Dave and Sara, Author at Dave and Sara’s Excellent 2018 Adventure

Cross-Country Skiing

By Dave and Sara on Tuesday, February 13, 2018

After skiing yesterday afternoon we met up with Fabio, our guide for today at a bar near our rental for a quick drink and to make plans. We decided that with Chamonix being quite crowded (it’s a school holiday this week for a lot of Europe) our best bet for finding more untracked powder would be to head to Courmayeur first thing in the morning and then to ski back into France from the Italian side of the Vallee Blanche.

How convincing was Fabio’s description of the skiing Valhalla that is Courmayeur? So convincing that Sara actually agreed to board a bus at 8:30 in the morning to cross into Italy through the Mont Blanc tunnel. Yep, a bus.

Our plan decided, Dave and Fabio rushed across the street to purchase tickets for the bus. The lady at the ticket counter made it quite clear we were to bring our passports with us. “No passport, no travel.” Dually noted. Skiing with our passports, definitely a first.

After saying goodbye for the evening to Fabio we went out for an early dinner at the Le Monchu, a restaurant specializing in mountain food near our hotel. Mmm, more cheese. Also, the local wine grape is called Mondeuse and it’s delicious. With an early morning border crossing bus ride in our future, we went to bed early.

This morning dawned clear with the sun casting a pink hue on the snow covered mountains. No clouds and no wind. In other words, the beginning of a perfect day for skiing. (And bus riding) After a solid breakfast we met Fabio at the same bar, downed an espresso and boarded our bus for the 30 minute ride through the tunnel into Italy.

The Mont Blanc tunnel is pretty cool. It is 11.5 kilometers long and goes from Chamonix to Courmayeur. You ski on top of it and the tram parking lot on the Italian side is literally right next to the tunnel exit.

We plan to go back to the town when we get to Aosta but for today all we saw was the parking lot and the hill. (A note to anyone planning to ski Mont Blanc. Your MB Unlimited pass is valid for Courmayer but you must stop at the ticket counter in Italy and get it activated before riding the lifts). We took the first tram up, switched to a lift, then a 70’s era gondola, then to a tiny antique tram and then to an even more anitque peak to peak tram. We noticed the same thing in Zermatt that the higher you go, the older the trams get. That last one today seriously was museum quality. Finally at our destination after one bus and 5 rides I must admit I was doubting our decision a little bit. After a tricky traverse and many warning signs I was beginnging to doubt it even more, especially when Fabio started side stepping down the backside of the traverse into what looked like a giant coulier. Another traverse, this time on the north facing slope and then we saw it. A giant, wide open untracked bowl of fresh powder. Fabio looks at us, grins and says “Stay 3 meters apart and have fun. See you at the bottom.” And that was only the first part! We skied at least 3 of these amazingly delicious bowls all in row, making our way down eventually into some really fun tree skiing and finally to the track along the creek. Sara began to ask herself; Is Courmayeur really ski heaven and was this our Italian ski angel? Does riding a bus always lead to these amazing experiences? Who knows but then the day got even better! Just at the point when the run out and poling became tiring, Fabio turned to us and says well it’s about lunch time and if you want to go to this one place they will come and get us with a snow machine and give us a tow back to the restaurant. How could we say no to an Italian lunch that starts with a ride behind a snow machine? Clearly we could not.

So glad we opted for the free tow, it was a very long run-out from where we stopped. After a lovely lunch on the Italian snow beach with an insane view of the Mont Blanc, we headed back towards the base area to catch the Skyway Tram back towards France across Helbronner Pass.

The Skyway tram is by far the newest tram we’ve been on and it’s very fancy. It’s circular and rotates 360 degrees as it climbs, which, with the steep terrain is a little dizzying. Terrible construction idea.

But the views at the top were pretty breathtaking.

