Photo Hunt - Creamy

This weeks Photohunt Theme is Creamy

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I had to get the definition out to see what I could do. Creamy, containing cream.


I love homemade apple pie with whipped cream, especially when we are guests in Switzerland! This was from my last trip in March 2008. Talk about being spoiled!

Photo Hunt - Protection

This weeks Photohunt Theme is Protect (ion)

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This weeks photo hunt was an easy one for me. I wanted to date back in history from where I lived in Montreux and remind people of the Castle of Chillon, especially during the Savoy period* of rule and Bernese period* of protection.

Here are three photos of the castle during our last visit in 2005.

Chateau Chillon as it is known was built on a rocky island . The castle served as natural protection and a strategic location to control the passage between northern and southern Europe.

The beauty of the fortress today.

The upper area served for guards to protect themselves and watch over the Castle.

During the The Savoy period from the 12th century to 1536, the Castle was known as the House of Savoy and controlled the route along the shores of Lake Geneva.


While in the The Bernese period from 1536 until 1798, the Bernese Swiss conquered the Pays de Vaud and occupied Chillon in 1536. The castle retained it's role as a fortress, arsenal and prison for over 260 years.

Happy Hunting - We are off for Vacation in sunny California with very limited internet access.

** Thanks everyone for all of the great comments. I'm reading but don't have enough time to visit. All of the comments are so wonderful though!**

Cheapest Places to Live

A 2008 cost of living survey by Credit Suisse just came out in Switzerland. The survey identifies the cheapest places to live in Switzerland. Yes I know there really isn't a cheap place to live in Switzerland but it's a rather interesting report.

So were are Switzerland's cheapest place to live? The cheapest places to live do vary greatly from one Canton to the next, but there is a clear winner this year.

The survey gave a hypothetical example of a family with two children and a gross income of SFr156,600 ($133,000 ) living in a bought home. The report calculates that such a family would have SFr36,800 left over from taxes and fixed costs in the community of Bettingen, canton Basel City, but SFr61,400 if it lived in Rheinfelden, canton Aargau.

COST OF LIVING SURVEY 2008

The Credit Suisse 2008 cost of living survey ranked the 26 cantons by measuring the disposable income of inhabitants: (The last survey was taken in 2006, and is shown below.)

1. Appenzell Inner Rhodes (first place in 2006)
2. Obwalden (7)
3. Glarus (4)
4. Thurgau (8)
5. Appenzell Outer Rhodes (6)
6. Schwyz (2)
7. Solothurn (16)
8. Schaffhausen (13)
9. Nidwalden (3)
10. Jura (15)
11. Uri (10)
12. Graubünden (11)
13. St Gallen (14)
14. Aargau (12)
15. Valais (9)
16. Fribourg (18)
17. Lucerne (19)
18. Zug (5)
19. Ticino (17)
20. Bern (21)
21. Neuchatel (22)
22. Zurich (20)
23. Basel Country (24)
24. Vaud (23)
25. Basel City (25)
26. Geneva (26)

One Year Ago

One June 5th, 2007 I became a landed immigrant of Canada - nearly 4.5 years after deciding that was what I was going to do...

Immigration definitely was not a short journey as I look back to January of 2006 in my post about immigration and already a good 4 months into my application at that time.

It's been 4 years since I've left Switzerland.

4 years since I've been back in North America and not a day has gone by that I wished I could move back to my previous dwelling a la Suisse.

And 3 years and counting since I started this blog and planning my first trip with P to Switzerland.

And so I figured why not put a photo up from 4 years ago, only one month after returning from Switzerland.

Expat's View From Paradise

Interlaken
Originally uploaded by thnkfst

I’ve been tagged again by Renny and of course flattered. I have returned the tagging favor since it supports the theme of this blog about Switzerland and photography and my expat life.

I couldn't figure out how to do a snap shot view on my Mac (It's just different to save.), so I figured a photo of my
‘My Desk Top Free View’ was the next best thing.

So here I have grab captured my desktop and I would say it fits the theme quite well.

I took this photo while on Vacation in Switzerland in August 2005. The photo is overlooking the entire Interlaken area and lake below. That tiny spot is a gigantic bee flying straight in front of us.

