Lake Living

Living near Lake Geneva (again, Lac Léman if anyone comes to visit and wants to fit in) has been great. On my second day here we took an old steamboat across the lake to France. If you know me at all, you probably know that I was happier than when the new season of Game of Thrones was released! In case you aren't familiar with the shape of Swizzytown, here's a map showing the Geneva area: 

The dark grey line is the Swiss border. We are surrounded by France in Geneva which is why this is the Swiss-French part of the country. (Was that an obvious piece of information? Comment below if I should delete this fact.)

Waiting in Nyon for the boat to Yvoire. 

Yvoire is a beautiful town right on the lake. It has cobblestone streets and there were beautiful flower boxes in almost every storefront or home. We had a delicious lunch of fresh fish (from the lake of course) and fries and then walked around looking at the small shops. 

The streets of Yvoire

We visited the Five Senses Garden which was a labyrinth of sorts and divided the flowers by, you guessed it, how the five senses relate to them!  The kids really liked it and there was an activity sheet for them to do with questions about the flowers and other plants. It was more of a vocabulary exam for me as a lot of the terms were pretty specific. I could have used a pocket dictionary but alas, did not have one. 

 Edelweiss for all you Sound of Music Lovers!

No idea what type of flower this is but it was my favorite :)

I loved taking this mini-trip and it made me so excited to travel this year. It's still hard for me to wrap my mind around how close everything is. Possibly because I wasn't ever that excited to cross the border to Iowa... 

Here's a picture of my host family and Joy, their former au pair who also came to Yvoire, while we were on the boat to France. 

Joy, myself, Sylvie, Julie (5), Christophe and Nicolas (7)

Hope this post finds you all doing well!