Last week me and my brother-in-law went hiking in Ticino. Here are some impressions from our wet hike!

Calanca Hike

By the way we have a new address:
Dorfstrasse 40
4452 Itingen
Phone 061 971 35 79 (same)

I am back from my 10 day thaimassage course in the swiss alps. The course went extremely very well and was beyond expectations.

Here are the impressions of my fantastic course!

Yesterday we said bye bye to my Greek friend Takis with family and tomorrow we say hello to Lucinda’s sister and family. Hotel Tanner is very busy this summer…

Here are the photos of Swiss spring!!

Finally the pool is open. The wait is over… Lucinda was there on opening day dot nine o’clock – But some old regulars beat her once more. We do not know how they do it… Think they bribe the pool guy… On Tuesday I had a few hours off, so we had luncheon at the Badi. As you see on the photos we had the pool for ourselves. It cannot get much better than this! Ange and Raph had their swimming tests also on Tuesday and both passed and got their badges (pinguin and crocodile).
On Wednesday Angelino had his first class trip. The whole school went to the Zoo Zürich and had guided tours and looked at many animals behind the scenes. Also on Wednesday the fastest Itingen kid (view last blog).
Today Raphael started his job at Thomas’ farm. He could help cleaning out the goat and donkey poo and ride on the little tractor. He stayed double time than agreed, loved it so much and wants to go back everyday till he is old…

A few weeks back Ange and me joined a guided tour to the biggest cave in the area. For 3 hours we walked, climbed, crawled through the cave. The kids loved it. As it was so interesting I went again next day taking also Raphael to re-do the tour. At one stage we tried to find the exit with no lights. We didn’t get half a meter far. Lucky we had our lights with us which saved our life…

This weekend Lucinda heads to Washington and Boston for a week for business reasons (sounds good). So at the Dorfstrasse 6 we have a boys household once again. We ordered already lots of pizza, booked the movie tickets for Kungfu Panda 2 (Nr. 1 is our all time favourite…) and looking foward to a big party with Goetti Andi…

Hi there. I am back.

When we were landing in Zurich from our Thai beach holidays End of March it was cold, grey, foggy and rainy. We were preparing already for another exhausting cold and rainy spring. But already the next day the friendly weather started. Warm and sunny it was – and since then never changed, just got hotter and hotter, with the occasional day of rain. We talking about a period of more than 2 months! This is unheard of in Switzerland especially for springtime. No rain in April, no rain in May. This weekend they forcasted lost of rain and thunderstorms, but we enjoyed 4 sunny and hot summer days in the local pool, which open much too late last weekend. In Switzerland it is total fireban and it is not even summer yet. For the nature and farmers lots of rain would be much needed. On the other hand it is nice to have one sunny day after the other…

As this is so unusual I had to soke up every little sunray I could get and was too busy doing outdoor stuff, so there was no time to blog… Sorry. And well I finally got an I-pod and needed to get this one started and once you start you don’t stop. A great little gadget – I got Lucinda one, too… So we also part of the apple family.

What happened in Itingen? Lots of work. Lucinda is busy for the University Basel. She was in Ticino this week with a delegation from the US and is flying to Boston for a week next Saturday. I was busy doing my annual Osteopathy exams, which I passed again, teaching a massage course at the red cross for beginners, and working lots in the practice. Over Easter we headed down to Athens, Greece where I was assisting a 10-day Thaimassage for my friend Takis.

Greek Easter was so much fun. It is the most important day of the year for the greeks, so it was very festive with lots of churchbells, fireworks, gunshooting, processions and lambs on the spit (yum!). As our course was strictly vegetarian we talked Takis into inviting us to his parents place to join the family easter roasted lamb and intestine soup, it was a great meal. Back at the course we had a huge vegetarian banquett. On Easter Sunday night I could not move anymore… We finished the Greek time off with 3 days of wandering around the ruins in Athens. Lovely.

And the house we are renting at the moment has been sold finally and we have to move out by mid July. As the flat we intended to rent is not finished with renovations we had to look around again for another place to stay. And out of nowhere a great farm house in the middle of the village with big barn, wine cellar and garden popped up, and we secured it straight away. So from 15th of July our new address is Dorfstrasse 40, 4452 Itingen.

In 3 Weeks the 10-day Thaimassage course I am organising is starting in the Swiss mountains. We have a full house, I am soo excited and hoping for a great course. I am busy organising the last details.

Angelino will start his 2nd schoolyear after the summer holidays. He will start learning an instrument. A few weeks ago we had an info day where the teachers showed all instruments and the kids could have a go. Angelino headed for the drums first, but got a big NO from us. (I must know why … I was druming for 10 years… Still feeling sorry for the nerves of my poor parents and grandparents). He settled for sax, guitar or accordeon. Think he is going for guitar now.

Raphael will start his 2nd kindergarten year. But he wants to start working instead and is looking for a job. He wants to help my friend Thomas the farmer taking care of the goats, donkeys and rabbits. We asked Thomas and he agreed to take him on propation. So Raphael will start next week for a view trial work shifts.

