Tuesday 10 July 2007

Pilgrimage from Culli to Montreux 07/07/07


Surprisingly when we woke this morning at 07:30 we felt pretty good. A sign of good wine I say :)

The mayor had invited us for coffee at one of the local cafés and since he didn’t speak so much English a university professor who had been at the party came to help translate. Thanks Anne.

By the time we set off for Montreax at 09:00 we were in such good spirits. I had a sense of well being that I have only experienced a few times in my life….or maybe it was just the red wine still pumping around my body ;)

The rain had also disappeared so it is looking like it will be the first day without any rain in over three weeks! About time!

Switzerland had really turned it on for us. The snow capped Alps could be seen in the distance and the lake looked magical.

Once again it didn’t take long to find a winery that was open, so even though it was only 11am, we were in such a great mood that we decided to do a bit more tasting. We couldn’t have picked a better spot.

The house’s back garden bordered the lake so we sat around with a few other Swiss tourists to enjoy the view. It was spectacular! This is really living :)

After an hour or so we grabbed a bottle for lunch and headed off. A couple of hundred meters down the road we spotted a great place to have a picnic so we could still see the house we had just left when we stopped again. It was a perfect pilgrims meal. A 2CHF tin of beans with a 17CHF bottle of wine.

It was also hot so it was time for our first swim. The water was still a bit chilly but it was great.

Two o’clock came around and we were still lying on the rocks 10kms away from Montreax. It was time to get a move on.

Dan has been touting the virtues of Macs ever since I started looking for another computer, but we hadn’t been able to locate a Mac store. And then one magically appeared in our path. It’s never a good idea to make business decisions after a couple of bottles of wine but I couldn’t resist. Today had been such a wonderful day it just felt right to buy one. So now I’m converted. I’m the proud owner of a MacBook!

I now have to catch up on all the blog entries I’ve missed…

Just before reaching Montreax we stumbled upon a campground that looked great. It was right on the lake, had heaps of young people lounging around and was cheap. It was also fully booked :(

We had already rung the YHA and knew it was full as well so this was a bit of a worry. We weren’t even in Montreux and everything was full.

Not to be discouraged we once again contacted the YHA to beg. One of us would be in luck as they had just received a cancellation and had a bed free. We told them to hold another bed for us if one became available and that we were on our way…

Upon arriving there was still only one bed free so I let Dan have it. I knew that I could quite happily go and party all night anyway. The main problem was that I wanted a shower so it was back to the lake for another swim.

The festival is amazing, the Swiss seem to do everything they do extremely well. I am impressed. The crowd is friendly, there seems to be no trouble and the atmosphere is relaxed. It’s GREAT!!!

Dan went to try to see if there was any tickets left for “the Good, the Bad and the Queen” and came back extremely excited scoring two tickets off a scalper for less than they were worth.

Just as we were about to enter the concert, I got a call from the YHA saying they had a bed for me. I couldn’t resist as it meant we could then be able to comfortably spend one more night here.

I missed a couple of songs but the concert was awesome. Thanks Dan :)

It was then downstairs to the club to dance the night away…

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