Valentine's Day in Paris

Since Valentine's Day landed on a Saturday this year, Nate and I thought... where can we go to celebrate it? Of course, the first thing that popped into my head was PARIS! At first, Nate wasn't exactly jumping up and down at that idea, but after he thought about it, he said, "Let's do it!" He was reminded of the saying, "when in Rome," except we were saying "when in Europe, go to Paris while you can!" I was so excited because neither one of us had ever been to "The City of Lights" before, so it was a first for us both.

Valentine's Day arrived and we left first thing in the morning. When we stepped out of our building, it was snowing. Snow doesn't usually stick here in Basel, but it had stuck to everything and it was beautiful. We were sad that it happened on a day we were leaving and I didn't even have a chance to take any pictures because we were to rushed to catch the train, (as usual, because of me) but fortunately, we made it! Once we arrived to Paris, we had to take two underground metros to get to our hotel. I told Nate that when we got above ground we had to look for the Eiffel Tower because I knew how to get to our hotel from there. Well, we didn't have to look far! It was staring us right in the face as soon as we came up the steps!

Nate's face lit up once he saw it... I think he was more excited than me!

I was excited too! The Eiffel Tower is much bigger than we thought... look at how small the people look next to the base of it.
Some American girls took a picture of us... although, it is a little crooked.
Here is a straight one...
After we saw the Eiffel, we went to our hotel room, dumped our luggage and we were off! We took a bus to get us to the historic core, which is where we saw the Notre Dame Cathedral. I like all the old churches I see, but I really think this one is my favorite!

Nate is standing on "Point Zero" which is the center of Paris as it was 2,300 years ago!

Here is another angle of the Notre Dame along the river.

We continued to walk along the river and we saw all sorts of sights. These booths are run by the so-called Left Bank book sellers where you can buy all sorts of second-hand items like books and paintings.

The Louvre Museum and the famous glass pyramid... Don't I look tall here?

It's because I was standing on this! Jake wanted to be in the picture too, but it looks like he was blinded from the sun!

Trying to be artsy... the buildings and fountains surrounding the pyramid were so beautifulThe Carrousel Arc. If you look closely, you can see the Louvre through the Arc.
Going toward the next arc, Arc de Triomphe, we walked through a lovely park along the way. There were open grassy areas, gardens, and ponds with chairs scattered everywhere. This is a nice spot to sit and relax... you can even see the Eiffel Tower to the left.Part of the Arc de Triomphe... Unfortunately, we couldn't go back any further to take a full picture because there was a major round-about road where TWELVE roads connected to it. Yes, twelve.
The triumphal arc honors those who fought for France, particularly during the Napoleonic Wars. On the inside of the arc there are all of the names of generals and wars fought. Underneath is the tomb of the unknown soldier from World War I.
We then took the metro back to our hotel, it came above ground for a split second and I got a quick snapshot of a different side of Paris... the sky rise buildings. I prefer the old buildings, but I thought it was a pretty sight along the river.The Eiffel Tower at duskWe went out to dinner on the quaintest street in Paris, Rue Cler. They even had roses and candles on the tables for Valentine's Day... so romantic! As we ate a delicious meal, Jake was unbelievably good. He even laid down and went to sleep! I think it was all that walking that tired him out!We shared the best creme brulee ever for dessert...
We were so exhausted after a long day of traveling and walking, that we just wanted to go back to the hotel and go to sleep! But we knew we had to take advantage of being there and see the Eiffel Tower at night, especially since we were only a 5 minute walk away. I thought it was an even prettier sight all lit up!
Nate is anxiously awaiting the light show... he's got the video camera ready! And there it is! It's hard to capture all the glimmer in a photo...
We walked around to the other side and found an even prettier view with the fountains in front... have you seen enough pictures of the tower yet?!
Last one... I promise
I asked someone to take this picture and the tower turned out straight!
We left the next morning so that we could relax a little at home and make it to the evening service at church. We were so thankful for such a wonderful weekend... the weather and everything else was just perfect. We hope to return another time, when it's a little warmer and we actually have time to go inside the museums and art galleries. Let us know if you want to come visit and join us!

Skiing in Zermatt and The Majestic Matterhorn

The weekend before I left to go home to the States for Christmas, Nate and I joined some of his co-workers to go for a weekend of skiing in Zermatt... and it was quite an adventure. I have always loved to ski, but I had never had the chance to ski in the Swiss Alps, so when I heard of the opportunity, I told Nate we could not pass it up. Plus, we were going with people who grew up skiing in Zermatt, so we felt comfortable having them there with us on our first Swiss ski trip.

DAY 1

When we got off the train, we stepped into a winter wonderland ... this is the main street in the village.

It is hard to tell from these pictures that I took at night, but this place was straight out of a fairytale. It was so quiet & peaceful, every hotel looked something like this one (below), and there was a fresh blanket of snow on everything... As we walked around, Nate and I said to each other, "Is this place for real?"

