Alps 2020, Day 7: Return via Switzerland

July 5, 2021Leave a comment

We packed up our stuff and left our cosy Italian apartment, sad to be homeward bound. The first part of the drive took us along a road flanked by magnificent, snowy peaks, out of Italy via the Great St Bernard tunnel. We climbed up to it in our little VW Polo hire car, paid the toll and emerged in Switzerland 6km later.

We wound down the equally mountainous road on the other side, marvelling at the Swiss Alps. The roads were wide and smooth and large chalets made up towns and villages, boasting hotels, amenities and ski-related things. We stopped at the Relais-du-St-Bernard, a service station on the edge of a town called Martigny. It was nice to stretch my legs after an hour or so of having to concentrate on the road, rather than the stunning surroundings, but we were amazed (not in a good way) at the price of food at the service station.

The next bit of the drive took us north along flatter ground to Montreaux, a large town on the eastern side of Lake Geneva. We parked on a roadside close to the edge of the lake and got out for a wander. It felt like a well-kept place, with benches, trees, clean pavements and an attractive marina. We walked down to the lake and just stood there for a while, taking in the breathtaking view of the rippling water backed by high, jagged, snow-scattered mountains under a moody sky.

We got back in the car reluctantly and headed to Geneva along the long north side of the lake, bypassing Lausanne and hoping to get there with enough time to drop the hire car off and have a little explore. I’m writing with hindsight and I don’t remember anything notable about the drive, until we got to Geneva.

Our Air BnB and the car drop-off point was near the airport, north west of the city centre. We had quite a long, stressful time finding a petrol station and returning the car. We got to the busy part at what must have been rush hour and Google maps wasn’t being particularly helpful at finding us a petrol station. Angry Swiss drivers exacerbated the situation, so Ryan became a stressed and (sorry) fairly unhelpful passenger while I navigated the difficult-to-understand roads, conscious that there were probably Swiss driving etiquettes to which I was oblivious. Eventually we managed to fill up and return the car to the multi-storey car park drop-off point on time.

Loaded with all our stuff, we set off on foot to find our Air BnB, a very basic, student halls type apartment in a not-particularly-nice area that we’d chosen because it was within walking distance from the airport and relatively cheap (about €60, which was ridiculously expensive compared to our lovely French and Italian accommodation). We dumped our bags and, starving, didn’t bother to change before setting out to find some food.

We’d hoped to see the city centre but were exhausted and hungry from the stressful drive, so we found a bar along a main road within walking distance of the apartment. From memory this part of Geneva wasn’t anything special – I remember wide roads, slightly run-down takeaways, peeling posters and a lot of overhead wires. The bar was lovely though, a proper “local” where nobody spoke a word of English, and the wine went down a treat – as did the complementary cheese savouries and cured meats.

After a couple of drinks we found a restaurant called Da Vinci’s, just down the road. It was too posh for our salopettes and base layers but we didn’t care. For starters Ryan had porto soup, a thin broth made with port and beef stock, which was absolutely nothing to write home about – unless to warn against ever ordering porto soup. I had snails in garlic butter which were chewy but tasted nice. For mains Ryan had pasta carbonara, which was lovely, and I couldn’t resist my favourite treat – prawn cocktail. Afterwards we sat at the bar for some drinks and were pleasantly surprised when the bartender cut into a huge wheel of cheese and handed us complementary snacks, including lots of olives (another favourite).

Eventually we left the bar and went back to the apartment, exhausted and sad that the holiday was nearly over. Our flight was early the next morning and we were up at an unearthly hour, lugging bags to the airport. The bag weighed in a few kilos too heavy (always anxiety-inducing) but luckily we had a friendly baggage attendant, so Ryan put on his heavy mountain boots and we layered up even more, somehow reducing the weight to under the 20kg limit. Everything else was unremarkable; we hung around at the airport for a bit, mournfully watched Switzerland disappear through the plane window, and got picked up early from Bournemouth Airport by Ryan’s brother.

