It is still in the 70s in Rome but here it has dipped into the low 60s during the day and into the low 40s at night! Lately, sunlight has been in short supply and as Tom phrased it "It's not even the shortest day of the year yet! - Yuck!".
Though it has gotten a little chillier - this has not stopped us from wandering around and having fun!
On an overcast Sunday we decided to take a drive over to France to a little town called Yvoire...
Yvoire is a small medieval village in the region of Rhone-Alpes in south-eastern France. It is located at the tip of the Leman Peninsula and delimits the two parts of Lake Leman (also refered to as Lake Geneva), the 'petit lac' and the 'grand lac'. It is also claimed to be one of the "most beautiful villages in France". I can definitely agree - it is beautiful almost to the point of looking staged or designed.
It is about an hours drive from our apartment and you pretty much hugged the lake the entire journey. After parking the car we started wandering this lovely little village. We arrived around noon and decided to find a place to eat. We settled on a cute little hotel-restaurant right on the lake where the local boats come in. Little did we know that we were about to have one of the nicest meals we have ever had...
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| Hotel Restaurant du Port |
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| Yvoire - visit by foot (no cars) |
As with all the restaurants on or around the lake their specialty was 'filet de perch' (a small local fish directly from the lake fried in butter and served with a myriad of different sauces). Also on the menu was Foie Gras (one of our favorite dishes). All I can say is that we apologized to our waitress because the meal came with a salad and neither of us touched it - we were too busy swallowing the delicious foie gras and filet de perch. Thank goodness this was a walking town - because after we finished eating we needed to walk a little before getting back in the car!
Well, enough of us being pigs - let's show you a little of the town.
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| The western entrance... |
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| ...and the eastern entrance to Medieval Yvoire! |
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| Cute little shops.... |
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| ... and amazing colors everywhere! |
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| Local pottery, glass & jewelry... |
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| ...and a lovely little harbor! |
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| The welcoming committee! |
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| Everything just perfect! |
This little town/village impressed us so much that we went back the following week. Our friend Stuart is visiting and we just had bring him there!
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| The area around Yvoire... |
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| ...& Suart's Scallops - Yum! |
Another fun thing we did for Stuart's visit is he & I went up to a town called Broc (by Gruyere) to the Callier Chocolate factory and took a Chocolate making class! What fun! We made Chocolate Molten Hearts...
Take a look:
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| Stuart by the Callier Sign! |
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| The Maison Callier! |
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| Our kitchen classroom... |
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| 'Maison Callier' in White Chocolate |
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| A Coco-cow...just amazing! I was just amazed at all the items they had made from Chocolate! |
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| More Chocolate items! |
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| Our teacher Geraldine... |
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| ...& Stuart the Chocolatier! |
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| Stuart's finished product! |
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| ...& my finished product! |
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| Geraldine, Stuart, Me & Sarah - L'Atelier du Chocolat! |
We truly had a wonderful time and ended up coming home with Callier Aprons, the Silicone Chocolate molds we used and 16 Molten Chocolate Hearts - thankfully Tom brought them to work the next day (but not before trying 1 or 2 that night)!
Everything else is going really well -
Stuart is with us through the weekend. Tom is taking tomorrow off and we are taking a drive to Aosta Italy for the day. It is White Truffle season in Italy and we would not want to miss that!
On the home front - my pottery class is going really well! The final baking on two of my double glaze bowls is complete, I am still working on my appetizer plates, my ceramic bread basket is coming along nicely and I have started using scrap clay to make holiday decorations... Lots in the works:
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| Double glazing makes for a great effect... |
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| ...I am very pleased with these two pieces! |
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| Appetizer plates drying... |
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| ... and the Bread Basket is coming along nicely. It now needs to dry before the first baking! |
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| Lastly, some holiday items (trees & stars) Hopefully, I can complete then before the holidays! |
I just wanted to post a little update on our adventures and there you have it!
The snow has started covering the mountains and we are getting ready for a very 'Non-Italian' winter!
Welcome to Switzerland!
I will still sign off by wishing all our friends and family the best of health and much happiness!
We love you all!
Ciao for now...
Ron & Tom
