Contemplations and Ruminations

As I sit here watching clumps of clouds and the Alps pass by below, I'm awestruck by life.  When Fraulein Maria leaves the abbey in The Sound of Music , she says, 'When the Lord closes a door, somewhere He opens a window'... and a window He did fling open for me. I was left literally gasping at the views while silently saying a prayer for all the doors that slammed shut in my face. Quite a memorable trip this has been, more than made up for all those times I was left clutching to my sanity by a frayed piece of my mind. All the places I've been and all the faces I've seen have left an indelible mark on my psyche.  The breathtaking Alps...  From Geneva, to Brienz, To New Jersey and New York, to Washington, to Niagara, to Boston, to Salzburg and back again to Geneva... images flash through my mind as I write this... Walking through the fields in Geneva...   The pristine cool waters of Lake Brienz reflecting the wonders of the world above,  The...

So after getting lost and not finding Pèrouge the first time , we decided to try again a few days later. We catch the train from Geneva to Lyon, and then another train from Lyon to Meximieux and in half an hour we reach Meximieux.  And Perouge is about fifteen minutes walk from the train station...  So you follow the signs... Mid way through, for a second, I thought I was walking back home in some narrow alley... after seeing this banana tree and the tiled roof.  That's my brother...  Imposing gate on the way... And after climbing uphill, you come to the medieval city of Pèrouge... The entrance stone... It was not that crowded, which was great...  I think tourists don't come here... it's kinda difficult to find this place... A nice place... Deserted streets... apparently the movie The Three Musketeers, was shot here, in Pèrouge. Some more doors or gates... whatever you prefer to call them.  Nice plac...

There wasn't much to see in Yverdon-les-Bains (E-vah-doh le bain) , but we went there nevertheless to check out some ancient Stonehenge kinda thing... that I read about on the net. The one in England is pretty fascinating ... what stories those stones must have witnessed, if only they could talk... When you get down in Yverdon, this is what you see... some geometric fountain, which was intriguing.  Johann Heinrich Pestalozzi is quite famous here... he was a Swiss pedagogue and educational reformer who exemplified Romanticism in his approach. He founded several educational institutions both in German and French speaking regions of Switzerland and wrote many works explaining his revolutionary modern principles of education. His motto was 'Learning by head, hand and heart'. Thanks to Pestalozzi, illiteracy in 18th century Switzerland was overcome almost completely by 1830.  The church at the the town square... A very simple and pleasing church...  ...