Snowboard Competition

The past week there has been an ongoing snowboard competition, there has been a big sound and light show throughout with the hill lit up with tons of moving lights.

On Saturday night were the finals which we went to see. The youngest competition was 15! The guy from Canada won. Here you can see the hill when they changed the lights for the jump and also the giant screen showing the live video.

The part that was recording the video was pretty cool, it was a camera on a wire that ran the entire length of the run.

Avalanche training course on Pischa

On the past weekend we had fantastic weather, which was a good thing because I organized an off-piste ski training weekend for some friends from work.

We were also really lucky to just have fresh snowfall but without much risk of avalanches.

We dug in the snow to get a look at the profile which wasn't very interesting since there weren't many layers. The snowpack is very stable right now.

And on the first night a few of us had cheese fondue. I must admit I was falling asleep at the table and we still had another day to go. Recently I had this really funny cold and was talking in this ridiculous falsetto voice  for several days. It was a hit at work and people were talking like me when they came to ask me questions.

As I said, the weather was great and the snow was really nice.

The next day I spent half the day with the group working with digging and transceivers. However, I didn't go up to Pischa horn with everyone. I had done this trip before and really wasn't feeling well.

Instead I sat around in the BBQ chairs (wooden boxes facing the sun with a nice seat) and enjoyed the sunshine (which came after I took this picture). Then I went to the restaurant and dozed and talked in Swenglish (Swiss German and English) with one of the rescue dog guys. We weren't the only ones having training at Pischa this weekend, the avalanche dogs were also there. When there is an accident you can Rega and they organize a helicopter. The avalanche dog volunteers get a text and must get to the helicopter and then they fly to the accident.

London and Cambridge and Stonehenge

This past weekend it was a good time in the UK to visit some friends and see more than Heathrow airport (which is all I've ever managed to see of the UK so far).

After landing in London I took the bus to Cambridge and walked around the town looking at the colleges (there are many).

And everyone in the town rode bicycles, there were so many people riding around! They also had lots of bike lanes and bicycles parked everywhere, locked to anything that didn't move.

After walking around the town I stumbled on the Sedgwick Museum which had fossils and rocks. It was very tiny, but one of my favorite museum topics and I spent several hours in it. Here is a picture of the largest spider, it would have had a leg span of 50cm!!

And it is also had tons of ammonites and these shapes are ones I haven't seen very often.

Later we went out for dinner in the pub where Watson and Crick would meet to discuss DNA. I had my picture taken next to the photos on display.

The next day we headed into London to check out the sights. Right outside the tube station was Big Ben. There were also kids? teens? in masks trying to get the tourists to take pictures with them and then they would harass them for money afterwards.

We walked by Westminter Abbey but didn't go inside because of the huge lines.

And then we walked Buckingham Palace, which was surrounded by crowds after the changing of the guards (which we missed).

And around the palace they had the gate for Canada.

More walking around, Covent Gardens was full of people! Tons of people, tons of crowds wandering around tons of market stalls and stores. As we wandered the sun set and I got a picture of the London Eye, all lit up.

Then we quickly went by the tower of London and had a look at London Bridge.

Finally we walked by the department store Harrods. The Disney princesses had invaded their Christmas windows. They had had jewelry designed and many things from the department store were on display.

We went into Harrods which was an interesting experience, they had huge crowds in the cheaper Christmas/Harrods key chain section, but the rest of the store had fewer people. The most expensive teacup we found was for 120 pounds (not including the saucer). It was Hermes. They had many departments and we only visited one floor (this one included a bunch of rather large statues).

We headed back to Cambridge and had a great meal in an Algerian restaurant. Definitely more diversity in London compared to Davos! It was a late night and a long day, but the next day was just as long!

The next morning we headed out to see Stonehenge, but the train wasn't running from Cambridge to London! We took a bus (which in my discussion with an abstract artist I learned went through the tiny villages before getting on the autoroute) and then a train to London and missed our connection. We finally made it to Salisbury (looong trip) which was a pretty nice trip. It turns out that you can't really do the trip very cheap, once you get to Salisbury you are still 9 miles from Stonehenge and you can't really walk or cycle because it is next to a busy autoroute. We were so lucky that for our visit we had clear skies, it meant some great photos.

We paid our 20 pounds to take the tour bus from Salisbury and first stopped at Old Sarum, an old town and earthwork from 500BC!

 

The place was huge and they had a few old walls (but with all the facing breaks removed). The walls were made of flint and I haven't seen so much of it before. It was waxy on the inside, chalky on the outside and the chips on the rocks were occasionally quite sharp.

Then we caught our tour bus to Stonehenge. It was really cool, there was a pathway all the way around and tons of people, but the sun was setting and it was getting cold. However, I got some pretty amazing pictures.

But the time we headed back to Salisbury it was almost dark and I got a picture of the cathedral. Apparently inside is one of the four original copies of the Magna Carta, but by that hour everything was closed.

Then it was a long train ride and bus ride back to Cambridge (with a stop near Piccadilly Circus for dinner).