Month: August 2022

Back streets of Sion.

The mountains are calling, and I must go.

-John Muir

Sion is one of those cities whose roots go back into antiquity.  In Roman times, it was called Sedunum.  There are two hillocks in Sion crowned by the remains of the 13^th century Château de Tourbillon and the Château de Valère (the latter containing a museum and a 13^th century church).  In the town, there is also the Cathedral of Notre-Dame-du-Glarier, the Church of Saint-Thêodule (1516), the Maison Supersaxo (1505), the town hall (1660) and the remains of the Château de la Majorie (now housing an art gallery).  It is an important market place for fruit, vegetables and wine and lies on the road and rail routes to Milan, Italy, via the Simplon Pass.  It is predominantly French-speaking and has a population of 29,000.

We take the bus to Sion today, not to enjoy the sights, nor to ponder our place in its history, but to go shopping.  Tomorrow is my sister-in-law’s (Michele) birthday and I want to find her a gift.  I’m also looking for chocolate to bring home (when I asked my friends and family what they wanted me to bring back from Switzerland, the unanimous answer was chocolate) and maybe something uniquely Swiss for me.  The temperature is 88℉ and I work up a sweat walking through the streets.

After a few miles and stores, I find a girolle.  It is a round wooden plate with a hole in the middle through which you secure a spike.  Small wheels of cheese (traditionally Tete de Moines, or monk’s head cheese, but there are others) are impaled over the spike.   One end of a blade, with the cutting edge sitting down on the cheese, is placed over the spike so it can be spun round and round.  As the blade is turned, thin portions of cheese curl up into rosettes that are just the right thickness and consistency to melt in your mouth.  Delicious and very Swiss.  I buy Michele a bottle of Novembre, her favorite local white wine, a lot of chocolate for me to take back to the US and we head home.  At dinner, I feel uncharacteristically very tired and, again, slightly feverish.  Damn cold.  I will sleep well.

I awoke feeling fine and rested, no fever or other symptoms.  Today is Michele’s birthday.  It is a tradition that the family goes, on her birthday, to Crans-Montana, a touristy ski resort town high in the Alps, down the tracks and on the opposite of the valley from Haute Nendaz.  There’s a restaurant there that has a blueberry tarte that Michele loves.  It also has a lot of small shops that cater to the rich and famous and is a nice place to window shop.

The first hotel, Hotel du Parc, was opened in Crans-Montana in 1893.  Golfing started in 1906 on a majestic plateau that exists amongst the steep slopes.  Golfing is still popular here today.  The first downhill ski race took place in 1911 and the place has been a ski mecca since.   I can only guess how brutal skiing in these mountains must have been before there were any ski lifts.  One of its most well-known celebrities, Roger Moore, owned a chalet and lived at the resort for many years until his death in 2017.  The town has a population of 10,218.

After we have lunch and eat our tartes (I had a wild-berry tarte full of currants that was delicious), we walk around the town and ogle what’s behind the store windows.  There’s a store dedicated to selling every kind of Swatch you can imagine, chocolatiers, sports shops for all kinds of outdoor activities, cheese shops, clothing stores and just about anything else you can imagine a resort town might have.  By the time we make for the bus stop, I’m feeling really tired, achy and a bit feverish again.

Back in Haute Nendaz, we go out to eat and enjoy a fondue dinner and good wine.  Fondue is a very traditional Swiss meal originally designed as a way to eat hardened cheese and stale bread during the winter months.  The earliest known recipe is from 1699, and today, it’s prepared using mostly Gruyère and Emmental cheeses.

The food and wine are very good, but the exhaustion and fever are starting to get the best of me and I’m glad when it’s time to go home.  The temperature in the valley was in the high 80s today, but tonight, up here in the mountains, it’s 60℉ and I’m feeling a little chilled, wearing no jacket.  I’m soon in bed, picturing all the places I’ve been the past few days, imagining doing it all with Waldo on the end of the leash.

He would love it.

Celebrating Michele’s birthday with a nice glass of vin blanc.

The promenade next to Lake Geneva.

My hair is grey, but not with years.

