Anzère

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Today we went skiing in Anzère, a small village about an hour-and-a-half from Lausanne. We picked the relatively small ski area given that it's currently the winter break week for the public Swiss schools in our canton and some of the more popular resort areas were likely packed.

Anzère definitely has a beginner feel to it relative to other Swiss ski areas. This was fine by me given that I'm not the expert skier that Emilie is and can definitely benefit from practicing a bit on some easier terrain.

The weather was nice with mostly sunny skies and high clouds. Given all the cold weather of late, it was nice to finally have some warmer temps.

Here's a picture that I took later in the day looking back on the Rhone Valley (right side of photo) between the Bernese and Pennine Alps.

More Cross Country

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Given the great snow conditions, we decided to head back to Emilie's mom's place this weekend in order to do some more cross-country skiing. We figured we might as well make the most of all the snow while it lasts given that last year was pretty poor on that front and who knows what to expect next year.

On Saturday we decided to take a longer ski route than normal and ended up passing a farmhouse where sled dogs are raised. The fenced area outside the house must have had over 30 dogs and they were going absolutely nuts as it was apparently feeding time. You probably can't see from the picture below, but the doghouses were completely covered in snow so it looked like the dogs had igloos.

Shortly after passing the farmhouse, we heard some barking behind us and it turned out to be another cross-country skier who was taking out four of the sled dogs for a practice run. I wanted to take a picture, but they were too fast and nearly out of sight before I was able to grab my phone.

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On Sunday we went skiing again and were joined by Emilie's mom and sister, who can be seen conquering a difficult hill in the photo below.

It had snowed for much of the night before, which left the a nice layer of powder on the pistes. This made the skiing a bit harder but allowed for more scenic views given the snow-covered trees.

Adelboden

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This weekend Emilie and I went to Adelboden, for the third installment of what has become an annual ski trip. We drove up Saturday morning and, given the continued arctic temperatures, decided to buy a couple of additional items at the ski shop to fend off the cold.

One of the items purchased was a ski mask that fit under your helmet and only left your eyes exposed. As a result, we definitely looked a bit interesting (see picture of Emilie below) but nonetheless were able to stay pretty warm.

The weather was beautiful, though there was a bit of a haze half-way up the mountain. Thanks to the cold weather, there weren't very many people on the slopes.

We stayed at the same hotel as in prior years. For those who have read my prior accounts of our visits to Adelboden, this is the same hotel where we had the nude sauna incident a few years back.

As is customary with our Adelboden visits, we had a nice dinner with viande des Grisons and fondue moitié-moitié. Normally I'm indifferent with respect to fondue, but this time it was excellent.

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The weather was beautiful on Sunday, albeit still freezing. If nothing else, the cold weather definitely kept the crowds away and the snow conditions good.

Bearded Gargoyle

The following picture is from an article about the recent cold weather in Switzerland. It shows a gargoyle from a fountain in Zurich that has grown a bit of facial hair thanks to the cold weather.

Versoix

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The vague de froid has continued and there appears to be no end in sight. To give you a feel for how cold it's been, the following are some pictures that Emilie's sister forwarded to me.

They were taken by someone along the lake in Versoix, which is a town near Geneva on the way to Lausanne. The combination of the strong wind, water from the lake, and bitter cold resulted in some interesting natural forms of "ice art".

I particularly like the ice-covered cars, which don't look like they'll be going anywhere for a while.

The same is probably true for the boats, below.

The edge of the lake was effectively covered in ice.

  

Here are some lakeside benches. The ones in the second photo actually look as though they're pure ice.

The ice-covered trees are also interesting. I particularly like the one in the last photo, which looks a bit like a chandelier.

Freezing in the Jura

This weekend we braved the cold and went to Emilie's mom's for some cross-country skiing. Given the cold, the entire ride felt like we were passing through ghost towns. Absolutely no one was outside and we hardly saw any other cars.

Here's a photo that I took from the car as we were passing by the town of Bellfontaine on our way to ski on Saturday. The landscape in the foreground looked a bit lunar to me with the wind-blown undulations.

The town where we went skiing both days -- Chapelle des Bois -- was equally deserted, with absolutely no one outside.

Thus we weren't overly surprised to find that virtually no one was on the cross-country pistes either. I have to admit, the first 15 minutes or so of skiing each day was a bit painful but after warming up a bit it wasn't that bad. That said, it was way too cold to stop and take any pictures.

Lang Lang

Tonight Emilie and I went to Geneva to see a performance by Lang Lang, a celebrated Chinese concert pianist. And as you likely have already guessed, Emilie was the driving force behind this cultural excursion given my utter lack of knowledge on the classical music front.

Since we needed to leave for the concert directly from work, I took the train to Geneva and met up with Emilie at the concert hall. As such, I had to find my way from the train station to the venue and stupidly decided to opt for the 15 minute walk rather than trying to navigate the distance by public transportation.

In short, the combination of the freezing temperatures (exacerbated by the cold wind coming off the lake) and my bonehead decision to try to navigate by memory, resulted in a miserable and unnecessary 30-minute tour of Geneva. And thanks to my prescient decision to leave my gloves at home, I inflicted additional pain on myself through the borderline frostbite that resulted from my attempts to leverage the (incredibly inprecise) GPS function on my phone to help guide the way.

Given the unexpected delay, I arrived at the venue after the concert had started. This probably worked out for the best, though, as it took a good 20 minutes for me to thaw out and collect myself. Plus, there were TV's in the reception area, so I was at least able to see/hear what I was missing.

After the intermission I joined Emilie at our seats. The balance of the concert was nice, though I don't think that I ever really recovered enough to fully appreciate Lang Lang's performance. Here's the view that we had from our seats.

If you look closely at the photo, you can see that there was a small section of seats on-stage behind the piano. This resulted in one of the more awkward moments of the night, as a few of the people seated there decided to leave (thus walking across the stage) just as Lang Lang was returning for a second encore performance. Fortunately, he had a good attitude and made a joke about it.

Vague de Froid

While the forecast indicated that it was supposed to get colder, I had no idea how cold it was actually going to get (approaching zero Fahrenheit in Lausanne before wind-chill). I can't say for sure that this is the coldest that I've ever been, but I'm sure that it's pretty close.

The vague de froid ("wave of cold"), as it's being referred to across all the local news outlets, is apparently hitting the broader European continent extremely hard. Sadly, this has included a significant number of deaths in some eastern and central European countries.

Given such grave consequences, I feel bad complaining about the relatively minor impact that the cold weather has had on me (most notably the freezing conditions while waiting for the bus home at night). Nonetheless, I have to say that conditions really are brutal. 

Highlighting how far reaching the vague de froid is, here's a photo that I found online of the Piazza del Popolo in Rome covered in snow. I also saw a similar photo of the Collosseum.