We had been hiking all morning long and were so happy to have been dragged along to experience such culture, views and knowledge from a local friend who lives in the area.

Talk about Paradise - and so yes that is my Desk Top View too..

If anyone would like to share what their desktop view is, please feel free to let me know you have participated in the comments.

Montreux Jazz Festival

A new update for the 2007 Montreux Jazz festival has been announced and it makes me so excited inside. Too bad we won't be planning a trip there to see all the great bands. And for my tastes there are many!

Here's the list of some of the musicians attending. I also read Nora Jones will be there. My picks would be Faithless, Foreigner, George Benson and maybe a few more. P would be looking at Faithless and Pat Metheny for sure. But when tickets start at 99CHF, it really makes you think again...

Faithless
The Chemical Brothers
The Beastie Boys
Placebo
Motörhead
Tori Amos
Ismael Lo
Youssou N'dour
Chick Corea
George Benson
Al Jarreau
Jeff Beck
Rickie Lee Jones
Van Morrison
Pet Shop Boys
Solomon Burke
Seal
Jimmy Cliff
The B-52s
Pat Metheny
Lambchop
Maria Bethânia
Foreigner
Roger Hodgson
Wu-Tang Clan

The jazz festival is also scaling back acts and not including the casino as one of the featured venues. Read more about the Montreux Jazz Festival from Swiss Info..

Hiking at Lac Tannay

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This weeks Photo Hunt Theme is Hobby.

I wanted to look up a list of hobbies according to wikipedia because I was having trouble finding something different than what this blog is about: Photography, travels, all things outdoors and life. I decided to pick a photo from an Outdoor nature activity where we hiked up a large hill up to Lac Tanny, Switzerland. The actual location is basically on the other side of the mountains of Montreux, very close to the French border. The reward from the hike was an incredible view, blue skies and some lunch.

Here's the beautiful hiking trek which is definitely a hobby of mine.

And the view..

If you were to look over those hills, you'd see Montreux and Lake Geneva/Lac Leman.

Feeling Thirsty

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This weeks Photo Hunt Theme is Thristy.

I'm sure I will find many beautiful fountains which are said to be great places to drink the water especially when you are thirsty, but the found in Ouchy, Switzerland was the only one I came across. Switzerland is known for it's variety of fountains and wonderful drinking water. The water is so pure and tastes to me exactly like the bottled Evian, which is about 50km's away from Montreux.

The inscription says A souvenir for the academy of Ouchy. I'm not totally sure how you are supposed to interpret it with donkey's drinking water. This photo was taken in August 2005 while P was on his first trip with me to Switzerland.

Classic Montreux Architecture

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This weeks Photo Hunt Theme is Architecture.

Since Montreux, Switzerland has a very special place in my heart, I thought I'd try and give you a bit of detail behind some of the incredible architecture within the city.

Copyright Jen Schilling 2003 - do not use this photo without permission

The period known as La Belle Époque (literally meaning the beautiful era) left it's mark on the Swiss Riviera. This entire region expands from Villeneuve to Vevey, Switzerland. Montreux of course is in the center of all of this beautiful architecture. I believe it's also known as the Grand or Swiss Riviera with magnificient hotels, town houses and villas layered beautifully among neighbouring resorts which align the waterfront of Montreux and Vevey.

The period of time when this 'Belle Époque' boom occurred was from the late 19th century and lasted until World War I. The Belle Époque was considered a golden time of beauty, innovation, and peace between France and its European neighbors.

New inventions made life easier at all social levels, the cultural scene thrived, cabaret, cancan, and the cinema were born, and art took new forms with Impressionism and Art Nouveau. Art and architecture in the style of this era in other nations is also sometimes called "Belle Époque" style. All of this beauty can easily be found within these cities.

Today Montreux is much like it was during the Belle Epoque. Montreux is a city for children and families, wanderers and dreamers. It's a city to relax in with a great book and to enjoy million dollar views. In comparison to my home now in Canada, only West Vancouver can be compared. However, Montreux still has the small city feel with all shops within walking distance of your house. Something a bit too distant in the West Vancouver community. To me, it's the perfect place to retire and enjoy the sunsets and thunderstorms which create the Swiss Riviera.

