Geneva

I have returned to to our adventure in Paris and I will be updating the blog on a regular basis once again. I was on the ground for less than a day before we were on a train heading to Geneva Switzerland. Lori had to go for work, so it was the perfect opportunity to turn it into a weekend getaway.

Lori was in Geneva a few years ago, once again on business, so she was the local expert this time. Geneva is beautiful and is the cleanest European city I have ever been in. It is definitely not a party town like Brussels. It's very quiet and reserved. Of course beauty, cleanliness and safety comes at a price, Geneva is also one of the most expensive cities in the world.

On Sunday, we took a boat tour of Lake Geneva. The lake is 45 miles long and about 9 miles wide. It has been home to quite a few celebrities over the years. Lord Byron, Charlie Chaplin and Freddie Mercury to name a few. For fans of Classic Rock, like myself, this is the body of water that Deep Purple was referring to in their hit "Smoke on the Water". The fire that caused the smoke was in Montruex, which is at the opposite end of the lake.

One of the highlights in the Geneva harbour is the Jet d'Eau or Water Jet. It's a fountain that shoots 132 gallons water per second over 450 feet in the air. It is quite spectacular.

Being sailors, we were very happy to see so many sailboats on the water. I'm not exactly sure how many of the larger boats made it to an inland lake though.

There were a few quaint cottages on the shore as well.

On our way back to Geneva, we had a spectacular view of Mont Blanc, which is the highest peak in Europe. The mountain is actually in France. The lake itself straddles the Switzerland-France border.

As always, we ate very well while in Geneva. It is a hard statement to qualify, but I may have had to greatest chocolate ice cream I have ever eaten in my life. It was certainly the creamiest ice cream in the world. I have no pictures of it because it was gone before I could get the camera out. Tomorrow I will tell you about our Charbonnade meal. It was really good.


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