Margrit’s breakfast setting was exquisite with thin folded cheese, cheese designed like pieces of broccoli, fine rhubarb jam, and other foods decorated with flowers, basil and mint. The four white sentinels joined us for breakfast along with the sun tempered by the invigorating Swiss chill.
As we ventured out once more, the two ducks quacked and the two dogs barked. Up into the hills once more – what a hill!. We passed a young woman jogger, whom we stopped for directions; like bike riders, joggers seem to be okay with that. I call them in hearing distance which gives them a chance to slow down and remove their ear phones.
We passed an older man who had a cutting machine in the cart he was towing with his motor bike and helped him tie it properly. Four tractors had us leaning into the fence because the machines they pull take up the whole road. They were on their way (now the grass is cut for winter) to either plough the low grass or plant summer crops. It still amazes me how they come up those steep grassy hills without tipping.
I pondered on our daily hill climbs. While it’s tough up the very steep ones, when you come around a corner, you might meet a cool breeze, often not the case in the valleys. The views are different and you can see far into the distance. The eagles or falcons are usually up high too, and the forests they live in. At times we are also relieved when high, because it means we go down for a long time.
I think I’ve said it before but it is easier for me to climb and descend than walk on the flat; I can scare less people with my voice exercises, less people are harassed by my questions and it is so peaceful with very light traffic. The mystery of what’s over the next hill or around the next corner is more acute and you can see the large mountains more clearly.
I got my first electric shot some days ago by climbing a fence that was around our back yard. I know most of them are wired to shock the cows into staying, but didn’t realise it would be outside our little yard. I’ve also unhooked many electrified gates by holding the plastic provided. But this time I was holding two sets of poles and one contacted the fence, yow! and I let the poles fall.
The wonderful Swiss benches have disappeared so we had to succumb to a bus stop today but at least we could stretch out. Our last lap into town through a patchwork of colours: new crops, older flowering ones, grasses and tilled soil look liked a welcoming mat. But we hadn’t booked a bed because bed phone numbers, we didn’t have – no welcome.
The kind shop person sent us to the Kloster, the person we thought was the Kloster woman pointed to the track, the Kloster man saw this and said he was full, he pointed to town where the front yard man pointed to the back yard man, and then the disability driver obviously knew how to talk to someone like me, said it is the person who has things in front that look like they are to go in her garden. He was right.
We are now in a shed across the road (not bad), the shower is down the street half a block in another shed (nice shower), the toilet is back across the main busy village road upstairs in the owners’ place where the wifi is (scary), and the only place to eat is a short walk at the end of town (worth the walk we are told). While the concerns here are not insurmountable, we really, really don’t want to go to the loo tonight.
However, it must be said that our hostess Doris is charming and speaks our language …. and has done our washing!!!!
