Getting away from the grey

The weather here during the latter part of April was grim. Cold and grey every day with strong breezes and no compensating rain to help the gardens. It was therefore a blessed relief for Jane and me to get away from it for a few days by visiting our daughter and her family in France.


Although they work in Geneva, Switzerland, they live in France, commuting daily over the border. I can definitely see the attractions in this arrangement. I'm not very fond of big cities; I much prefer the countryside. This is the view from the bottom of their road. The snow-topped mountains are the Jura.

A couple of hundred yards further on you leave the village and get out into the real countryside:

It seems incredible that this place is just 20 minutes' drive from the centre of a major city!

When I'm out walking I always like to inspect the "flora and fauna" as closely as possible. These are trees full of clumps of mistletoe, which seems to be very common there.

Turning round 180 degrees you see this:

That view is of the Alps, with Mont Blanc dominating the skyline.

The contrast between the beauty of Nature and the utilitarian ugliness of man-made structures was very striking:

Like most places, the village in which my daughter lives is slowly expanding as new houses and apartments go up to provide accommodation for Geneva commuters. However it was encouraging to see that the increasing population has enabled a very nice food-shop to open in the village (something previously lacking) - thus cutting down on the need to make trips to town and to the supermarkets.

I just hope that those lovely fields and open spaces don't all get swallowed up in some vast concrete-and-brick conurbation!