-“The Prisoner of Chillion,” by Lord Byron

Today, we went down the train racks toward Geneva a little further to a town named Montreux.  Montreux is a city of about 26,000 citizens that lies on the northeastern shore of Lake Geneva.  There is evidence the area was occupied since the late bronze age and an important wine-growing region since the 12^th century.  It has been a popular tourist spot since the 19^th century with grand hotels attracting the rich and famous from all over Europe and the Americas.  It has seen the likes of David Bowie, Noel Coward, Zelda Fitzgerald, Freddy Mercury, Vladimir Nabokov, Igor Stravinsky, Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovski, and Shania Twain, just to name a few.  Queen Victoria was a fan of Montreux, visited here several times, and Freddy Mercury has a larger than life bronze statue on the promenade erected in his honor.  We’re here just to explore around and see what the place has to show us.

We get off the train and walk through winding streets, surrounded by buildings from the “Belle époque,” the turn of the 19^th and 20^th centuries.  They often have roofs and windows of a unique design that have an ornate flair that gives the city, in my mind, an old and cherished feeling of pride-of-history and culture.  It’s like I’m walking through reflections of the past, footprints left of what’s gone by.  I seem to be surrounded by lingering shadows of things, things that once marked a daily life, now gone and largely forgotten.  There’s a sense of continuity that runs from what happened centuries ago to my walking the streets in the present day.

We walk down to the lakeside where there is a promenade running right next to the shore of Lake Geneva.  It is well manicured, sporting flower beds, beautiful trees and shrubbery, and seems to be a popular place to go for a stroll.  Soon, our path takes us to where the yearly jazz festival is being prepared – we will miss it by a week.  In addition to auditoriums, there are food stalls of every imaginable flavor and ethnicity – Indian, Brazilian, American, English and, of course, French, German, Italian and Swiss.  Soon we are entering downtown and we stop to have a tasty lunch at a French restaurant.

After eating, we retrace our steps and walk on to Chateau de Chillion, some seven miles or so away.  Its origins and distant history are buried in the darkness of the middle-ages.  A castle was built there in the twelfth century that survives to today and is a popular tourist spot.  Among other things, it served as a prison and in 1880, Lord Byron wrote the poem, “The Prisoner of Chillion,” about an unnamed man who was imprisoned there.  In the bowels of the place, once used to house prisoners, there is a plaque honoring Byron.  The castle was also the domicile of various dukes and other royalty and there are a number of interesting old artifacts left behind.

On the way to the chateau, I lag a little behind my brother, his son and grandson.  I’m feeling unusually tired and I keep getting distracted by the dogs leading their charges down the path.  I say hello to them, but they ignore me and continue on with their doggie business.  After a bit, I notice a young woman, in her thirties, I would guess, setting her cellphone on a rock so she can get a selfie.  “Est-ce que je peux vous aider? (Can I help you?),” I ask.  She says yes and hands me her phone.  After a few pictures, we talk a little about where we’re from, and so on.  It turns out she’s from Sao Paolo, Brazil.  I speak a little Portuguese, she speaks a little English, but I explain I need to practice my French, so we walk on and chat in that language.  She is going to the castle as well and we have a very pleasant conversation as we visit there.  I don’t understand everything that’s said, but enough to get by, and I’m pleased she can understand my probably horrible accent.  All too soon, we bid each other enchanté and part ways.  My family and I have to catch the train.

Soon, we’re back in Haute Nendaz, have a nice dinner, and go to bed.  I’m starting to feel like I have a low-grade temperature, a lingering irritation in my sinuses, and very tired.  I figure I’m coming down with a cold as the symptoms are so minimal.

As I fall asleep, I think of Waldo and how much he would have liked the walk down the promenade next to the lake.  He’s fine, but I really wish I could have brought him here with me.

But at least I don’t have to explain to him about my trying to cheat with the other dogs I met today.

In the dungeon of Chateau de Chillion. I must have been here before — there’s a plaque that says so!

The trail, next to a bisse, meandering through the forest.

In every walk with nature, one receives far more than he seeks.

