7. Family and Food. 5/11/22

Greetings

Low key day that began with a slow stroll to meet Julia and Julian and Louis (who had just completed his pony lesson) at the Rive Halle, a market hall with 23 different vendors—each displaying yummy specialties. Among others there is a butcher, a poultry stand, a pork butcher, a baker, a cheesemaker, a fruit and vegetable vendor, a chocolatier, a pastry chef, a fish vendor, some caterers (or kiosks with ready-made goodies), a florist, and more. Within the Halle is a restaurant: Bistrot des Halles, which is where we had lunch. We feasted on several starter dishes including: carpaccio, escargots, a wonderful pate (maybe venison) encrusted in some kind of baked dough and more. We followed this with main dishes including a wonderful ravioli stuffed with crayfish (my main), some amazing cote de boeuf with vegetables, and at least one other dish. Ended with fantastic tarte tatin. I think we downed a few bottles of wine along the way. And then we headed to see Julia and Julian’s new house, and got a tour by Louis. And by then, Ella was up from her nap so it was a full house.

The kids were fun now that they are very bilingual and curious about everything. The house is located in what they call a suburb but it is only 15 minutes to downtown Geneva and they have access to public transportation. Geneva, by the way, is a rather small city with only about 200,000 residents (smaller than Boise, ID) but cosmopolitan as a result of all of the international institutions in its midst.

After spending several hours at the house, we headed back to the hotel and set out for dinner by ourselves. We hadn’t booked anything and didn’t want to eat at either our hotel or any of the nearby hotels so we ventured across the bridge and ate at a little place called Au Coin du Bar.  It’s an old- fashioned bistro complete with bistro furniture in a charming small space. Seems like a place for a lot of locals who hang out at the bar. We shared two dishes which were quite good and upped our consumption of meat for the day to about what we normally consume in a week! And our wine consumption is also topping the charts.

After dinner, we strolled back across the bridge to the hotel—with the Jet d’Eau (the fountain or the Water-Jet) in full view. The fountain , which you see in all pictures of Geneva is probably the city’s most famous landmark. It’s situated where Lake Geneva exits as the Rhone. When you fly into Geneva the Lake is very visible. I think it is the largest lake in Europe and part is in France. The water jet spouts to about 450 ft. It’s been interesting to stay in this part of the city and to see the lake every time we enter or leave the hotel. For all previous visits to Geneva (and there have been many) we stayed in other parts of the city where we had to walk to the lake. But nothing is very far given the size of the city.

A bit more on the lake: there’s always a lot of activity with hotels, restaurants, and beaches surrounding the lake on the Geneva part. The lake is also clean and lots of people swim in the lake (even at lunchtime if one’s office is close to the lake).

For us, it was a light walking day. I think we only totaled 8,500 steps and about 3.5 miles. 

Now to respond to some emails and to do a little work on my book. Tomorrow is our last day here and then we head to Malta.

All the best –

Fern