So close, yet so far - VEVEY

After three or more snow-free weeks, I finally feel I can safely say... spring has arrived! It's been in the low 60s and upper 50s during the day and the 40s at night... I know to people in Atlanta, this might not sound like spring, but after the snows of the past few months, it certainly feels like it here.

We spent the past Saturday recovering from a particularly grueling jiu jitsu class on Friday night. By Sunday, we were walking again and eager to get out and get some fresh air. We dressed, ate sandwiches and headed to the train station. An hour and 6 minutes later, we were in Vevey, a small town on Lake Geneva.

One of Mr K's coworkers lives in Vevey and was kind enough to walk us around and show us the sites. His drive to work is about 40 minutes, which seems like such a long time after living here for a while and I wondered if it was worth it to live so far from work. About fifteen minutes later, I wasn't wondering anymore - Vevey is gorgeous. We spent a couple hours walking along the lake (with about a thousand other people - it seems that everyone was out to enjoy the weather yesterday!) Mr K and I got a sandwich to split as we walked and he and his coworker both sipped cold beers bought from a lake-side stand. Looking across the lake, you could just make out the snow-covered mountains peeking out of the haze.

Another thing you saw when looking out at the lake was a 25 foot tall fork standing off the shore. The fork was created to celebrate the 10th anniversary of Nestle's food museum and was only supposed to be a temporary piece. It was installed, left for about a year, taken down and given to a cutlery factory. Ten years later, it was reinstalled. This time, a petition was passed to keep the fork and it now appears to have a permanent home in the lake.

In addition to the giant fork, Vevey is home to a camera museum and a game museum - unfortunately we went for our visit on a Sunday and both were closed. We're hoping to go back for another visit in mid-May when our next guests arrive. Near the game museum, our tour guide led us up a tower and through a really really tiny door to get a nice view over the town and the lake.

We walked for a couple more hours and then stopped at our friend's apartment for some coffee and water and food talk. He just got back from a couple weeks in the US and brought back a sack of loot for us - hurrah for new books and dvds and slash-proof camera strap and weirdo little flashlight (guess who requested what.....) As it was time for us to head back to Fribourg, we took one more short walk to see the Nestle corporate headquarters (HUGE) and a last view of the lake. As we walked back, we passed several kids playing on a skateboard ramp with their razor scooters (as some grizzled older "kids" with skateboards sat off to the side and sipped their beers). I marveled at the lack of a guardrail or fence or barrier of any kind between the ramp and the lake - it makes you wonder how many scooters and skateboards "accidentally" end up in the shallow water at the edge of the lake if only to give their owners an excuse to splash in and fish them out....