22 February 2008 – Glo and Mike visit Part 2

Friday

Having had a nice sleep in Mike and I were ready to explore the town. On the map, Geneva looked pretty small, so we decided to do this on foot. We had found a website with a list of things you have to do in Geneva, so we marked them out on the map and left John’s flat. First stop was Plainpalais flee market, which apparently runs everyday. After a few wrong turns we arrived to discover a huge empty square. We made a few enquiries and we were definitely in the right place. It turned out the market only runs on Wednesdays and Saturdays. So much for trusting the internet….

We moved on to the reformation wall and then walked up the hill to the old town and our next stop: Saint Peter’s Cathedral. 157 steps to the top of the cathedral, but the view is worth it. You can see for miles around you, including the Jette d’eau/wee. We descended back into the centre of town and started the long walk up to the UN buildings. By this time it was getting quite late and by the time we got there the park and buildings were closing. However, it was well worth the walk and very impressive. We took a few token photos and Mike started to panic as we had about 20min to walk back to John’s flat which was quite a few km away. We arrived back late and were greeted by a horrified John who couldn’t believe we had walked everywhere. Apparently it’s really far…. It seems life in Geneva was starting to soften the “we only walk, cycle or take the free (bendy) bus” London student way in him.

Dinner was one of the hugest pizza’s I have ever seen (and I lived in Italy for a very brief four months). I don’t think anyone managed to finish theirs (to anyone else who goes to visit John, I certainly challenge you to try!). We all quickly regretted having ordered starters and when the desert came I am not sure how we managed to eat any of it! The waiters were strangely comical, when I present them with the piece of plastic I found in my salad, they quickly whisked it away without so much as an apology… and I’m not sure they coped with our mixture of English and French. However, the food was unquestionably good. We washed our meal down with Amaretto (this might not mean much to most of you, but it was one of our token drinks at Imperial video game/barbecue parties back in London) and then hit the town. It was supposed to have been an early night as we were due to be up around 6 the next morning for skiing, however, several shots later we were still in the bar, celebrating John’s boss’s birthday. We eventually made it back to the flat and bed, where Mike was banished to the living room as apparently he snores and had kept John up all the previous night. I have to say the pair of them sounded like a married couple fighting about it all day!