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G wakes us (and everyone) up early and we discover that he’d come up lame. The tendons in his foot are aching and this is as good a time as any for us to venture out alone. We don’t notice a vital piece of information for many minutes as we bumble around the place. It had snowed during the night and early morning! And wispy fat snowflakes were still falling as we looked on. I shouldn’t have been surprised. When E’s husband and I played the Wii on the second night we were there, the weather report on the Wii had predicted snow, but I take predictions of precipitation with a grain of salt. They’re always a bit flaky.
For breakfast we had the leftover bread and some cheese. Very nice and N,E had always wanted to have that sort of breakfast. I mentioned that fact and she corrected me, saying that some sort of meat was needed to complete her idyllic vision of Euro-breakfast. We got on the train with one destination in mind; Rheinfall! These are the biggest falls in Europe and where I was led to believe that Sherlock Holmes or Professor Moriarty perished. I’ve looked it up now and that dubious honour goes to the Reichenbach Falls, which is in Switzerland and does start with Rei… No h, though…
The further along toward Rheinfall that we went, the less snow there was. Eventually there wasn’t any snow at all. We arrived in Neuhausen, which is the closest stop we could get to the Rheinfall and to Schloss Laufen. This would turn out to be not very close in the end, but at the time we were full of hope. Fresh out of the train, we walk down some stairs and come to a path with two directions. I have a feeling that we should go right, but N,E wants to go left. I have no idea why I would go with the Queen of the Wrong Choice as regards 50-50 choices. When we were doing Amazon DVD rental, I’d hold two DVD’s behind my back and get her to try and choose the one she was thinking of. She never got it right! Over twenty times!
Anyway, as a result. We trekked a half mile up river away from the Rheinfall. It was pretty, though I suppose. We figure out our mistake and head toward the Rheinfall at last. The views on the way were very scenic and there were ducks, swans and other birds, which I had to point out to N,E because she has no inner animal detector. This might be the reason she doesn’t like camping in the wild. She’d have been eaten by a marmot ages ago.
The Rheinfall itself was spectacular, especially when viewed from the Schloss, but I wouldn’t want to even attempt the description of such a beautiful sight. I’ll just provide a link to one of the pictures I took of it. We walked all the way back to the train station and there were some portents of growliness to come. The grouching continued until I was informed that N,E needed a snack or I would be killed. N,E‘s hunger tiger was on the prowl! Run!
Seriously, though she gets low blood sugar and needs a boost, especially after a long walk. So at the next train station I jump out and get some snacks for the journey back. I got some Paprika crisps and Jamaika Rum Chocolate to eat and for me to drink was a delicious pre-packed cold caramel latte. This meager food supply was lucked on with disdain. Snack did not mean snack, I was told. Snack was big with meats, cheeses, breads, desserts, and things. I protested that that was more like “lunch”, but you can‘t really argue language. English is just too strange to believe.
It was getting late in the afternoon and we didn’t want to stick E with our rambunctious child for too long. So, we headed back to Bassersdorf and settled in with a cup of spicy chili tea for N,E and coffee for me, but decaf because I don’t do caffeine after two if I can help it.
Later that evening while tea was being prepared for us, (Thanks, E!) she gave us a drink called Panache, which is lemonade and non-alcoholic beer. It sounds disgusting, but it was very nice! We ate the nicely-spiced chicken before EH got home, because he was working late. When he got in, he complained about the chicken not being so nice re-heated and E said that was what you get for being second level support. N,E called his meal second level chicken. She can be very funny (more later). 🙂 We played Settlers of Cataan that evening and… I WON! I was on a roll and we got banana bread for dessert to top it all off!
Other notable funnies from that evening were: A calender in a magazine where behind each door was some kind of product – N,E called it an Advert Calendar. When searching for some sort of mock-nasty thing to say to EH in German, all she could come up with is you are a table! She sniggered a lot when anyone said “Wood for Sheep” and I do mean a lot!