So you see lots is happening here. Oh I forgot: Lucinda’s Mum came for a 2 week Swiss holiday. She loved it so much, she didn’t want to leave. Lucinda’s sister with family will come in 1 month for some summertime fun in Itingen.

And after the big move to the new location we will go on our well earned holidays to Ticino.

Yesterday Angelino came home nearly crying and reported he had a bad day at school and got punished by the teacher to write 2 pages because he chatted during class with the neighbour girl (at least she got 2 pages either!). His first “Zwöi Siite”"… I had a few of them in my schooltime. It brought back a few memories of my schooldays… And I still remember my best buddy Andy. He loved writing the punishments so much, that he always handed in 10 pages instead with very complicated astronomic scientific or how-to-build-a-t-bar-lift essays (Yes I am talking about first year…). I am sure Andy has a few examples stored away in his extended archive…

Just sitting here at the computer and watching the news. The south of Thailand flooded. For 8 days straight it is raining cats and dogs in the south of Thailand and tourists and locals are stuck on the islands, because ferries or planes are out of service… When I think that also we could be stuck right there if we spent our holidays 2 weeks later… But luckily we got back home safely 10 days ago from Thailand and we had a truly amazing holiday.

Ten years ago I met Lucinda doing Tai-Chi at sunrise on a sandy beach on a island in Thailand. To celebrate our 10 years anniversary we decided to head back to where it all started. It felt great to touch down in Asia again after such a long time. (We only had a little taste on our Laos adventure 3 years ago.) Driving into the crazy, loud, stinky, chaotic Downtown of Bangkok it felt like arriving home and was sooo exciting. The first day we didn’t stop exploring and feasting on the many street kitchens trying everything. Lucky our Hotel had a pool so the boys could relax at the poolside in between.

After a few days of travel we arrived at Koh Phayam, a small Island close to the Burmese border. It is a magical place where the tropical jungle meets the sea. We enjoyed a fantastic time exploring the island by foot, boat, bike-taxis (no cars on the island). We saw eagles, snakes, giant geckos, monkeys and the best the fishotters swimming along the beach nippling fish. Of course we spent plenty of time in the water swimming and on the beach building sandcities.As we had sunset view, we enjoyed many sunsets and sunset drinks to celebrate our anniversary… Too soon it was time to say goodbye. But we dediced not to wait another 10 years to go back. We try to go back next year and enjoy this island as long as possible before it goes mainstream (it is starting slowly now.).

So lucky we headed back to Switzerland in time – we missed an earthquake and winterly temperatures in Northern Thailand and now this nonstop rain.

In Switzerland we have summerly hot temperatures already, so we had to put the skies away in the cellar and we are enjoying our flower garden exploding before our eyes.

Here are the photos of our Thailand trip.

We had a fantastic trip to Thailand. It was great to go back to Asia after 3 years of break. It felt like coming home. Above the link with the photos as appetizer. More blog later.

Last Friday Angelino was 7 years old! He was looking so forward to this day for weeks. Lucinda was busy preparing the birthday party for days. He wanted a knights party. So they made arty invitations and Lucinda sewed knights costumes for everyone, baked cakes in shape of shields. The dragon and the treasures the knights had to fight and find, were installed in the woods in the morning. Unfortunately our area is swept by a hug flu wave at the moment… Lucinda got the bug 2 days before and just made the preparations. And even worse, more than half of the invited kids were in bed with the flu and couldn’t come to the party. So there were only a couple of guests arriving. Angelino was very disappointed and said that it didn’t feel like a birthday party. Anyway with Raphael, Lucinda and me joining the party we had lots of fun as knights hunting the dragon and lots of cake to eat for us.. Lucky there was a surprise visit from Lucinda’s friend Sandra who bought a Robin Hood costume, which Angelino’s saved the day. And the lively Family party in the evening made him feel like a birthday boy! We agreed to organise another party in summer when all the friends are back on track.

2 weeks ago the new kids hospital in Basel opened. We wanted to have a look on the open day, but the crowds were so big that we couldn’t get in. I told the boys hopefully we never see it from inside… But yesterday we had the chance to have a look around… Angelino was hit by soaring earpain at 6pm which got worse and worse. After consulting the online doctors we decided to show his ear quickly in the emergency. After 2 painkillers, 3 hours of waiting, a beginning middle-ear infection and a found little object in his ears, was diagnosed and we were released home at midnight. Anyway the painkillers did the job, angelino fell asleep straight away (after vomiting in front of the reception…) and slept through the examination… He felt much better this morning and insisted to go to school.

Just one more last car thing. Lucinda just told me the reason for the buyer to buy the car was the colour of the car. This colour edition is kind of a collector’s item and in big demand. If we would have known that before…

This is funny, because it was the main thing I didn’t like about our car first. Still remembering lying in hospital with broken leg five years ago. Lucinda visited me and told me that we could purchase my good friend Phil’s parents car for a good deal. When I looked out of the hospital window I was speechless when I saw the pink Merc – looking like a drugdealers-pimped car. Anyway with the years I got slowly used to it. And here we go – a collector’s item. And tThe grey leather interior let the collectors heart even beat faster…