Friday August 10th, 2oo7

Friday August 10th, 2007
11:39pm Ovronnaz, Switzerland Time
3:39pm Saskatoon Time

We just got home from a day of exporing! The sun was shining today! We started by going to St. Pierre de Clages which was a book village. It was boring. The only excitement was the cutest, happiest little puppy. Reminded me of Tori. She was so adorable. Then we drove to Sion which is the capital of the province we are in, which called...Valais...i think. When we drove into Sion, we saw 2 mountain tops, each with a castle on top of it. We parked and walked up a huge hill to get to the entry of the 2 castles. We first went up 10,000 stairs to Valere. It was built in the 11th century. It was gorgeous, and so high up! We took lots of pictures off the edge. There was a church at the top that we went through. We were getting so annoyed with dad because there wasnt much battery left in the video camera, and we didnt want him to waste it on the church. Then we went down, and our legs were rubbery. We decided to hike up to the 2nd castle which was twice as high as the other one, with 3 times the amount of stairs. It was called the Tourbillon Castle, and it was built in the 13th century. We had to walk atleast 100000000 stairs to get to the top of this one, and all the stairs were uneven rocks on the edge of a cliff. We FINALLY got to the top (sweaty and unable to breathe...we are SO out of shape), and discovered it was all ruins. It was gorgeous though, and it was my favorite. It was way higher than Valere castle, we could see right down into it. We took so many pictures off the edge of this castle, and (thankfully) it was absolutely gorgeous out. Shelby saw a soccer field, so we got a couple pictures of that too. On our way down, Shelby and I climbed up some of the ruins. Note to self...quit wearing flipflops when we have to hike up 3 miles to get to a castle. Im surprised my $1 flipflops have lasted this long. We then drove into downtime Sion and stopped at an information place, and we saw a map of Switzerland. We found Ovronnaz on the map, and we are 1590meters high, and near us there are villages as high as 3250meters!! Then we went out and shopped! Poor dad. While we were in H&M for "apparently" over an hour...dad sat and read his Harry Potter. So we shopped until the stores kicked us out, then headed back to Ovronnaz. We stopped in an Ikea-type store on the way back and attempted to communicate with the non-english speaking associates, but failed. We came home and ate supper. Then Shelby and I walked over to the spa where the internet is. We checked our emails, and I called Shaun with the end of our Swiss calling card. Shelby and I walked home, and it was dark. We saw the lights of little towns even higher on the mountain than us! It was so pretty! A car almost hit us while we were walking. I was sure I saw people hiding in the bush in the dark, and Shelby and I freaked out a bit, but we didnt see anyone. Turns out it was Siri and mom taking out the recycle, then spying on us. We played cards for waaay longer than we were supposed to, then we repacked our bags and put everything by the door. Early morning tomorrow. 12 hour drive to northern Germany!