-John Muir

This morning, I awake, dress and meet Bill and Ted in La Brioche, a boulangerie (bakery) across the street from my studio.  It’s small and cozy and has a welcoming and gentil (kindly) atmosphere.  The French (and this part of Switzerland) believe in l’art de vivre, or the art of living.  They choose to skillfully craft their experiences, including those of eating and drinking.  It is no wonder that the origin of the word gourmand is French.  The result is very tasty food and excellent beverages, including, of course, the local wine.  I don’t usually drink wine at home, but here, I relish it.  At La Brioche, I have a cappuccino and a tarte au framboise (a raspberry tarte).  Man, it’s a good thing I’m only spending a week here.  If I spent much more, I’d go home weighing a ton.

Afterwards, we walk to the tourist office where we are scheduled to take a bus to Veysonnaz, a small village not far away.  At the tourist office, we meet up with Luda, a retired colleague of my brother’s.  She was born in the Ukraine, but now lives in Houston.  Both Luda and my brother are retired geophysicists who used to work in oil exploration and bought property in Haute Nendaz when that was possible (Americans can no longer buy property here, although they can keep it if they bought it before it became illegal).  She is energetic, very friendly and will make a good companion for this morning’s trek – a local hike through the mountains.

It’s a short ride to Veysonnaz and the bus leaves us close to the beginning of a well-manicured trail that follows les bisses.  Switzerland used to have a lot of two things, high mountains and glaciers.  They still have the former, but global warming has cut deeply into their supply of the latter.  There is still enough water, though, flowing down from the heights, to provide hydroelectric power and the life-giving fluid necessary to grow crops and animals.  They’ve built reservoirs up high and one of the ways they bring the water down to where it’s needed is through long troughs, about three or four feet wide and three or four feet deep, made up of stone, cement, and other materials.  These troughs they call bisses and they run nearly horizontally, traversing the steep slopes of the Alps laterally.  Along the way, sluice gates can be opened to allow the water to flow down to where it is needed.  Because the bisses are nearly horizontal, the water flows vigorously, though not overly rapidly.

Trails exist alongside the bisses to maintain them and a volunteer community has arisen to keep them in good order for those, like us, who enjoy walking on them.  We are walking opposite to the flow of water, so we must be going uphill, but the grade is so gentle, it’s hardly noticeable.  Even for us old(er) folks.  The bisses and the trails wind around the steep slopes through dense forest and, in places, flatter open pastureland.  Just like New England, many of the trees are white pine.  Unlike home, there are very large trees, probably over a hundred years old, and remind me of the Black Forest in Germany and Grimm’s Fairy Tales.  The temperature is in the eighties, but it is much cooler in the shade of all these trees.  Add to that the friendly people we pass (most of whom speak English) and the beautiful vistas out over the Rhone Valley and you get a very pleasant hike.  If only Waldo could be with us.  And look at all those sticks!

Along the way we talk about all manner of things, including the Ukraine war, of course.  But we don’t spend too much time on that topic, Luda still has family there and I think she finds it difficult to think about it.  She’s been on this hike before and points out landmarks along the way, like the small village of Verrey, just a few yards uphill from our path, and tells us that it has only been the past ten years or so that they’ve had electricity.  I could do that.  I have done that for short periods of time.

Our hike takes us to Planchouet, another alpine village, about seven and a half miles from Veysonnaz.  There, we have a nice late lunch.  I have a croûte de fromage avec jambon et oignons (cheese on toast with ham and onions) and a local beer.  Délicieux!

After lunch, we catch another bus and go back to Haute Nendaz.  The trail continues on and ends up right outside my front door, but it is a couple of miles further and I’m feeling a little tired and my back is starting to hurt.  My mucus membranes are a little raw too, but I decide that’s because I must be coming down with a cold.  At any rate, we get back home and, after eating a wonderful dinner of grilled rabbit, prepared by Ted, I go off to bed, feeling like I’ve earned the right to sleep this night.

I get texts that tell me that Waldo is doing okay, but, damn, if only Waldo were here,  sharing this day!

Watch where you’re going, Ted! You’re on a cliff face!

Kids playing in the water fountain on a warm day in Martigny.

