Bad, Bad, Leukerbad

Yesterday Jed took the day off from work and took us and the kids to the thermal baths in Leukerbad. Helga, his wife, is still traveling for work, and Marcelle, our au pair, is visiting her parents in the Netherlands.

It was a two train, one bus journey to the high mountains of the Valais. Leukerbad is touted as the most voluminous reserves of thermal water in Europe having continued uninterrupted since Roman times. We went to a massive spa center with as many as ten pools of varying temperatures including a huge kiddie pool with a large play structure in it and a lap pool among others.

I went off to swim in the lap pool as I have missed my biweekly swims at the TSR pool. Steve and Jed took the boys to an outdoor pool where the warm mineral water felt gloriously soft within the backdrop of snow covered mountains. The boys played and swam joyously. There was a jetted area and fat pipes pouring water overhead. There was a tunnel leading from indoors to outdoors. There were five floors of pools, most leading to outdoor decks and some to eating places. The elevator showed floors zero-two as well as minus 1 and minus two. There were hundred of lockers divided into groups of 100s. Being Sunday, it was very crowded mostly with Italian tourists. I was the only woman in a one piece bathing suit. There was lots of exposed skin for better or worse.

Auke was in thrall with the high slide in the kiddie pool. He could barely climb up the steps but nothing stopped him. As we stood at the bottom to catch him, he emerged from the water laughing and saying, "again, again"! This child is fearless.

Steve and I are on the fourth day of our marathon babysitting weekend. To paraphrase, "Fatigue, grandparenting is thy name." Friday we picked the boys up from school at 2 pm. and took them to Pully Port. The little train in the park has not started for the season yet but we found much to do in the playground. Several hours later we were back to our house for dinner. Jed took them home about 9 pm. Saturday we were on duty from noon to 7pm. Our neighbor and her child took us to the Tropiquarium where we saw crocodiles, penguins, exotic birds and it had another great playground. Yesterday was Leukerbad and today duty begins again at 2pm but first Jed needs our help at 7:30 am getting them off to school.

Needless to say we sleep very well at night. We have enjoyed our time with the boys and Lausanne has so many places for kids that it will be quite a while till we are bored with the venues. Today we will take them to Ouchy. This area of Lausanne is along the lake. There are many docks for sailboats and a steamboat that stops at several towns along the lake, another great playground.

It is difficult to believe that almost three weeks has passed since we arrived and we are homebound in two days.

Late addendum: After we dropped Tern off at school we thought we would go to the market. I was making soup for dinner and needed a can of chopped tomatoes. There are only two grocery chains in Switzerland. Both carry everything from household items to fresh fruit & veggies. We were at the closest market at 8:15 am. To our surprise it did not open until 9am. We went a couple more blocks to the other market which opened at 8:30. Markets open late and close early, by 6 pm or 7 pm. They are open only a half day on Saturday and not at all on Sunday. The Swiss believe in having a life, even for the grocery clerks.