8. Quiet, Old Town, Sun, Parks, and Finn. 9/4/22

Today was a quiet day…. Post wedding day.. started out late… quick breakfast at our now regular café down the street from the hotel – Christie’s. Turns out that the owners and bakers are Ukrainian. Lots of wonderful decorations highlighting support for Ukraine. Turns out we really missed the big bash after the wedding—at the Cotton Pub where about 25 of Julia and Julian’s friends partied until after 1:00 a.m.! Mmmmm must be getting old since we opted not to attend that part of the celebration.

After brunch we strolled to Geneva’s old town – Vielle Ville – an ancient maze of small streets and squares filled with restaurants, little hotels, galleries, and historic buildings that have pretty great masonry facades. The old town is about 80 feet higher than the lake so it’s a bit of a climb. It was a picture perfect day… about 70-75 degrees, crisp bright sun, so it was very pleasant to walk.  Saint Peter’s Cathedral, from the 12^th Century, is the major building around which much of the old town  is situated. We strolled around for a while and then headed back toward our hotel, stopping a few times to take in views.

Then we headed out again and walked to the little island in the middle of the river (Rhone)… and just wandered for a while. Then we headed back to Christie’s to pick up some wonderfully yummy desserts to bring to Elizabeth’s for dinner. One of the pastries we bought was a perfect cube covered in chocolate powder, making it look like a solid chocolate box (about 2” x 2” x 2”).. but the surprise was cutting into the chocolate cube. It was filled with a perfect half yellow and half blue marshmallow-y cake that clearly represented the Ukrainian flag. The other pasties were: four quarter cakes that sat together to form one bigger cake—1/4 carrot cake, ¼ cheesecake, ¼ red velvet, and ¼ black forest…. !!

Given all the goodies we were carrying, we opted for a taxi to Carrouge where Elizabeth lives and where Emma and Hem and Finn are staying. We had a lovely dinner and the desserts were a big hit. Finn seems to have emerged from his stomach crisis (which prevented him and Hem from attending yesterday’s wedding). He was bouncing around and in pretty good shape. They are headed back to London very early tomorrow morning. And we are headed back to Zurich tomorrow but don’t have any definite departure time since we are driving. 

Tomorrow morning’s challenge will be getting the car (that Alfa) out of the garage to head out of town. Not yet sure the route we’ll take but we’ll figure it out tomorrow.

All the best.

Happy Labor Day!!

Fern