Our Silver wedding anniversary

25 years ago today we caught the train down to Lauterbrunnen to get married in the little registry office. Later that day we had an Anglican service in St Bernard’s church in Wengen. It was snowing hard on 24th March 1992. The weather’s a lot better today.

We’ve had lots of cards and gifts from villagers and visitors alike.

Lovely meal at the Silberhorn. 

And Uptown Lights are playing in Rocks. 

All in all a pretty good day.

Winter and summer all in 12 hours 

It snowed quite a bit last night, and this morning the sun took about an hour to melt it all. Up the hill a storm is raging with lots of lifts closed, so we’ll stay in the village and enjoy the sunshine. Certainly the shops are betting on warm weather – here’s a display of flip-flops outside Alpia Sport.

Higher up the village the flowers are coming up thick and fast. Snowdrops are everywhere, and the Swiss are very fond of daffodils. 

Foggy

Yesterday was foggy and mild, we spent most of the day at home before going to the President’s annual party at the DHO club.

Today was foggy and a bit colder. We decided to venture out. It’s looking distinctly spring-like by our house.

We caught the train down to Lauterbrunnen to have a look around the shops. Obligatory Staubach waterfall picture. 

Back in Wengen the mild temperatures have really taken their toll on our nursery slopes.

It’s raining now and everyone’s praying for snow later tonight. Fingers crossed.

More summer skiing

We had a hard-fought battle with Altitude in the quiz last night. Eventually we won by a single point with some help from Paul & Hayley on the wordles round.

Lovely sunny day today so we popped up to Männlichen. Here’s Val sat at the far end of the Edelweiss bar. We were the only customers. 

It was a similar story on the mountain. Pistes in pretty good condition and not a soul around.

By lunchtime the snow was getting really soft so we descended back to the village to eat. The weather is just like summer.

Pool race

Yesterday’s rain has gone, so today we can enjoy the pool race. Here’s how it works:

Dig a pool about 30 metres long at the bottom of a snow-covered slope. Competitors ski down the hill and try to surf across the pool. Simple. The catch is that the starting point on the hill is lowered a little each time, so crossing the pool gets more and more difficult.

A few pics.

Here’s Hannah.

And a short video.


As you can imagine the nursery slope is a bit of a mess after all this which is why we have the pool race at the end of the season. The whole village turns out to watch.

Rain

Lovely dinner with Hayley & Paul at the Silberhorn last night – thanks guys! This was followed by a lively St Patrick’s evening in Rocks. Sorry, forgot to get any pictures.

It was chucking it down when we woke up this morning. Nothing much to do therefore except get the train to Interlaken with Hayley & Paul who are leaving today. The rain is forecast to continue all night so today’s new arrivals might get a bit soggy in the morning if they go skiing. Good excuse for a lazy day and a ‘full English’ brunch tomorrow.

Last sunny day

..for a while anyway. We had a good ski from Männlichen round to Scheidegg and then around the higher pistes on the Lauberhorn. Paul got this nice shot on Fallboden. 

The pistes softened quickly in the warm sunshine. Back in the village this afternoon the temperature reached 17 degrees C in the shade and double that in the sun. We ate our ice creams in the cool of our living room as it was too hot on the balcony. 

We’ve had lovely weather all week but the first clouds started rolling in from the north this afternoon. Tonight the temperatures will fall dramatically and it looks like we’ll have a wet weekend.