Please have a look at this building, the most grand hotel existing in Montreux, the Montreux Palace. It's not the same as in the above photo yet the architecture is the same. The architecture I was told comes from a British influence from the 1200's. It's beauty is still found throughout these lovely cities.

If you ever consider traveling to Montreux, don't just visit the city center itself. Take the train to Montreux and visit Glion, the local train and the vineyards above Montreux. There is so much to see from above where the beauty becomes a fairy tale and the beauty never ends.

Switzerland by Rail is the best way to get around the area as you are also able to use the GoldenPass Services such as the chocolate train to Gruyere which includes going up to Les Avants and through the Roches de Naye.

Rigi Mountain near Arth-Goldau

Rigi Mountain near Arth-Goldau
Originally uploaded by thnkfst.

There are hiking routes throughout the Rigi mountain range. Most of the routes start at Rigi-Kaltbad or Rigi-Klosterli. One of the stops is accessible from the part you see in this picture.

Once at the summit you have a birds eye view of Luzern and the Vierwaldstattersee and Zug and the Zugersee on the other.

It's most known for the sunrise over the alps.

Traveling Switzerland

While traveling to Switzerland, the Language is one of the most fascinating around.

There are actually 4 official languages in Switzerland.

German is spoken by about 64 percent of the population.

French only is spoken in about 19 percent, mostly the regions of Canton Vaud, Valais, Geneve and Biel, Fribourg, Jura, and Neuchâtel.

Italien is spoken mostly in the south in Tincino at about 7 percent.

The fourth national language is Romansh and is only spoken by less than 1 percent of the population in the area of the Grisons, canton of Graubünden, which is mostly extending from the areas past Chur moving towards Davos and over towards St. Moritz. Romanish is the language the Swiss are trying to preserve since it is a dying dialect and quite hard to come across if you are just a tourist.

In a majority of the cantons the most commonly spoken language is Schwyzertütsch, known to most as Swiss German. Swiss German is an Allemanic dialect of German differing vastly from both written German and other German dialects. It's so different that it basically is known by the Swiss as an additional language.

Interestingly enough all newspapers and magazines are written in standard German, so travelers don't have to worry about not being able to understand Swiss German. I tend to think of Swiss German as a dialect with a lot of French words in it. However, Swiss German is so complex that the dialect differs from one Canton to the next. It differs enough that a local can probably tell you which region of Switzerland you are from!

German is the language of many theater, motion picture, and television productions. In all, Swiss German is by far the most popular. You will find most Swiss able to speak High German because this is the language studied in schools. You will find the areas of Basel and Canton Bern/Biel and Fribourg to be the most popular area to find French, English and Swiss German spoken....

Fasnacht

Tis that time of the year for the best party around. If you have never seen Fasnacht or Carnival in Switzerland, it is a must see. I've had the pleasure of seeing it in many different cities. The funniest thing is that it you can party in one Fasnacht one week and then jet off to the next village for the next Carnival/Fasnacht.

Here's a short blurb about what happens in Basel - according to everyone, by far the best! I used to live in Basel so yes I've gotten to see this great spectacle.

Fasnacht is like one big family party for the whole of Basel, although guests are obviously more than welcome. It has to be said that our carnival, whose origins are deeply rooted in local tradition, does not give visitors much of an opportunity for active participation in the proceedings.

And there are bound to be many things you simply will not understand: our Basel dialect, the things we make fun of (usually local events and personalities), and our own special brand of humour with its strong irony. Even so, you are sure to be fascinated by the incredible party atmosphere, the vivid colours of the carnival costumes, the stirring tunes of the drummers and piccolo players, and the weird and wonderful «Guggen» music played by the brass bands.

Perhaps you will simply enjoy wandering around our city's lively streets, alleys, bars and restaurants, absorbing this unique mixture of celebration and melancholia, and the haunting enactment of mediaeval ritual: the dance of death (Totentanz) and the masquerade (Mummenschanz). The best way to enjoy things is simply to wander around the streets and go with the flow. And a final tip: don't take our humour too seriously...