The animal kingdom is destined by nature to serve, and that service is fulfilled in alleviating the temporal and physical needs of man…

-Saint Bernard

The next morning, I awake with the sun just peeking over the serrated mountain ridge across the valley.  It shines over the middle of my balcony, through the large window and glass door, directly onto my bed and in my eyes.  Misty clouds hang around the jagged peaks and the early morning light glints off the meandering Rhone River as it winds its way through Sion.  The air is still and cool, enticing me to go for a hike along the steep, but walkable, slopes.  Birds sing tunes unfamiliar to me and the smell of dewy grass, white pine and green shrubbery tickles at my nose.  What a glorious morning greeting in the midst of the Alps!  If Waldo were here, we would be out roaming around, looking for sticks.  (I want to check on him, but it’s too early.  There’s a six-hour time difference between here and Massachusetts, so I’ll have to wait until at least 2 PM).  It’s so early, and I am still tired from my journey, so I decide to go back to sleep for a bit.  I pull the curtains to get the light out of my eyes and I’m soon, once again, unconscious.

Reawakening at about 9 AM, I walk up the hill to Chez Michele.  My luggage indeed showed up last night, but not until around 1:30 AM.  After a cup of coffee and a croissant, Bill, Michele (his wife), Ted, William and I take the bus to Sion and catch the train to Martigny, a village at the mouth of the Rhone Valley.  The plan is to visit the Saint Bernard Museum there, and maybe, pet the puppies.  In the past, Martigny was a starting point for pilgrims to cross over the Alps to get to Italy.  Some 20,000 people a year hiked over a high pass, two-thirds of them in the winter.  Needless to say, many trekkers got into significant trouble and some monks founded a hospice near the summit to care for them.  Dogs were bred, the Saint Bernard, to help them rescue the travelers when they were in need.  It’s a myth that they carried kegs of wine or brandy around their necks, but sometimes they did carry milk from cowsheds.  One dog, named Barry, saved over forty people during his lifetime and is still a remembered hero in the area.

The museum is housed in a building on the edge of town.  They still breed and raise the dogs whose ancestors saved so many.  Unfortunately, since Covid, they don’t let visitors pet the puppies any longer, but you can still see them lolling about in the shade, trying to get out of the heat.  The temperature is about eighty degrees or so, but with all that fur, it must be hard to stay cool.   The museum also has artifacts and pictures of what the trek was like when the pilgrimage was still popular.  Now, of course, there are trains, roads and tunnels that pass through the Alps to Italy.

Also in the town are Roman ruins, including a bath and a small colosseum.  Martigny housed a Roman settlement (Octodurum) from the first century BCE until the fifth century CE.  What’s left are structures that are recognizable, although a mere shadow of what they once were, and stabilized so one can wander through them safely.  I walk through the entrance to the colosseum and, once in the middle of the arena, have the strongest urge to shout, “Where are the lions?  Bring ‘em on!”, but there is no audience to appreciate it, so I demur.

The town of Martigny itself has quiet cobblestone streets and a twelfth century church.  There are open plazas sporting artful water fountains that kids play in and many a nice café.  I had a cappuccino and then go searching for some local brandy.  We visit a distillery outlet, but all they have is apricot brandy, Abricotine (fruit brandy they call eau de vie or water of life).  The stuff is good, for sure, but I’ve already tried some and I’m looking for something different to bring home.  In addition to the ubiquitous grape, apricots can be found everywhere in the valley.  Abricotine is a local specialty.

Our tour done, we returned to the train, and then the bus, and got back to Haute Nendaz at about 8 PM.  Not at all a late hour for French dinner, but I am hungry.  We go out to a local restaurant where I enjoy a fine meal and a glass of Gamay vin rouge.  A long day, lots of walking and interesting things to experience.  A quick text tells me Waldo is doing fine and I’m off to bed.

Waldo would have loved all the walking and meeting all the people, for sure.

Brother Bill in front to a 12th century church.

The Alps, in the distance, Sion and the Rhone Valley, as seen from the bus, winding its way up to Haute Nendaz.

Roads were made for journeys, not destinations.

