A very non Disney day

Left Tuferstwil at about 6.30am today and made the long drive through to the EuropDisney area.  we needed to drop the car outside of Paris and train into the city hence the stop.  We passed a lot of gorgeous little French villages and countryside and have now ended in an 'extreme' smoking part of France with all of Eastern Europe.  There is also the fair share of British on holidays here.   We are staying at Vienna's Dream Castle which is smoke free but around every corner you can smell smoke and walk out the front door and you are engulfed in it.

We checked in and thought to get away from it all we would visit the big outlet shopping centre - big mistake - the place was packed and people just parked everywhere they could - up curbs, on corners, behind other cars..... we gave that a  miss and wandered down to the 'full' price shopping area.

For dinner we ventured into the Disney Village and ate at Planet Hollywood.   My burger was so pink inside it was unedible.... but hey they played LMFAO so we were happy.  We walked around the village and then headed back to our stinky hotel for a good nights sleep.

Wil, Switzerland 25 December 2011

Christmas candle on Trudy & Martins tree

Church near our hotel

Martin, Chris & Trudy

Koji in the playground at our hotel

Koji with Trudy & Martins tree

View from hotel room again

Wil, Switzerland 24 December 2011

Nigel panics with the fire extinguisher as Ralph lights the candles on the tree!!

A Swiss Christmas!

Martin & Nigel & Peroni's

Raclette for dinner!

Trudy & Koji opening presents

The view from our hotel room

Martin, Tommy & Jill playing Wii

Wil, Switzerland 23 December 2011

View of Lutisburg coming down from our hotel

The Rathouse (council) in Wil old town

Post office - Wil

Tommy in the old town of Wil

Old buildings in Wil

More old buildings in Wil

Door of old church

Mum!!!!!!!!!

Merry Christmas!

Well we had some blog time off over Christmas – so here’s the update….

Was awesome to catch up with the Eglauf’s for dinner – they have not changed at all and are still as lovely as ever….

23^rd December we went shopping at the Manor and Co-Op here in Wil and did a bit of Christmas shopping as well as stacked up on all the goodies we could that are native to Switzerland – thing ‘good’ chocolate, paprika chips and Peroni beers for $4.90 for a three pack!!!!

After that we wandered through the old town of Wil – it’s over 400 years old and looks amazing…. And then headed over to the Eglaufs for a catch up and dinner.  Little Jil was there and the boys had a great time playing with her.  

Christmas Eve is the big day in Switzerland and we did a little more shopping before heading over to Trudy and Martin’s.   Family walks are a big thing over here, especially on the weekends, when everyone is out and about walking on the weekends together in all kids of weather.   As Ralph says ‘there’s no such thing as bad weather – just bad clothes’  So we took off in a light snow with Martin leading us up the pathways and roads to the tower that overlooks Wil – there is a webcam at the top of it looking over the town. www.wil.ch

It was a big walk up the stairs to the top of the lookout but we made it – it got a lot colder up top and by the time we were ready to come down we were in a mini blizzard!!  (Well it was snowing more and there was a slight breeze which blew the snow around everywhere).

We had a chat at Trudy’s and then all headed over to Ralph and Heidi’s house for Christmas night.  They live on the next hill with their little girl Jil (5 years).  It was a lovely evening with a big tradition Swiss Raclette dinner (melted cheese and potatoes) – they decided to forego the usual Christmas dinner of SauerKraut and beans for our sake this year.   Lot’s of presents and jokes later and it was 10pm and time to get the kids to bed.   Language is no barrier for kids – they just get on with the playing even without understanding each other.  It was so lovely for them to invite us into their house and give the kids such a different Christmas experience.

Christmas morning we all slept until 9am and dragged ourselves out of bed for breakfast.   We had a long slow morning at the hotel – packing, playing and eating all the goodies we had bought ourselves….. all the drinks, yoghurts etc… sit outside on the window sill – there is no need for a fridge for these things here.

The restaurant attached to our hotel is 1 year older than Australia.   It was built in 1828 completely of wood – we were always on the lookout for escape routes as they had candles burning everywhere throughout!!!   The owners spoke no English so it was a very quick conversation each morning at breakfast….

The place is renown for its children’s playground and is quite the hangout over the summer months….

