Bonjour de la Suisse: Welcome to Geneva

I'm always happy when good things happen to my friends, and it makes me even happier when that means good things for me! Chica had gotten a rather unexpected nice raise (with back pay) and asked us if we would mind if she came out for visit #2 this year. WOULD WE MIND?!? I was so happy I was ready to do a back flip. Last year when Chica was out we had the some grand adventures and I was thrilled to be spending another crazy summer with her.

She booked her flight and was on her way. We only had solid plans for the first week or so, but I wasn't too worried. The thing about Chica is it really doesn't matter what we are doing, just hanging out or off doing some crazy thing, we always have a great time.

She arrived on a Thursday after a very taxing flight. I wanted to help her get over her jet lag and start her trip off with something fun, so I arranged for us to attend a GoL function called "Glamorous Cocktail Making Evening" - this sounded right up Chica's alley! After dinner outside by the lake, we got gussied up and walked to the nearby bar where we met up with a few other girls (and one brave guy) to learn how to make killer cocktails. One at a time we got our turn to go behind the bar to mix and stir up delicious drinks. Chica got to meet some of my GoL friends and ended up having a fabulous night!

The next day was my birthday! My friend from Germany, Rena, was also having a birthday and we decided celebrate together. That night we met up with our friends at a local bar. Her mom even made German chocolate cake for us to share! Cake really doesn't go with beer, but it was nice to have a cake anyway. :) We partied into the night and those of us who were left decided to head over to a big beach party that was going on across the lake. We met up with even more friends and continued the party there. It was a late night, and Chica was such a trooper fighting her jet lag!

That night we were invited for a wine tasting adventure the very next day! I say adventure because it wasn't your normal wine tasting; this was a "Five Senses" tasting in the Swiss town of Sion. We went with a couple I've known for some time, Keleko and his girlfriend, M (they were also at the murder mystery dinner). I really didn’t know what to expect, but it sounded fun!

We were soon being treated to some of Switzerland’s best wines. There were five stations, each dedicated to a sense, with wine and food samplings. We had a questionnaire form we were to fill out at each station to help teach us a thing or two about what we were eating and drinking. It was so unique. In the end we were given a lesson about blood alcohol and given a breathalyzer test from a local police representative. (Don't worry; we were taking the train back). The surprising thing we learned was if you swish your mouth out with water, your breathalyzer number goes down substantially! Who knew?!?

This was also the first time I got to see Chica's new little travel gadget in action... her new video camera. This little gem would come out quite a bit during her visit (you should ask her to post some of the videos... they are priceless) and captured some great moments I'm still laughing at today!

We were back relatively early, because the next day we were setting out to the UK to meet our friend, Fi. Fi's family is from Scotland and she had been traveling in the UK visiting friends and family for almost a month with her one year old baby, Ro. We were scheduled to meet up with her at Gatwick airport in England (where she was down meeting with her husband's family) and the four of us were to drive to Scotland. That was about all we knew. Again, we really didn't know what to expect, but we were sure that it was going to be a trip to remember! :)