At the summit of the Skyway we put on our harnesses and Fabio tied a climbing rope called a sling to each of our harnesses and carabiner clipped to our jacket collars. He said it was for easier crevass rescue. Umm…yes, sign me up for the easiest method of crevass rescue please. We headed out onto the lookout terace and then down a few flights of metal stairs marked with really scary signage about immiment danger and then climbed over multiple closed gates (apparently optional) until we got to the end of the staircase and handed Fabio down our skis so we could make the last few meters on a rebar ladder stuck into the side of the rock supporting the Skyway terminal. Queue the happy skier sounds, we had arrived at the famed Vallee Blanche, a ski route that goes over high alpine glaciers and eventually back down to Chamonix. Directly in front of us was the Aiguille du Midi which is the more common beginning to the route. This also means that while the route across from us was already tracked out even one day after a big snowfall, our route was still quite pristine and we had lots of fresh, untracked powder, again to play around in. (Thanks Fabio!) Even with all the crazy signage, the skiing itself wasn’t that technical today, the snow was amazing and it’s not that steep. There are however giant pieces of glacier jutting out of the snow everywhere which, while arrestingly beautiful, reminded us that skiing a requires thoughtfulness and care. The route is 22 kilometers long and we had the place pretty much to ourselves for the first half. After joining up with the run-out for a bit, Fabio took us to the far side and into this crazy glacier-ice luge. It was one of the most amazing, coolest, unforgettable experiences we’ve ever had. Skiing these narrow chutes, at times taking our skis off and walking between 20 foot tall ice walls and ice arches, was something we’ll never forget.

Towards the end of the Vallee Blanche there is a staircase that takes skiers up to a short tram and then the cog train. 30 years ago, skiers could exit the glacier directly to the tram. Now there are literally hundreds of stairs that have been continually lengthened as the glacier retreats at an unexpectedly rapid rate. It’s a dramatic real life example of climate change for sure.

At the bottom of the valley we took our skis off, attached them to our backpacks and hiked straight up a steep hillside for about 15 minutes. It didn’t take that long but after a long day of skiing, it was really hard. After the hike we put our skis back on for the long cat track back to Chamonix. We arrived back at the base in Chamonix a little before 5 and walked back to our rental, saying thank you and so long for now to Fabio, our intrepid guide for one of the most amazing days we’ve ever had on two planks.

Editors Note: We skied two runs today and our legs are completely destroyed. Also, at least Dave’s upper body is destroyed from all of the poling that was involved. If you were to do this every day, you would be in such good shape! Our guide took a ton of photos for us. We will add them as soon as we get them.

Chamonix

Powder Days

By Dave and Sara on Monday, February 12, 2018

Last night we were able to decrease our number of grocery store runs. This is good because most everything was closed because it was Sunday. After enjoying a glass of wine next to some folks from Michigan, we headed home and Sara made a great penne pasta with smoked salmon and romanesco. It was delicious.

This morning we took the leftovers and made it into a fritatta. The perfect fuel for our day to come. It snowed most of the night and we decided to head out to Grand Montets earlier today. We were on the Base Tram before 8:30. The visibility remained poor but the conditions were amazing. There was knee deep to waist deep powder. That early in the morning we were able to get two runs on the mid mountain gondola that were basically untracked. The day prior, we made a reservation for the high mountain Tram at 11:05. We thought most of the snow would be tracked out but we were wrong. Nearly the whole run we were able to get fresh tracks. Following our first team ride we made another reservation for an hour later and grabbed some lunch. During lunch the sun came out and our second run on the tram was also amazing. Light fluffy powder. Unfortunately the GoPro died before the second tram ride but below are a few shots of our day today.

We’re having some technical issues getting video up which is a bummer because we took some sweet ones. Hoping to get them posted tomorrow. Until then here are some nice shots of Aiguille du Midi from when the weather cleared today in town.

Chamonix

Great Mountain, Bad Visibility

By Dave and Sara on Sunday, February 11, 2018

Not much to post today. The highlight of the day was getting the washing machine to work. We had so much laundry and it is great to get it all clean. Having a place with a kitchen means that we have been trying to eat in. Last night we made some Salmon and Romanesco. It was great to eat something fairly plain.

This morning we headed over to Grand Montets to ski. It is about 15 minutes outside of town and came highly recomended from the Davidsons. When we arrived, it was snowing pretty good. The conditions were great but the visibility was not. When you are in the clouds, it is snowing, and there are no trees, it is impossible to determine what is up and down. Undeterred, we skied a few runs from almost the top, but decided not to go all the way up because it was just too hard to see. We skied for about 3 or 4 hours and decided that it was getting too hard to see. The takeaways from our first day here in Chamonix is that the snow is fantastic and the mountain is really fun. They are expecting to get about 30 cm tonight so conditions should be fantastic tomorrow. We have a reservation to take the highest tram at Grand Montets tomorrow. Hopefully we will get some great photos/video of the good conditions for our loyal followers. Tonight we are going to make some pasta with leftover romanesco. Yum!