We then headed to meet Ralph and Heidi and visit Heidi’s family’s farm – we all gathered outside as the kids tried all the playground equipment and pulled off all the ice off the top of the fish pond.  At first glance they looked like they were smashing panes of glass on to the grass but as everyone laughed we realized it was the ice – the fish were still alive in the pond mind you.   All of Heidi’s family came out and we went for a big walk along the walk tracks up through the forest and across the farm areas…. Was lovely.  The kids all played really well – there were 6 of them by this stage – Koji had a little friend called Sarah who was 8 also and had got an iPod touch for Christmas – they spent some time comparing apps!!!

It was around this time that Tom came in holding his eye, which was red and weepy – he had got a poke in the eye during the play…

Dinner was at Trudy and Martins and then we all thought it best to get Toms eye checked out before we head off on the 7 hour drive to France tomorrow.

We said our sad goodbyes to Trudy and then Martin took us up the hospital’s emergency to check Tom’s eye out.   The Dr stuck a coloured slip of paper up under his eyelid and moved it around (Tom later described it as a splinter in his eyeball) and then turned on some fluorescent light on his eye phone and held it up to Tom’s eye – where the ‘stuff’ all turned fluro yellow.  Seems Tom has a tiny laceration on his cornea but should be ok.  They gave him some anesthetic drops and said to see an eye specialist in a few days if it has not cleared up or gets infected.

So goodbyes to Martin and we were headed back to our hotel for our last pack and sleep.

Has been a fantastic little Christmas here – although as always, missed everyone back home a lot too….

 We hope everyone had a very Merry Christmas with all their loved ones.

Wil, Switzerland 22 December 2011

Arosa train station

View from hotel window - getting deeper and deeper

Another view from our hotel window

On the train from Arosa to Chur

And more snow.....

The awesome Swiss Railway

Our 'Zug'

The train was pushing fresh snow away all the way down to Chur

Christmas trees

Another view from the hotel room in Arosa

Don't you just LOVE car hire companies........

OMG It has not stopped snowing – massive snow flakes still dumping down on Arosa – as one man at our hotel said a few days again they were complaining because there was no snow – not they are complaining because there is too much snow!!!  We are so lucky we got the train up to Arosa instead of driving.  The train was pushing through the snow on the way down and the view was incredible!!!

The day started at 2am with Nigel sorting something out at work….. and then Koji joins him for an early start to head for the slopes – there is powder everywhere and half the runs are now closed due to poor visibility and too much snow….. Explosions are going off everywhere through the valley to bring down avalanches from the build up.   They managed one run down and did a hell of a lot of walking as they were stopped from going down runs from yesterday……

AND SO THE GREAT CAR SAGA…….

All packed and trained back to Chur where we had to take on ‘Europcar’ in a big way.   Travelling through Europe we booked a Skoda Yeti – 4WD to be picked up in Brussels for 13 days and dropped back in Paris.   On arrival in Brussels we were told they in fact don’t have a yeti but upgraded us to a Mercedes Benz B180 – aka the door wedge.  Nigel was not happy at the time but we were assured it was a much better deal for no extra cost.   We advised them we were travelling through Switzerland, France, Germany and Belgium – all good they said.   Well after our horrific drive through Europes worst storm in 10 years on the Autobahn down to Switzerland from Germany – Dani & Marc looked at our tyres and said we should not be driving this car in winter in Europe – it has summer tyres.  It is way too dangerous.  They also reminded us if we are in accident in winter on summer tyres we are not covered by insurance -  we pay for absolutely everything.   We tried to talk to Europcar who said we could leave the car at their office in Chur and train up to the mountains to Arosa – so for 4 days we paid for a car hire we could not use – the alternative was to end our booking and make a new booking – extra costs as we were now in Switzerland, and would be hit up with one way fees twice – was going to be around $2,000.  We expressed our concern and disappointment but the girl was very friendly and we were glad she let us park there for free for 4 days and came in especially on a Sunday to meet us to get our keys.   So today before we leave Arosa I ring Europcar to tell them they really need to change the car – if the police saw us we would be put off the road here.  The Swiss office was terrible and said it’s too bad – you got the car in Belgium and they can do nothing.  I spoke to the Brussels office where we got the car and was told we should not have accepted the upgrade – not sure what else we were to do as this was all they could offer us!!!!  The laws are different in Belgium and they don’t need to provide winter tyres (winter and summer tyres over here are as close to life and death as anything can be in this type of weather) – We mentioned that is was snowing just across the border in Germany but it was our fault and there is nothing they can or will do.  I told them if we had an accident and anything happened to the two young children in this car I would sue their arses off (knowing full well they would be covered for that too!!!!)   Thanks guys – great service.   So we get to Chur at lunch time and the two people in the Europcar office have a look at the car and both say they would not drive this car anywhere.  It is way to dangerous.  They said they had a VW Passat for us to change to but upon ringing their supervisor were advised they could only give us the car if we cancelled our contract and started a new one.  So 2 x one way drop off fees of $400 plus a massive cost because we are now booking in Switzerland.  The girl at Europcar in Chur tried to give us every possible discount – to the point that we are in fact working in hotels in Switzerland if anyone asks – and we now have the car but can’t leave Switzerland so need to drop it off at the border and train across to Paris….. to save the $400 one way drop off fee.   The train from Zurich to Paris for all of us now is $311 anyway!!!!