Here is a picture of our pedestrian street during the day...

Zermatt does not allow any cars, trucks, or buses... everyone must come in by train. The only thing you'll see are these cute little electric-powered taxis. Nate and I opted to walk everywhere because it's a small enough town, but when we had our ski boots on, that was a work out!

DAY 2

We got up early Saturday morning, got our skis, and hit the slopes! It wasn't crowded and a pretty clear day, so I thought it was pretty smooth sailing from here on out. In this picture, we're riding our first lift. Most of the lifts are enclosed, which is nice because they are so long and it is too cold to be sitting still outside for that long. A few facts about Zermatt: There are 71 lifts, 196 miles of runs, and the longest run is 8 miles!!!

When we rented skis, we told them we were intermediate skiers, but little did we know that an intermediate skier in Switzerland is like an expert in the States! When we started to ski, Nate was falling over the place! I had skied with him before and he didn't fall even once, so I didn't know what was going on. I tried to help him out by giving a few refreshers/pointers, but he did not appreciate that... men! :) He told me that he wasn't falling because he didn't know how to ski, but because his skis were too long! Instead of having a miserable day of Nate falling and me trying to help him up, we decided to go back and get shorter skis. Fortunately, the ski rental place was right at the end of the slope, so we skied right to it. And boy, we were glad we did that, because it made the day SO much more enjoyable for Nate (and me)... he skied a lot better with the right-sized skis!
As you can see, in this picture above, it's snowing! The day that started out clear turned into a small blizzard. At first, it was so beautiful, but we soon realized that it made it very difficult to ski. Also, Nate and I didn't really have all the right gear. Our gloves were too thin and we didn't have goggles... so, our hands were frozen and we couldn't see well. We only had sunglasses which kept fogging up, but if we took them off, the snowflakes would fall in our eyes... and that was quite miserable.

Me, posing before getting on another lift to get to the top...

We had a nice, warm lunch at the top of one of the peaks with part of the PwC group (all the Swiss ones) and then skied with them afterward. They all looked like professional skiers!! I think we were holding them up at times... okay, probably the whole time! We came to a fork in the slope (after we had been skiing for what felt like an eternity) and they wanted to go down the more difficult one, so we went our separate ways to go the easier route, but then we realized that it was closed and we had to go down the difficult slope anyway, but by ourselves!

Here is a picture of one of Nate's co-workers snowboarding... I had to borrow this picture because we skied on a lot of runs like this, but I never got a picture of it. I was too concerned with making sure I didn't fall off the mountain!Just when we thought our day couldn't get anymore interesting, we ran into a sweet American girl who had gotten lost from her husband and she needed our help. It was starting to get dark and she was getting worried, so we let her use our phone. We got to talking... and it turned out that her husband worked for PwC as well and they were in Zermatt with the same group! Here is Nate to the rescue... and fortunately, she found her husband at the end of this slope and he was so glad she was okay!

Despite all the obstacles we came across throughout the day, the skiing part was a blast and we have many things to look back on and laugh at from this day... Look at all the snow on us even after we dusted ourselves off! On Friday night we went to a Tex-Mex restaurant (my favorite!) ... it was delicious. And then on Saturday, we went to a very interesting restaurant where the whole dinner was a surprise. We had absolutely NO idea what we were going to get! The servers asked everyone what they didn't like and then brought out surprise courses. It was all very good except for a raw beef appetizer. Yuck! I forgot to tell them that I don't like raw meat!

DAY 3

Sunday morning, we woke up to a beautiful, sunny day! I prayed that we would have a clear day so that we could see the Matterhorn. Here is a good picture of the town and the stream running through it...

On the other side of this bridge is a view of the most recognizable peak in the world, The Matterhorn! I honestly could not believe it when I saw it. It is simply breath taking...
Me and The Matterhorn... and it was FREEZING outside. I don't think I've ever been that cold in my life!
Since we didn't have time to ski, Nate and I thought we should seize the nice day and at least take a lift up to get closer to the Matterhorn and see the view of the surrounding peaks. Here is the view from the top... you can see the town of Zermatt below and the gondola that we took to the left... it was quite scary!
When you come to this side of the mountain, you can actually ski down to Italy!! Here is the sign with the Italian flag. I guess you have to make sure you have your passport with you!

The Matterhorn from the top. People are skiing right below it and you can do that year round! It looks a lot smaller from up here...
Nate is even taller than it! Not quite. :) The Matterhorn is almost 15,000 feet and Nate is only 6'1"...

We had the gorgeous view as we ate lunch (inside!). There were tables outside, but we were not that brave.
After soaking it in as much as we could, it was time to go back down to catch the train home. We ran into our new friends (the girl who we "rescued" and her husband) and we took pictures of each other.
I always love getting on the train to go home because you can think about the weekend, read, or take a nap! I think we did a little of each. Here are some views from the train ride...
Don't forget... you can click on any of these pictures to see them bigger!