Guess what, it’s busy again. Philipp from Central Sport got this snap of the queue for the Männlichen cable car this morning.
One look at that was enough to convince me not to bother. The flip side of this of course is that the village makes a lot of money. Val has as many lessons as she wants at the moment. For those who can’t be bothered to queue to get up the hill, there are plenty of other things to do.
Uptown Lights at the Sunstar later.
Emily’s aunt (Adele) and uncle (Stephen) are here. Stephen wants to go skiing, but it’s really busy. Last night in the Sunstar we hatched a plot to get up really early and beat the crowds. 8.15 cable car should do us nicely. It was still pretty dark.
We had a good ski and eventually got the new gondola back up to Männlichen for coffee. Afterwards we skied round to Scheidegg. The sun still hadn’t come over the mountain.
Another coffee at Scheidegg and the sun finally arrived, as did the crowds. But it was a good thrash around the mountain and we reckoned our plan paid off.
Val started work for ski school today, so she was off up the hill very early. I need to do some cleaning and get a few things from the Co-op. I also need to clear the worst of the ice from the path up to the front of our house, but this has to wait until the sun has softened it up a bit.
Val skied back after work and got a couple of snaps. Here’s the VIP area for the Lauberhorn race at Wengernalp.
And the home run as it crosses the meadow at Allmend.
Steve & Colin are playing at the Sunstar later.
Mix together the following ingredients:
Stir that little lot together and you get – crowds! This was entirely predictable, so we went up very early, and we were rewarded with some good skiing.
That new pylon is in exactly the wrong place – Val says she’s been turning on that spot for almost 30 years.
When we came down for lunch the queue for the cable-car was well out of the door.
We had a pretty good snowfall overnight, and today was a mixture of fog and overcast skies. Wengen is pretty much running at maximum capacity now. Ski school busy on the nursery slope.
Each train brings yet more guests, and the retailers along the dorfstrasse try their hardest to relieve them of a few francs as they pass by. These fresh doughnuts are particularly popular.
Fresh snow and a good weather forecast always lifts everyone’s spirits.
Last night we had our traditional Swiss Christmas dinner down at Chalet Bärgarve with Beanie & Sandro and the girls. Sandro’s mum and stepfather were there too. Lots of music.
Christmas jumpers knitted by grandma.
Lots of presents.
Larena has a guitar.
The only slightly formal part of the proceedings is a rendition of ‘Silent Night’, which is an essential part of a Christmas night celebration. Beanie and I played it as a duet on guitar and piano whilst everyone sang.
This morning the sun put in an appearance so we headed over to Winteregg for a ski. The snow was better than I expected but still not great. The views from over there are always lovely though.
Lovely bar picnic in Rocks last night while Colin and Steve provided the entertainment.
Today the sun came out for the first time in a week. Lunch at Allmend. Wengen looking Festive.
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