We were lucky to get abroad in 2020, given the pandemic that shocked the world just a month after we set foot in Switzerland. I’m writing 14 months late due to various diversions, so may have missed a few things out, but I’m relieved to finally have finished my Alps blog. Definitely a place to return to, as often as possible. In hindsight, even losing control of the hire car along a steep, icy back road makes a good story. 10/10 an excellent adventure.

Alps 2020, Day 6: Aosta Valley, Italy

June 7, 20212 Comments

I’m writing this a year and four months late, which is quite poor even by my timekeeping standards. A lot has happened since then (global pandemics etc) and other diversions have meant that I’ve neglected my blog terribly, so consider this my effort to catch up.

We woke in our cosy Italian Air BnB, breakfasted on cereal, made coffee on the hob with a saucepan and ladle (no kettles in Italy) and drove off to find somewhere to hike. I can’t remember why we went where we did – maybe we Googled local hiking spots – but after a short drive we ended up parking in a pull-in halfway up the side of a mountainous valley. The weather was kind of grey and snowy, but visibility wasn’t too bad and we loved the remoteness of the location.

We waded through deep snow towards a forest, following what vaguely resembled a path. When we reached the trees it was as if we were transported into a winter fairytale. Dark green firs, pines and spruces towered above us, branches laden with thick snow, and as we got further in the tracks faded and the white ground ahead became pristine. It felt like we were the first people to ever set foot in the forest.

We played around, shaking snow from branches, throwing snowballs, falling over, climbing bits of rock, drinking from a stream and shuffling along the trunk of a fallen tree. It was surreal, like noone else existed. We ate feta and salad sandwiches under the shelter of a rock and, childish impulses satisfied, headed back to the car the same way we came.

I drove cautiously along the winding roads, down the side of the valley and into the town of Aosta. After a brief altercation with an uncooperative, non-English speaking parking meter, we managed to get a ticket and wander round the town. Neither of us had been to Italy before so we found it really interesting.

Aosta is an ancient place which has largely retained its Roman foundations, including thick city walls, an amphitheatre, some old gates and a regular, blocky street plan. On approaching the centre we walked through a couple of stone arches and were bemused by the juxtaposition of thousands-of-years-old architecture with modern, raised walkways and handrails. Despite this contrast the town didn’t feel fragmented or piecemeal in any way – it felt simultaneously old and new, “then” and “now” inextricably woven together and brought to life by a vibrant buzz of people, flags and shop fronts. We weaved along cobbled streets lined by four and five story buildings painted yellow, orange and beige, populated by all kinds of shops and pizza, pasta and gelato places.

We left the buzzing high streets and found the cathedral, a towering neo-classical building fronted by tall white columns topped by intricate carvings of crucifixes, wreaths, figures, books and ornaments. Set back under the large front arch is a wood panelled door surrounded by a colourful display of painted biblical scenes, framed by golden columns and another arch containing delicate statues with painted robes and faces cast upwards. I cant do it justice with few words, so here’s a picture:

We explored the side streets, intrigued by intricate architectural details and the simple, timeless elegance of the place. Snow-scattered, mountainous valley sides rose above rooves and chimneys, giving the town a self-contained, cosy feel, and statues (notably of Neptune, huge trident in hand), arches and an abundance of churches hinted at Aosta’s long, rich history.

We wandered back to the car feeling satisfied with our cultural immersion, only to find some paperwork under the windscreen wipers and a couple of police officers lingering on the street. Hearts sinking, we realised that the road was being closed for the “Fiera di Sant’Orso”, some kind of festival that had been advertised on banners around the town but which we’d paid no attention to, nor had we seen road signs warning of closures (not that we’d have understood them anyway). One of the police officers said something semi-irately in Italian, to which we replied quite uncomprehendingly in English, and she took back the paperwork and let us drive away after a bit of gesturing and what was probably a bit of a telling off.*

A 20-minute drive through the valley took us back to the Air BnB, where we had a camembert snack and researched places to go for dinner. We wanted to try proper Italian pizza and we found a pizzeria called Le Vieux Bourg in a small town called Etroubles, 15 minutes from the apartment. We got there about 7pm, found a tiny shop and picked up a couple of cartons of €2.30 wine (always classy) for later, then waded through snow to get to the restaurant.

