Piano Practice

I captured a short video of Aubrey today as she was practicing the piano. She's been working on a song from the movie Amelie...Just click on her image to start the video... The lighting is dark but c'est la vie...the sound is what I was after! The song is titled "Comptine d'un autre été" (Nursery rhyme from another time)...


;-) Dave

oops

Saturday I decided to get a good hard ride in and rode south towards Nyon. I hooked up with a French rider and he convinced me to ride with him toward Divonne. I wasn't sure where this was but was feeling great and headed that way.

Though I typically ride with my passport, on this day I left it at home...next thing I new I noticed that the signs were a bit different and I was seeing many French, not Swiss license plates..."Did we cross the border?" ...He replied, "yes, Divonne is a border town but it's not manned..."

I answered, "But I don't have a passport with me..." His response..."Don't worry even when they do checks, they never check bicyclists"...

Anyways, I had visions of being the first test case of what happens when an American living in Switzerland sneaks into France without a passport...

So I said thanks and goodbye, turned around, held my breath, and sped back thru the 'unmanned' border crossing. Fortunately, the test case was not to be...No one batted an eye, no flashing lights and I was back safe and sound.

It still strikes me as strange that you can take off on a bike and end up in a different country!

Tulips, carnivals and Rapeseed (canola)

The flowers are in bloom and it's beautiful...We've had incredibly nice warm weather to boot! Feels like summer already..Check out the tulips in Morges..

Today was also the Lausanne Carnival...caught me by surprise as I was riding thru to reach Pully....it was quite the spectacle...Marching bands, dancing...a bit of a miniature Mardi gras feel but instead of beads they threw confetti...

I ended the day with a nice back country ride with friend Cheryl...The rapeseeds and their yellow flowers looked spectacular against the blue sky and mountains. I don't think the picture does them justice!

El Ghriba

Our first stop on our way to some markets in Djerba was Midoun. Brenna went to town with her negotiating skills and we picked up some good souvenirs. We also had a wonderful Italian-Tunisian lunch mix which was clean, tasty and super inexpensive. Then we had to take a picture of this sign for a small shop....note the truth in advertising..."Scam"...




We then visited the Synagogue in Ghriba, one of the oldest in Africa. Legend has it that the synagogue is connected to the earliest Jewish settlement on the island by a priests from the Temple of Jerusalem. They supposedly settled on the island immediately after the destruction of the First Temple of Jerusalem by the Babylonians in 586 BCE!











...and here we are back at the hotel, packed up and ready to head home ...Just had to catch one last glimpse of the beautiful sea and breath in the fresh air...

Matmata on the way back to Djerba

One last shot before leaving Oasis





















Camel crossing sign...and there for a good reason!


















Stopping at another nice cafe for some coffee... Our tour guide who was up all night and seemed to be still a bit inebriated and hung over, really needed this break...We were happy that he was not in our vehicle!
















Troglodyte building near Matmata built on a slope. These date back 500 years. Troglodytes, are Tunisian cave people who live in houses dug vertically into the ground or on steep slopes, sometimes a couple of stories deep, complete with doors and staircases, but no windows. Typically they were built by excavating 50ft circular pits, and carving out rooms; these were cool in summer and warm in winter, though prone to flooding. Some are still inhabited by local families.

One, the Hotel Sidi Driss, had been used in the filming of Star Wars and this was our next stop.



































Walking in...I believe Sidi Driss was the underground home of Luke Skywalker's Uncle Owen and Aunt B.


























Everyone taking shots...

















































Next we visited a local house, still inhabited...Note the hand over the entry way to an inhabited house. This is the "Fatima" hand print and combined with the fish drawing, promises wealth, health, and general prosperity

















Grinding wheat...we actually got to taste some fire cooked bread with olive oil...nice appetizer prior to heading out for our lunch stop.




Large "desert rose" in lobby of hotel where we stopped for lunch...


















...and yes, there is mountain biking in Tunisia!























Boat ride back to Djerba. This was a sweet shot...the mother was very proud of her son and they were both pleased with the attention from this strange tourist...



















Goodbye shot of girls with Ali, our driver. Overall this 2 day trip was a great excursion...Most impressive for me was the hundreds of miles of voluminous, unadulterated, rippling sand. That's a picture that I'll keep with me for life. I wonder if the Great Sand Dunes in Colorado are anything like this...

