Ice climbing and ski touring at La Gouille

Eventually, we managed to get a trip together with Frenchy and Oliver. We've been talking a lot about week end trips, but actually never managed to have one with the 3 of us. Every time, one had a bad excuse to not join...

We went to the remote valley of Arolla, and stayed in the small hamlet La Gouille. First day, ice climbing... Good conditions. Second day, we went for a ski tour. We didn't do what we wanted, and messed a bit around... At one stage, I've heard a bit crack in the snow, which made us turning back... I hate these scary sounds... But the snow on the way down was excellent, which made a very good day at the end!

Oh yeah, and we stayed in a nice "Belgian" B&B. We had the classic mussels&fries for dinner, accompanied by a pint of Chimay beer... not very fine food, but perfect after a day in the cold! Just before we left, there was a small social event, the aim being to burn the Xmas trees... As the tree were wet and snowy, the fire managed to smoke in all the valley! You can see on the last pic how much smoke it was producing.

Pre-Xmas week end in Strasbourg

Here it is, my annual pilgrimage in Strasbourg in the pre-Xmas time, which is a good time to go there to enjoy the famous Christmas markets from Alsace. It is a good excuse as well to visit my sister and Sebastien, with their two babies. Aime, the youngest (2 month old), is still a bit young to enjoy the snow, but Armand really enjoyed it, despite of the cold weather... Indeed, when we visited the market of Obernai with Sebastien and Armand, the thermometer of the car was indicating -20.5 Celsius! Not very serious to bring a 2 years old child... But he survived, so I guess its alright...

Donn* will like this picture!

A pound of chocolate for who guesses what is this picture about! I will answer questions by yes or no.

* sorry Donn, you are not in the game as you know what it is!

Pumpkin fondue

Winter is there, eventually. This means eating reasonably often cheese fondue! Fribourg is very famous for its fondue, and the people here are very proud of it! As it would be the case in New Zealand, where Fribourg would be self-proclaimed the cheese fondue world capital!

Here are a couple of pics of some pumpkin fondue action, and of an happy man! ;o)

New camera test!

A couple of weeks ago, we went again "mushroom" hunting with Donn&Jen, above Montreux. It was a good occasion to try out my new digital camera, a Panasonic Lumix LX3. I still have to learn how to use it properly, but that should come with time, I hope!

Mushroom hunting with Donn

After 3 hours of intensive mushroom hunting, we ended up the day by dipping chanterelles in a cheese fondue... Yummy!

Dry tooling at l'Usine

"L'Usine" comes from the fact there is a large factory just at the bottom of the crag... Quite logical and not terribly original you will tell me (usine = factory in English). No need to say that people don't go there for the wilderness...

So, in a few words, my ass got kicked really hard! Dry tooling is definitely an elitist activity, and one needs to be strong to enjoy it at the most... Hard to say, but I may need some cross-fit trainings to get stronger! I know Travis will appreciate that...

Anyhow, it was still fun to watch the big boys climbing the super steep routes, and the settings where good to take picture... At the end of the day, Etienne brought a generator, and people could keep going on climbing at night. With the lights from the factory&motorway, this had a good feeling of urban climbing.