I’ve never had pizza like it. It was perfect – a thin, light base, just the right amount of tomato sauce, melty, gooey cheese, perfectly cooked toppings and not greasy at all. I had the “Twin Peaks” (sausage and onion, I think) solely because I liked the name, and Ryan had something meaty. Prices were very reasonable – more than passable wine at €2 a glass – and the waiter was friendly, as well as English-speaking. We had gelato for dessert, which we didn’t need as the pizzas were so big, but we wanted to try it and it was also very good. I can’t emphasise enough how good the pizza was, we still think about it to this day. 10/10 would recommend. I’ll stop now as I’m getting hungry.

I drove us back to the apartment and we spent our last night in Italy drinking cheap wine and trying to get over how good the pizza was. We like Italy.

* We’ve since received a parking fine in the post (14 months later) which we’re contesting. Fun & games.

Alps 2020, Day 5: Chamonix, Italy

June 29, 2020Leave a comment

I’m not much of a stay-in-bed person, but given the previous day’s fiasco I granted Ryan a lie in. It was our last day in France, so we had a morning of admin n chill. After our things were packed into Pierre the Polo we stocked up on food at a supermarket in Les Houches and headed to Chamonix.

Considered the mountaineering capital of the Alps, Chamonix is a lively town full of outdoor shops and bars. High, snowy mountains interspersed with dark pine forest provide an impressive backdrop for the colourful streets, and a statue pointing towards Mont Blanc commemorates Jacques Balmat, the first person to climb the mountain in 1786, and his funder Horace Bénédict de Saussure. I particularly liked a mural depicting balconies and shuttered windows busy with old-fashioned mountaineers, skiiers and locals which was painted on the side of one of the five-storey buildings that line the streets.

We poked around a Decathlon and a North Face shop before doing the standard tat shop run for tourist bits – we picked up sew-on badges, car stickers and a small keyring knife. We went for a wander, backtracked after getting a little lost, fell out with an uncooperative parking machine and left for Italy, reflecting that Chamonix would be a great place to stay on a group holiday.

The Mont Blanc tunnel runs straight through the mountain for 12km and cost us €45. In 1999 there was a terrible fire which killed 35 people, so we were instructed by the tunnel’s own radio station to drive between 50 and 70kph and stay 150m (two road marks) behind the vehicle in front. The thought of driving literally through a mountain was cool, but it was quite a boring 12km and the long strips of lights lining the tunnel made it very samey.

We emerged in the midst of the Italian Alps, whose mysterious summits and low valleys were concealed by thick, snowy fog. The imposing slopes stood in contrast to the comparatively visible, majestic French mountains we’d been surrounded by twenty minutes before. The road wound through and under the mountains (driving in this region involves a lot of tunnels) and we got to our new village, Ayez, in an hour.

We parked in the village car park overlooking the lovely, mountainous Aosta valley and settled into our AirBnB place. We had the ground floor of a rustic house, which was basically one big room containing a kitchen, dining table, double bed, a few bits of furniture and a room-dividing shelving unit full of unidentifiable but functional-looking items. There was a bathroom with a bidet just off the main room, and by the kitchen area there was a door into a really cool stone cave (probably meant for storing wine) with a big map of the Aosta valley on the wall. It had a real timeless, rural feel, with its carved furniture, tiled floor and miscellaneous ornaments.

Our AirBnB host, Sergio, knocked on the door after a while. Sergio spoke about as much English as we spoke Italian, which was none. Once we figured out that he spoke French I managed a conversation about the occupancy form we were required to fill out under Italian law, reassured him that the temperature in the room was fine (he was very concerned) and he went on his merry Italian way.

That evening Ryan cooked his signature dish, the whatever-we-have stir fry, and we spent the evening updating our vlog, poking around the various bits of Italian literature (which ranged from local tourism to a huge volume on 18th century French furniture), drinking thrown-together cocktails and planning the next day. The highlight of the evening was a strangely mesmerising wooden game that I’ve since found is called Tyrolean roulette, which involves rolling little balls at a spinning top in the middle of a round board and keeping a score based on the numbered divots that the ball pings into. It’s the simple things.