Verbier

Last Day in Switzerland

By Dave and Sara on Friday, February 9, 2018

Tonight is our last night in Switzerland. It is sad to leave but our next adventure in France awaits us.

To recap from last night, we were planning to go out for some pizza at La Pergola. Unfortunately, when we arrived, they said that their pizza oven was broken. I am not sure that I believe them as others who ordered after we arrived were able to get Pizza. I think they were so busy that they were trying to disuade people from ordering pizzas to give the kitchen a break. As we couldn’t have pizza, we went for pasta instead. It was still quite good.

This morning, we headed back out to the mountain. As it hasn’t snowed in a few weeks the mountain is pretty chopped up. In fact, last night we learned that one of the yellow runs we took yesterday is known as being one of the longest mogul runs in the world. The moguls across the mountain were big. Some of them four to five feet tall it seemed. Anyways, on day six of skiing, Dave was having some troubles getting in the groove. At least there were some great views to be had. Below is a photo with Verbier at the base.

After skiing some off-piste next to the runs, we decided to try the last run we did yesterday this time with good visibility. The run was quite nice. The beginning started with large moguls, followed by a wide open bowl that had some nice snow in it. We descended in to the town of La Tzoumaz:

The path went down a winding road where after a while, there was an actual road with cars next to the run. The path continued to provide us with breathtaking views. The photo below shows the bowl that we skied down way off in the distance.

We also passed a really adorable cheese shop off the road.

Once we reached the town, we took the Gondola back up and headed to lunch on the mountain. We found a great chalet called Chez Clovis. We both had, of course, soup and enjoyed the beautiful views.

After lunch, we worked our way back to Verbier. We ended up taking this route that went right through the town. I am bummed we didn’t get a photo of it; however, they even had slots in the road, so you could ski across the asphalt without damaging your skis. You had to watch out for cars. There were also a couple times where you had to cross an active pomel horse lift. The run went through the chalets in town which I plan to buy a few of with all the money we are making off the stock market right now. Stocks are up, right?

After skiing, we headed back to the room to clean ourselves up. We then went to grab an Apres at Le Rouge. This was another recommendation from Sara’s friend.

Tonight as it is our last night in Switzerland we are of course going to eat some cheese. Off to eat Raclette at La Caveau.

Before we leave Switzerland, here are some of our closing thoughts:

You really do eat a lot of cheese.
If you ate meat, you would be very happy.
People here are very nice.
They aren’t lying when they say it is expensive.
In one part of the country everybody speaks German (Zermatt), then you drive 1 hour and everybody speaks French (Verbier).
Skiing many days without a washing machine results in a really stinky hotel room.
It gets cold here, -24C is a new low for these two California constitutions.
We would happily come back to both towns! Switzerland, its been a blast.

Zermatt

Corrections!

By Dave and Sara on Tuesday, February 6, 2018

First update: we’ve heard about the upside down images in a few of our posts and our crack engineering team is on the case to update past posts and fix going forward!

Second update (and much more importantly). In the previous post I credited our lovely champagne aperitif to the hotel and while the hotel staff are great, I must give credit where credit is due! The aperitif is actually a gift from my amazing and talented coast to coast team; Annie, Devin, Stevie, Mirian and Rachael. I am so lucky to work with you all and truly touched by your thoughtfulness and I miss you tons! XO Sara

Zermatt

Zermatt- it’s a wrap!

By Dave and Sara on Tuesday, February 6, 2018

Our last day full day in Zermatt, here’s the recap.

Last night we walked around the town a bit, it really is so pretty here. There’s a lovely church where all the mountaineers of yesteryear are buried and right next door is the town hall and police station. And this!

Also the world’s largest Alphorn.

We grabbed drinks in a cool bar tucked inside the Old Zermatt restauarant and also ran into our ski guide David there. If anyone is thinking about coming to Zermatt we highly recommend booking a guide through David and his outfit Alpine Exposure. Super nice guy and he found us a powder stash. Yay!

After drinks we had pasta at Pizzeria Roma up the street. Super low key and friendly spot for a comfort food pasta dinner.

