Walking to Alp Garfuin

The boys were up early this morning and at the village tennis courts by 8am to play tennis - they have excellent clay courts here. Unfortunately within a few minutes Luke broke the strings on his racquet so they had to wait for a local sports shop to open where he hired a racquet for him to play with. 

Gavin was invited to play in an annual golf tournament hosted by the local gemeinde (council) for second home owners to thank them for their support of the village. Makes me smile that here they welcome people buying holiday homes and yet places like parts of Devon and Cornwall try to prevent this from happening, but it's all a question of numbers of people, this is a sleepy mountain village whereas Cornwall is overrun with tourists in the summer. Luke and Adam also got places to play in the golf tournament but then had to pull out as it would finish too late in the day as they were getting the 2.30pm train back to Zurich to fly home to London today.

So while Gavin was playing golf the rest of us went for a walk up the Monbiel valley, the plan was to have a light lunch at the mountain restaurant at Alp Garfuin and get back in time for them to catch the train. However when we got there it was heaving and there was no where to sit - tomorrow is National Day in Switzerland, a public holiday, so I suppose many people took today off to make it a long weekend and therefore it was so much busier than usual. We had to turn around and walk back without lunch, we got home and the boys packed up and I drove them to the station. I bought them salads and sandwiches from the supermarket which they could eat on the train.

I then went grocery shopping as I am not sure if the supermarket will be open tomorrow. The weather was glorious today but unfortunately for National Day it will be a mix of sun and rain. In the past there was always the most amazing fireworks display on National Day, but a few years ago fireworks displays were banned to save the animals. So tomorrow evening there is a laser display instead, but I think it may be raining.

I took Xena on another walk this afternoon, I was hoping to photograph butterflies - I did see a comma, some meadow browns and a few others.

The flat is quiet with Luke and Adam gone, but we will see them in two Friday's time at the airport when we go to SA.