-Confucius

And so, I’m now in Switzerland.  Switzerland is a land-locked country in the midst of high mountain peaks – the Alps.  It is bordered by France in the west, Germany in the north, Austria and Lichtenstein in the east and Italy in the south.  It has four official languages, German, French, Italian and Romansh.  The raison d’être for its existence comes with a long and varied history and prehistory.  There is evidence of people living in the area for centuries before the Romans invaded.  The local tribes, celts, were known by the Romans as the Helvetii, a name that persists into today (Swiss money is referred to as CHF – Confoederatio Helvetica Franc) and the Romans occupied the area for a time.  The mountains and valleys of Switzerland saw military conflict with the French, Germans, Italians and the Holy Roman Empire.

In 1291 an alliance of cantons was formed against the Hapsburg dynasty.  Allegiances flowed back and forth and finally, in 1815, at the Conference of Vienna, the European powers agreed to permanent neutrality for Switzerland – something that France, Italy, Austro-Hungary and Germany would benefit from.  They have remained neutral since.

In 1848, the modern state of Switzerland was founded.  Today, it has the second largest GDP per capita in the world.  Its major industries are banking and finance, chemicals and pharmaceuticals, mechanical/electrical engineering and metals.

As the train (electric) skirts around the north shore of Lake Geneva, and then up the Rhone River Valley to Sion, I see tall mountains on both sides – the Alps.  Some still have significant snow and ice on their peaks.  In the valley, the ground is tilled and, it seems to me, mostly covered by vineyards.  The Swiss do love their wine — as do I.  We pass villages made up of old (nineteenth century and older) traditional stone buildings, well cared for, that suggest a heritage-rich, quaint and calm ambiance.  Being neutral, Switzerland avoided the devastation of two world wars and its history is there to be seen everywhere.  Nowhere, even in Geneva, are there large glass and steel skyscrapers that haunt much of the rest of the twenty-first century world’s large cities.  It feels like I am transported into an ancient, simpler time, but with a few modern conveniences, like buses, cars, trains and planes, embedded for comfort.

We finally arrive in Sion, a small city on the Rhone River, population around 30,000, that spans the valley floor.  White glaciated peaks on each side of the valley rise to around 11,000 feet.  The city streets wind around in no obvious pattern.  There are cars and buses on the streets, but there is no evidence of traffic jams or too many cars.  Gas is a bit more than $8 a gallon, which I’m sure plays a role, but the Swiss also seem to try to keep things the way they have been.  The roads are bordered by pastel-colored buildings of four to five stories high; many are apartment buildings, mixed in amongst commercial buildings.  There’s a McDonald’s across the street from the train station (I find that embarrassing), although why anyone would choose their fare over the traditional Swiss offerings, I can’t guess.  The food and wine here are excellent, better than what we can get in the States, unless you want to pay the exorbitant cost of importation.  Not much of either is exported.

On arrival at the Sion train station, William and I go next door to the bus station.  Our bus doesn’t leave for 45 minutes, so we go to the Grand Café.  I order a café renverse (a cup of coffee with milk) and a small quiche, warmed.  I am quite pleased that my French is understood and I understand what the clerk behind the counter is saying.  All those hours of studying French are paying off!

The bus arrives and we are soon driving over a bridge crossing a very full, muddy Rhone River and then up the steep mountain on a serpentine path.  The city spreads out below us as we ascend and the entire Rhone Valley can be seen hemmed in by white topped Alpine peaks.  We climb higher and pass many older chalet-like buildings, some homes, some hotels and restaurants.  The road is narrow, barely wide enough for two cars to pass, with a sharp drop-off on the downhill side.

Our stop is the last one on this route and, after we get off the bus, we climb the hill to the Edelweiss After Ski Bar.  There, William and I meet my brother Bill and William’s father Ted.  After some beer and wine, we walk down to where I pick up keys for the studio apartment I’ve rented for the week, then we’re off to have dinner at Chez Michele, Bill’s chalet, about a half-mile up the hill.  Bill owns the house, but rents it out most of the year.  Haute Nendaz is a ski resort in the winter and there are many apartments to rent there.  We have a delicious dinner prepared by Ted, who is a wonderful chef, and then it’s off to bed.  It’s been almost 24 hours of travel time and I am spent.  I crawl under the duvet and drop off without worrying about my lost baggage.

I do wonder how Waldo is faring, though.

Rooftops of Haute Nendaz, nestled high up in the Alps.