This morning we got up early, had breakfast and hit the mountain for our last day. Unfortunately there was weather around the Matterhorn so we weren’t able to go up to the glacier again but it was ok, there is PLENTY of skiing to be had even without the upper, upper mountain. We stuck to the western side of the valley, northern facing slopes which were protected from the storms that tend to come up and over from Italy. We skied the little cable car as everyone seems to refer to it, it’s a peak to peak relic that provides access to a ton of off piste skiing. So fun! Dave tried to make a gopro video but unfortunately just got great shots of his feet.

We also had some important business to attend to today. As many of you know, we put a sticker for Jake up at every resort we visit in Europe. (Sorry this photo is a little wonky but there was a patrol hut right next door and they were giving me the side eye.) Jake loved to ski and travel so we like to think we’re bringing him along with us on a bunch of fun adventures. We hope you enjoy the view of the Matterhorn, Jakey, miss you all the time.

After skiing the off piste area a few times we broke for lunch in Riffelberg. The snow train makes a stop here, I’m obsessed with this little train.

We ate lunch at the cafeteria again today, with the market tanking in the US and Switzerland being mad expensive we stuck with soup and water. But hey, at least it was soup with a view!

The weather got significantly worse after lunch so with our tired legs, we decided to ski just a little bit more and then make our way back down to the village, about 3000 vertical feet 🙂

We’ve been staying at the lovely Matterhorn Lodge and Apartments here in town. The staff; Ruth, Flo and Lea have all been so lovely and the room and lobby are both great. Tonight they surprised us with Apres in front of the fireplace. (…California, who dis?)

We will post about our dinner tonight tomorrow (hint: cheese of course). Tomorrow we are off to our next adventure in Verbier. This will be the last time we have to take our bags on the train. Wish us luck!

Zermatt

Gone with the Wind

By Dave and Sara on Monday, February 5, 2018

So let us start with last night.

Up to this point we have depended on the hotel to get reservations for us for dinner. This time we thought we would try to find something to walk in to. The town is so beautiful with this river running through it.

Our ski guide had recommended that we check out an Italian restaraunt called Guisseppes. When we got there, we asked for a table for two and the maitre-d flat out said no. Distraught and cold, we walked back towards the main area and stumbled on a pizzeria called Restaurant Da Nico. The place was jam packed but luckily there was room for two at the bar. After our hard day we really just needed a drink. We started with a bottle of Barbera di Alba.

Can you tell how professional of a blog this is based on that great photo? With the wine we had two pizzas, one with mozzeralla di bufala and one with mushrooms and black truffle. The food was fantastic. We ate about 3/4 of the pizza and then we were stuffed.

With full bellies, we walked back towards the hotel to sleep. Our legs were absolutely destroyed from the long day, and we could barely stay awake. While we walked, we snapped a photo of the old area that is right by our hotel.

Once we got back to the room it was about 8:00 PM and we were ready to crash out (at least Dave was).

The next day we woke up late and after eating some breakfast it was time to hit the mountain again.

No rush to get on the hill today as it was pretty windy and we heard that a bunch of the upper mountain was closed due to low visibility. Nevertheless we got on the Matterhorn Glacier gondola which has about 4 or 5 different load on/off points including the top one which is right below the glacier (hence the name). On the way up we got a great shot of the town.

See how socked in it was today? We should have paid the weather more mind because a little bit after taking this photo we were in that cloud cover and it started getting gnarly. So gnarly the automatic sensor kept shutting the gondola off due to the wind. We sat with a very friendly Swiss guide who recommended that we stay low and ski the trees where visibility would be better. Why we didn’t follow him and get off at the third load off spot is a mystery to me. We kept riding until the last stop and wow was it blowing up there! Amazingly they were still running the high tram that goes to the top of the glacier. It would have taken a lot of money to get me to ride that one today. So there we are at the top of the hill and wisely make the decision to stay on piste as visibility was probably about 4 feet? I’m guessing because I couldn’t really see my feet but I could see my hands.

We slowly made our way down to the next gondola stop and jumped on and went in search of a more protected area. This part of the mountain is fairly steep and conditions were not getting any better. From there we started making our way over to the place we had made a lunch reservation. It was on another part of the mountain and we estimated it was about a 2 hour trip including skiing and lift rides (did we mention this is a huge ski resort?!?!) On the way we got a very nice view of the area that we skied off-piste yesterday. This is the area where you see the remnants of an old chairlift that was taken out by an avalanche.

Here is said place nestled in it’s pretty valley at the base of a glacier.