So an extra $1,200 out of pocket now and very, very annoyed with Europcar – the lady in Chur is writing a letter for us as we advised we will try and take it up with Europcar when we get back….. she was on our side.

Anyway – we left Chur at 2.30pm – yes I lost my 1 hour shopping time!!!! – and hit the autobahn.  Nigel felt a lot better in this car BUT the snow was that thick and slushy on the roads all through town that just getting around a round about we had our tyres spinning trying to get traction to move….. 

We stopped at Marche on the highway for lunch (remember in Singapore Mum – upstairs at that shopping centre??) and as we came into lower ground the snow turned to rain and it poured constantly instead of snow.  This cleared the roads up no end and we could get up past 35km per hour.

We made it to Tufterswil (with a ‘T’ not a ‘P’ nigel keeps reminding me), in Lutisburg, Switzerland and have just booked into our hotel – Hotel Rossli Tufterswil.  It’s a decent size hotel and the room is gorgeous – little A-Frame, clean with a bunk bed in a 2^nd little room for the kids.

We are about to meet Trudy and Martin Eglauf for dinner which we are really looking forward to…. And then another good sleep we hope – we have huge pillows now but as per usual – flat as pancakes……. 

Arosa, Switzerland, 21 December 2011

Tommy and Nigel in the gondola on the way up the mountain

At the end of a long day in the 'goats head' restaurant

(we actually got two menus tonight - a 'normal' menu and a 'wild' menu!!)

Tommy chilling with a hot chocolate

Tom pulled an icicle off a drain pipe coming off the house behind and decided to share it with Koji....

Koji sunbathing on the verandah of our room - no sun for a few days though.

Koji shattered at the end of the day

Snow from our hotel window

View from our hotel window

Tommy after his hot chocolate - every time.

Tommy coming down the big slopes

Our last day in Arosa

Decided to sleep in today but everyone had bad sleeps and was lots of bed swapping through the night so still woke tired…. Off to the slopes with two kids and their skis and up to the top of the mountain.

It was STILL snowing today and they say up to a meter by tomorrow so far.  The snow flakes today were as big as your thumb nail and just didn’t stop all day.

It was a whiteout at the top of the mountain but the boys did exceptionally well down the big run to the bottom.  There were lots of stops on the way and a few areas we needed to walk but we all made it down together as a family for the first time ever.  Koji and Nigel continued on for the rest of the day and did another 5 – 6 runs only stopping for lunch (a loaf of bread and a cheese and herb spread) – Koji was stoked with himself again, Tommy has not got the enthusiasm.   Dad did another run after Koji came back down the mountain and then we all decided to go into town for a look around.   It’s a very small village really and not a lot of shops or restaurants – we were looking for a pizzeria for spaghetti’s tonight – we were all pomme fritted out.

We walked and walked in the snow to find every restaurant didn’t open until 6pm – it was about 5pm.   And ended up walked a long way up the hill in the hope of finding something open!  We ended up hailing a cab and decided to stop at one of our favourites – the goat head restaurant….  As if on cue – we were the only one’s there and on the menu – spaghettis!!!  We ate all we could and then made the final ascent to our hotel in the thick snow.

Back in our room for the night and packing for our move tomorrow and on to Wil.  Big sleeps all around I reckon.

Nigel said “I’m sore.”