More desert shots

Here are some more shots from our desert excursion..the sand was unbelievably fine...(am still finding it everywhere!)













Picture from my post on my dromedary (one humped camel) as we head out to see the sunset over the desert..




















Dedi looking out at the sunset




















Pretty Colors...



















Next morning, looking out from a tower down at the campsites and oasis...
























Morning shot of the Sahara before heading back ....

Finding the desert

First, We hit a few cafes on our way to the Oasis in the desert..













Then we started to get our selves ready for some sand..





















Hiking up from the nearest WC...



















At the camp site, getting some sun...not a 5 star but really quite nice











First view of the Sahara...wow! Seems endless...by the way if you click on any image you should see a slightly bigger version of the shot...

Tataouine

Our next stop was Tataouine which is best known for its many cliff dwellings. Many civilizations have made this their home...Phoenician, Roman, Berber, and and now Arab-Muslim. Tataouine in the Berber language means source of water. The homes in the cliffs are hard to see from a distance which has given them strategic military advantages over unsuspecting explorers...Practically they provide warmth in the winter and cool dwelling in the summer..Tatouine is also Luke Skywalker's fiction home planet...

Here are some pictures. The white building is the Mosque...

Climbing up the hill. This part of the city is still inhabited. The people all look after each other. One man has olive trees and he shares/barters his olives. Another has fig trees and he does the same. A third is blind, and everyone helps him out a bit. They all claim to look out for each other and it seems like a very tight community.

Lunch!

Market and Ksar Hedada

Tuesday we headed out in a 4x4 land crusier to an oasis on the edge of the sahara desert. Along the way we hit a local market where we practiced the art of bargaining...it's interesting, if you don't bargain, the merchants seem upset! Well Brenna turned out to be a fierce negotiator....After being corralled into a few shops, she quickly learned to smile and nicely refuse their rapidly dropping prices..."It's nice, but we really don't need it, so if we were to buy it, the price would need to be really good..." In the end, she got some great bargains...proof of this came later in our trip when we saw the same items at fixed price shops priced about 30% above her price...Considering that the 'starting' prices were typically about 10x higher than Brenna's closing price, I think she found the formula!

Our next stop was Ksar Hedada where George Lucas filmed parts of the "Phantom Menace"

Entry way to Ksar Hedada

Looking down...

This was a pretty interesting site...I wonder how George Lucas found it!

Tunisia Arrival

We arrived safe and sound on our non-stop chartered flight from Geneva to Djerba. It's been a while since I've been on a flight where the passengers and the flight attendants applaud after a safe landing!

The Djerba airport was nice but understaffed to handle the 3 midnight flights that arrived at about the same time. Though we made it through immigration and security quickly, some of our fellow passengers didn't and we waited over an hour for them to get to our shared van. And this van was quite the sight....dark and parked behind all the big chartered busses.

Our bus....

The driver was asleep with a cigarette dangling in his hand...but all in all, we arrived at our hotel safe and sound (3:00 am) and got a good nights rest.

The next morning after a great buffet breakfast we went out to the beach. All was well until some guy comes up on a horse and next thing I know Brenna is off riding away. The guy looks at me and says, "A demain!" (see you tomorrow!)...He was joking but this was Brenna's first lesson in Assertive 101. She soon got the horse turned around and was back with us!

On the beach....

Later in the day we signed up for a 2 day excursion into the sahara desert...more on this in my next post!

Cheers, Dave

Getting Ready

Dedi and I have both been down with bad colds. Dedi had a several day head start and actually already has some energy whereas I'm still in the mode of taking up space and not much else....Spent most of the day horizontal, trying to find the balance between resting and keeping my head from filling up, if you know what I mean. But I'm feeling a bit better now. At least well enough to post an update!

We're starting to pack for a week in Djerba. Will post some pictures when we get back. Looking forward to some new sights and some much needed R&R.

We got a tasted of the Bise this week, with horrendous northerly winds. Made my daily bike commute a struggle. But we're now seeing sunny warm weather so no complaints.

Other news, we finally decided to sublet our precious parking space...took a year 1/2 to realize we really weren't going to buy a car. Put up an add and the next day got a taker. It's nice now to look out and see the previously vacant spot being put to good use.

Today, Dedi put together a small easter egg hunt for the girls. They seem so grown up, but at times like this, they quickly revert to being our little kids. Dedi and I enjoyed sitting back and watching the hunt.