Haha it’s kind of hard to see in this photo but it’s dark brown with bright red shutters! So cute right? The restaurant and chalet is called Fluhalp, named after the glacier that sits right above it. I bet in the summer it’s an awesome place to hike to and hang out. Today everyone was hanging out and taking refuge from the weather by drinking red wine and eating cheese and spaetzle. Like this:

Dave and I shared this and a salad. Also, check out the altitude (for those of you like me who can’t do so much math in your head that’s approximately 8500 ft) about halfway up the resort.

After lunch, it was time to ski back towards the town. On the way, we found a nice powder run; however, it unfortunately led to a dead end with a slow chairlift for people learning to ski. Oops. Once we made it out of the dead end, we skied the path back to Zermatt. On the way we found a great view of the city, right next to a mid-mountain champagne bar.

Don’t worry, we will provide more gratuitous cheese shots in the upcoming posts.

Zermatt

Skiing with a Guide Part 1

By Dave and Sara on Sunday, February 4, 2018

Today started as a great day. Dave finally woke up and didn’t feel extremely congested. After some breakfast, we met up with our guide for the day: David from Alpine Exposure. After a short walk we took the funicular up about 1000m followed by a cable car, followed by a very old tram. The tram itself is basically only there for guides and we were the only ones on it. Once we reached the top (3200m), it opened up on to a beautiful field of powder. As we skied it, I kept asking myself, where is everybody else? In California the snow would be all tracked out and there would be nothing soft left. Note: it has been over a week since they had much snow. While this area had some tracks, there was plenty of areas where we had long distances of completely untracked powder. The snow was a bit heavy here and it certainly was a thigh burner. Additionally, the runs were long. Very long. After two laps through this area it was already getting in to the afternoon. Below is a photo our guide took of Dave skiing out of a small coulier in powder.

Next stop was a quick break to warm up and hyrdate. We stopped at the Blue Lounge and had a hot water and lemon, and then we were off to try to eat lunch in Italy. Skiing from the western side of the mountain to the eastern side of the mountain takes at least an hour. That hour is all skiing. Once we got to the eastern side of the mountain, it was time to take the tram up to the top of the Matterhorn Glacier (3883m). This is the highest lift in all of Europe. Up here it was cold. I didn’t see a thermometer but it felt like it might have been colder than yesterday which was -11f. The elevation didn’t hit us too bad, but you could tell that you were feeling a bit loopy. From there we skied down to Italy and stopped for some lunch at the Rifugio Teodulo which was at 3317m. The combination of the altitude and not eating until almost 3pm made for a very interesting time. The bar was very cool. We sat on the guide side which is less fancy than the restaraunt but had much more character. We also learned that you can book rooms at this rifugio which also seemed really cool. We ate some sort of combination of semolina dumplings and French onion soup, and it was so good!

After refueling, it was time to head back towards Zermatt rushing to catch the last chair to bring us up for skiing some powder on the glacier on our way home. To be honest, Dave’s legs were very shot on this ride back to the town. It was about 4:30 and we had been skiing basically nothing but powder (some of which was heavy and/or chopped up) and his legs were dying. At this point, we ducked a rope and skied out on to the glacier to a wide open, untracked, powder field of powder that was much lighter. After skiing down it, we both commented that it was something we will remember for the rest of our lives. The skiing was super crusie-y and really fun! As we worked our way down, there got to be a point that Dave had to throw in the towel. He feared hurting himself as the skiing was somewhat technical and his legs did not have the gas left. Luckily before we stopped, we were able to get a picture of the three of us.

After making it to the next gondola, it was time to hitch a ride back to the village. We left the hotel at 9 am and got back at 5:30. It was a really long day. David was an awesome guide and we are hoping to ski with him again on Wednesday after they get a nice refresh of new snow tonight and tomorrow. Below is a map where I tried to remember what lifts we took and generally what we skied. Yellow are the lifts and the green is generally what we skied. I promise that this map does not do any justice on the shear distance we skied. I am guessing this is maybe the most vertical feet I have ever skied in a day.

After skiing we headed down to the spa in our hotel. Unfortunately, what we thought was a hot tub was more of a warm tub. Interestingly, it had these beds you lay on and it percolates ice cold water out of them. Maybe people are in to that, we were not. After a quick Sauna, we headed back to the room to drink some wine we purchased the day before. Also, it was coed naked, but us prude Americans wore our bathing suits.

