I was charmed by this Swiss city, by its sloping rooftops, jumble of beautiful old buildings, snowy hillsides and its French-speaking people.  We toured the cathedral, visited the public market, walked along the waterfront of Lake Geneva (across which you can see France on a clear day), visited the Olympic Museum, and ate delicious tapas for lunch, crepes in the late afternoon and Ethiopian for dinner.  Lausanne is small enough that we could quickly get around by foot, and the bus and train systems were easy to navigate.

We were lucky to stay with friends/colleagues in a tall, narrow, and comfortable old Swiss home with a large poster of Obama hanging on a kitchen cabinet (though no Americans live in the house).  We met Germans and Italians, but not any native Swiss.  A sure sign of the true internationality of this small country in the middle of Europe (bordered by Germany, Austria, France and Italy) which boasts four official languages (not including English, which is probably de facto).

Even though its been years since I have made any attempt at learning French, it was still lovely to hear the language being spoken and I could feel just a little bit of it returning to my tongue.

It was a nice escape, despite the bite of Winter temperatures.  And despite our canceled flight home, rebooking, waiting for hours, and running through the Munich airport to catch our connecting flight.  Such is travel in January.

In fact, the weekend was so nice that I went a little crazy with the picture taking.  Almost 300, which I have since cut down to a manageable 50 or so, which you can check out here.