Early morning greetings from Switzerland

For the first two weeks of our summer holidays we've been almost 100% offline - which is a good thing from time to time - but we're back in France so back online. We met retired friends of ours (school teachers from upstate Pennsylvania) who do a house exchange every year with a Swiss family. The Swiss chalet is up in the mountains, 1,000 meters above the village of Meiringen. Meiringen is known for the Sherlock Holmes story where he dies but then lives. (Perhaps Soap Operas got their crazy ideas from the survival story.) It's also known for the place where meringue was first created, at least by the locals. Whether it's the place or not doesn't matter though because it's superior to the meringue elsewhere as it lacks the excessive sugar of the awful stuff we find in France.

Though I've been to Switzerland many times for work I've never had a chance to see it from a tourist perspective. It's pricey - the rail passes are eye popping - though everything is stunning. The scenery that Mother Nature created is amazing and the Swiss are so tidy and maintain everything so well. Even with the expensive rail tickets we didn't complain much (well, not too much) once we used the system. You can get up and down and around the mountains in a well running, clean system. The walking trails are perfectly groomed and the views in the region were stunning. Above is behind the village where we stayed but is much higher (around 2200 meters, I think) so the parasailers are everywhere. Perfectly fresh air up there, the way it's supposed to be.