoors and had parts outdoors, so because it was night time and cold it was a bit scary! Lots of laughter, as you might imagine.
All were thoroughly exhausted when we left the park at 10:30pm and we still had a good hour journey back to the hotels...
We got away with only one minor injury where one kid was rocked into the side of the slide after capsizing out of a 3 person tube. He's alive to talk about it so all is well.
We slept like rocks for the few hours we had.

In pro - day 2

Our hotel:

Breakfast at 8am was hearty to get us going for the day. Nothing like the typical swiss muesli and yogurt with some bread and nutella on the side!
The girls were all together for the morning with me and Pete (another chaperone). The boys in the second group.
Our agenda - CAVING!!!
Moutatal has what they claim to be the third largest network of caves in the world. There are over 200km that have been explored and still much more that remains untouched. We of course, were only getting a taste of life underground.
Geared up in jumpsuits, helmets with lights, gloves and gumboots we headed off to the cave entrance. There, we were divided into two groups to follow guides. My group was supposed to be a little faster paced and challenging - we have no way of determining if this was true!
I regret to say I have no pictures, but really, there was no way I was going to bring my camera into the caves.
Let me explain what was involved lest you think we were walking into some large space:
For the first few minutes we were on a major, defined path. At some point we turned off of it to get some real experience. I would have to describe parts of it like rock climbing, but in the dark, with wet rock, with other rock walls all around and with no safety harness. We shimmied on hands and knees at times, stooped over low and even did a plank position over a pool to get across without getting wet. We went down and up slippery rock surfaces, gripping with fingers and once in a while a rope or chain for assistance. There were moments when the thought of the weight above me almost made me scream, but mostly I loved the experience. We even tried finding our way as a group in pitch black. With me in the lead I think we moved a total of 5 meters. oh well! The girls with me seemed to embrace the challenge and have a good time. They decided at some point that the mud in the caves was good for their skin and that was it: they had war paint all over their faces!
It was tiring and rewarding and 3 and a half hours and a full bladder later, we got out, peeled off our layers, went home and showered! (gratefully, I was rewarded with a hot shower this time)

The afternoon activity, as the groups switched over once again, was an orienteering class. They had to learn how to read coordinates on a map of the immediate area we were in, and then the task was to find a number of sights on the map, and answer questions. Pete and I left the kids up to the task and just enjoyed a chilly but beautiful walk around the village.
Views of the area:



In the evening we went for dinner to a Mexican Restaurant - I am not sure exactly why! - and again it was 11pm before we made it home...

Fall In Program Travel - Day 1

Itinerary:
Breakfast check in at 7:15am in the dining hall at school.
Depart with 44 bleary eyed 9th graders and 5 chaperones in one big bus at 8am.
group split for day:
James and I plus 22 kids get off at 9am in Bellinzona for a tour of 2 of the 3 castles there. The kids are more interested in the "toilets" and the sewage drain than anything else. What else can you expect from 14 year olds!
Our guide takes us into the town for a brief tour and some free time to wander, get a hot chocolate etc. It's freezing so I opt to buy a pair gloves.


12:30pm we meet up with our bus driver and head to the Locarno area where we will be spending the afternoon Rock Climbing.
The groups switch over, we eat our bag lunches from school and then head off with professional climber Pesche and our very own Paul Greenwood. With our group in two subsections I landed the all girls group with the professional rock climber which I certainly can't complain about. Especially since I discovered later that James actually was dropped!
Rock climbing shoes, harnesses and helmets were provided for us and we were given a basics in gripping and walking up rock face. After that intro we moved on to basic belaying and practiced in groups of three: having 1 person climb up and 2 belay.
We were then able to move around the area where ropes allowed, and climb up and absail down. We had a great time and were suitably worn out by the time 4:30pm came around.
After a busy day we headed north towards the German speaking part of Switzerland where the hotels where located. Along the way dinner was in an autogrill - not exactly gourmet, but then we are used to that!



The boys' hotel turned out to be a backpackers hostel (I'm so glad I was with the girls!!!) in the town of Schwyz. We were more remotely located near Muotatal in a very typically swiss looking Auberg. The real drama came when we arrived at 10:30pm and found ourselves short 2 beds. When you're dealing with wealthy families this is not a good thing. After some crying and carrying on, and a couple of uncomfortable conversations with the father of an upset girl, we managed to get everyone settled and ready for bed. Showers ended up being cold for whatever reason, but by that point it really didn't matter and falling into bed was all we wanted to do.
Day one, over and out at just about midnight...

Milano

Our trip to Milan is now two weeks away so I figured I would post a couple of pics to prove that I've been there and done that...
We spent the day walking around the main square (around the Duomo). Did some shopping - as one must in Milan - and then of course the highlight was watching a ballet at La Scala Opera house. It is a phenominal opera house and I was lucky enough to go for free (the perks of being a chaperone on a school run trip!). The ballet "Le Parc" - was a contempory ballet which I really liked. The view could have been better, but then it also could have been worse. We were in the Prima Galleria but off to the right side, making it hard to see anything that happened far off on that side of the stage. All in all though, a great day.