All good vacations start ...

... at 3:45 am. It's true that we were eager not to waste a moment of our precious vacation time, but we may have gone a little overboard this time. After a lot of last minute running around the night before, we were roused by the alarm before 4am. We were into a cab at 4:15 and into the air by 6. I guess we could have done it differently, sleeping in and catching a sequence of flights that would have had us in Geneva by late afternoon or early evening instead of noon, but if you had experienced the weather we had the joy of living through in Aberdeen the last few days you could understand our eagerness to depart. I swear that I saw the daffodils getting smaller, trying to suck themselves back down into their bulbs.

We spent a little time stressing on the plane about our connection in Amsterdam, having left ourselves a mere 40 minutes between flights. We almost resigned ourselves to missing the flight as we had to spend more time in Aberdeen de-icing the plane. But our hopes were raised again by the rather odd pre-flight comment from the pilot that we might make up some time because they had planned ahead and "taken on more fuel so that we could fly a little bit faster". We thought we would make it for sure when we arrived in Schiphol and found our connecting gate to be just about 200 yards from our arrival gate. However we soon found we had to run down the entire length of Terminal D, go through customs and security and run back down the terminal, all to end up back where we started. We did make it though. The only unfortunate thing about our second flight was the fact that we had stowed the camera in the overhead bin. The descent into Geneva is one of the most spectacular I have ever seen - including coming down over the Las Vegas strip at night.

I just realized how gauche that last sentence must seem. The beautiful natural scenery of Lake Geneva sitting in a green valley surrounded by the snow capped peaks is really no comparison to the neon garishness of Vegas.

What were our first impressions of Geneva? Expensive.

How did we get that impression? Made the horrible mistake of taking a cab from the airport to our hotel instead of the free (for visitors all public transport is free) train. That impression has been since been backed up multiple times elsewhere in the city - if you plan on coming here you really do have to stop looking at price tags or worrying about "value" or comparing it to other places.

Other impressions? This city is wonderfully ethnic. You see people of every nationality walking around, all off to their own specific national restaurant. Sure, they're incredibly outnumbered by Europeans on ski vacations, but there is still a great international flavour here.

Beautiful. The city is gorgeous. Situated right on the lake with the mountains in the background, there is a postcard everywhere you look. The jet d'eau, a 500 ft fountain in the lake provides a great backdrop. It is also a very flag-happy country, with the white cross flying everywhere, usually beside the Genevan flag with half of the two-headed eagle and a large key.

Another reputation that I think Geneva should have that I was unaware of was that it is really a shopper's paradise. All the prestige brands in watches, jewelry and clothes are all stacked up side by side along the lake. It would be a very easy place to drop a few hundred (thousand) francs if that's your thing. A lot of the stores were closed on Friday for the Easter holidays, but they were bustling again on Saturday morning.

After checking in at the hotel - the Hotel Kipling, a good room at a decent price - we headed out toward the lake. Fiona was in fine photographer mode, capturing all the sights from all the right angles. Meanwhile I was being caught at all the right angles by the glorious sunshine and am now sporting a "tete rouge".

After a croque-monsieur at the lakeside we wandered over to the Old Town. Going up through the narrow, cobble-stoned streets we went to Catedral St.Pierre, a giant Protestant church up on the hill. It's of historical significance since Calvin preached here at the beginning of the Reformation. It's a good thing it had that aspect, because the other thing the Protestants did was strip the church bare and put nothing back. Bare walls, with only a few stained glass windows did not do much to impress. And then we decided to test our legs and climb the tower. The views were amazing. The towers were once used to house fire spotters, people who worked in shifts and looked over the town (and beyond) to ensure that fires could be tackled as they sprung up. They, of course, needed a loo, so one of the towers had a small "toilet" carved into a corner niche. Not sure how the plumbing worked in those days, but I imagine there may have been a warning for people walking below. The neatest feature these days was the stoplight system put in place to regulate the movement up and down the very narrow stairs. Good thing, too, because there was definitely no room for passing.

After the Catedral we walked back down to the Jardin Anglais along the lake. A brief rest was required and taken there because we realized our next destination, The Reformation Memorial Wall, was back up the hill, just a few hundred yards from where we were. The Wall was impressive, although I'm not sure that Calvin, Knox and Cromwell would have approved of the hundreds of teenagers milling about, skateboarding and smoking the wacky-tabaccy. Or maybe Geneva is spawning a new schism of Slacker Protestants. Who knows - we were uncomfortable so we didn't stay long.

The long day was starting to catch up with us and we knew there was no way we would be able to stay up until a respectable European dinner hour. So we put on our best "who cares" attitude and walked into a restaurant we had seen on our journey - Au Pied de Cochon. At 5pm! Shock and horror.

Actually it turned out to be fabulous. We were the only ones in the restaurant. The service was efficient and non-judgemental. The food was - well it's hard to put into words. It was exactly what we were looking for. An asparagus and smoked salmon gratin, followed by Lake Geneva perch fillets for me - a goat's cheese salad followed by a mango-chutney stuffed chicken breast for Fiona. A trio of creme brulees for dessert. All with a bottle of the local grape (Gamnay), which we've become quite attached to. We walked back to the hotel (passing a restaurant that I'm sure was made for my brother in law) and made it just in time to fall into bed.

Saturday had one major event - pick up the rental car. This had us a little worried because there are always a million things that can go wrong. There were a couple of speed bumps, but in the end the good people at Hertz managed to get us into a nice little Peugot estate wagon, diesel, with a some guts under the hood. I'm looking forward to taking it over the mountain passes tomorrow.

We went back into the Old Town this afternoon to do grab some essentials, and once we had our pile of Swiss chocolates and a belly full of lunch we came back to the hotel, where we are now, relaxing and thinking about a fondue dinner tonight.

We'll have to bring it to a close now and upload pictures in a bit. Our computer is out of juice and our power adapters don't work in Switzerland.