Blog notes: I apologize about the large amount of text. Unfortunately, we were too busy skiing so we didn’t take many photos. Also, we will likely tag on our dinner experience on to tomorrow’s blog post as we are likely going to be too tired after we get back from dinner.

Ciao for now.

Zermatt

The Most Magical Place on Earth

By Dave and Sara on Saturday, February 3, 2018

Woke up this morning like woah!

Since we got in after dark last night we did not notice the giant Matterhorn massif looming directly over our hotel. And it is so spectacular. Here’s a closer look.

Pretty cool right? Here’s one even closer.

(JK, although this was my favorite ride at Disneyland growing up. Inspiration for the trip maybe?)

Seriously though this place is gorgeous. The town is really cute and I bet it is amazing here in the summer. And the skiing area is huge- it connects with Cervinia in Italy so you can really ski all the way around the massif on one pass. Today we stuck to a relatively small portion of the resort which still required a solid 45 minute high speed gondola ride. The snow is great and there is more in the forecast tomorrow and Monday. Avalanche danger is moderate however so we stuck pretty close to the groomers. Still found fresh powder though! (Sorry everyone skiing Tahoe this weekend)

No sight of this guy yet but we will be here for 4 more days.

We are staying at the Hotel Matterhorn Zermatt, centrally located and really nice (feels newly renovated?) Today on the hill we had lunch at Riffelberg with a lovely view of the Matterhorn and Monte Rosa. No photos though and also it was –24 degrees Celsius.

There can only be one cure for -24 degrees Celsius and that is copious amounts of cheese. This cheese-a-palooza was courtesy of Ferdinand at Hotel Cervo in Zermatt.

Zermatt

Planes, Trains, and Electric Automobiles

By Dave and Sara on Saturday, February 3, 2018

After our amazing lounge experience we described in our previous post, it was finally time to board the flight. Of course, the most important part of the flight was our celebration champagne.

With the champagne out of the way we had about 10 hours to kill. As expected, Sara slept through basically the whole thing. For Dave, he continues to battle a cold and barely slept a wink. Once we landed in Zurich, getting through passport control and customs was a breeze. Our bags were on the conveyor before we arrived so there was no waiting. I think we mentioned that we brought quite a few bags for our trip.

After leaving the airport, we stopped by the Sunrise cellphone store to buy a SIM card. BTW, it is very cheap here. $2.50 per day for unlimited talk and data. Hopefully we find something similar in France and Italy.

Once we got to the train platform we prepared ourselves for the first difficult part of our trip. Loading all of our gear on to the train. As the trained approached, we mentally prepared ourselves for getting all the bags on to the train in the short window of time before it left the station. Luckily the first train was a breeze and the next stop was Visp.

Things got interesting once we got to Visp. Again, as we approached the station, Sara and I mentally prepared for the transfer. At this station there were no carts and we had to transfer platforms. Upon exiting the train, we were shocked to see people in an all out sprint trying to make the transfer. With our bags in tow, we walked briskly carrying at least four bags each trying to make the train. While we were the last ones on, we made it! Now we had one hour left until we finally made it to our destination.

The new train we boarded was significantly different from the sleak modern quiet train we took from Zurich. These trains were significantly older and had quite a bit of character. While we didn’t get any picture of the train itself, we did get a photo of the track.

As you can see from the photo this was a cog train. The gauge of the rail was a bit narrower and the cogs in the center are due to the steepness of the route. In just over an hour we climbed from just over 500m to over 2000m. Unfortunately, due to the late hour of our travel we weren’t able to see much, but you could tell that it was beautiful. Once we arrived in Zermatt it was off to the hotel in a small electric shuttle/cab. Like a glorified golf cart the electrical shuttle whisked Sara and I quickly up to the hotel and we finally checked in. Interestingly, we shared the shuttle with one of Dave’s company’s client, who we ended up spending quite a bit of time in the bar chatting with. Great people!

As it is the weekend, finding a place to eat was not easy. Luckily, the friendly hotel staff got us in to the Factory at Hotel Post at the last minute. The food wasn’t that great but the caprese salad and pizza we ate filled the voids in our stomachs after the long journey.

As I (Dave) lay here in bed at 5 am unable to sleep longer, I look forward to a fun day of exploring Zermatt and getting our first day of skiing in. Hopefully, I can shake this terrible cold that I’m dealing with. Stay tuned for more updates.