Thursday, September 8, 2011

More Switzerland - in no particular order






I'll give you one guess what's happening here!








Boat ride across Lake Geneva




A cute old barn near Susan and Paul's home










Alpine slides in the Alps! Reed loved it.


Reed calls these fountains that are everywhere "boats" and wants to stop and splash every one.









Gruyere, my favorite place so far. The castle, the views, the main walking street, shops, flowers and, of course, the CHEESE!

















Thursday, September 1, 2011

Lots of pictures

Organizing posts is taking too long and all Brent really cares about are the pictures (we're able to talk on the phone and Skype so he knows what we've been up to). Hopefully he can match the stories to the pictures...


Reed hiking like a true European with "poles"




Views at the top of the gorgeous hike we went on.




We stopped for a picnic with an amazing view



Reed made a little "house for rabbits". No idea why.



At the end of the hike there were pastures for cows and they all had bells around their necks. It was a perfect Swiss day. I could have listened to that sound all day.


Reed thought it was "too noisy".



and "too spicy". He said this at the zoo too when the animal smell was a little over-powering. I think it's funny because he certainly knows the word "stinky" but the aroma of animals is "spicy" to him.

Ice cream cones at Ikea. We had to pay for a token and a cone and then go over to the ice cream machine where you put in your cone and it moves the cone up and down and dispenses it just right. It was an amazing process for Reed. He was in awe.


Chateau de Chillon. The coolest castle I've ever been to! It sits on (and takes up the entirety of) a little island just of the shore in Lake Geneva



More gorgeous views



There are these little fountains all over and it's all potable water coming out of those spigets. We had to wait for a few minutes to take this picture because people were filling up their water bottles. Picturesque and functional!


Little knight


Reed had a great time dressing up (again) and ran around with Susan looking for knights while me mom and I did the ipod tour.






It was nice to have a relaxing day and not worry about a 2-year-old wreaking havoc on cnturies old relics while I try to enjoy the castle. Thanks, Susan! They toured the castle too, but at his pace and they kept an eye out for knights. She had him knock on random doors saying "Bonjour monsieur Knight!". Sadly, the knghts seemd to have been "on a trip" or "too busy" when we were there.




We ate a picnic lunch on a bench outside the castle. There were very aggressive birds in this little courtyard and Susan has some priceless (as in, they should be wiped off the face of the earth) pictures of the birds trying to get my sandwhich. You know how much I love birds. My face was less than pleasant. ;)

Too be continued...

On to Switzerland!





Saying good-bye at the train station.

I was so ready for a nap (did you know traveling with a 2-year-old is exhausting!?) but the train trip down the Rhine to go to Switzerland was so gorgeous (all pics on Mom's camera) that I didn't want to miss anything!



Reed getting a little dose of Daddy. We miss him SOOO much.