In Her Majesty's Secret Service?

The peak of glory, or Piz Gloria, became a world star over night and has retained its fame for over fourty years thanks to the neverending reinvention of James Bond films. Now carrying this name is a revolving Restaurant located at almost 3000 meters above sea, on the top of Schilthorn mountain, where Champagne is served for breakfast while visitors, still in their skiboots, get to admire the 360 degree views of some of the most spectacular Alpine scenery in the Bernese Oberland.

Yes, we made it! We returned to this special spot of my beloved country to enjoy our first snow since 2006. For the kids it was the first time ever to touch the white matter. No, we didn't come in Her Majesty's Secret Service, nor was our aim to introduce Vegemite or to get hold of some Schabziger. Our mission was to enjoy as many adventures as possible in the short time available. As a family, I thought there was no better place for this than in Muerren, a tiny, car-less village in the skiresort of Schilthorn that embraces you into its peacefulness the moment you step into it. Located on the edge of an 800m vertical fall (well-known for base jumping), the inhabitants constantly face five of the ugliest mountains in the world (Schreckhorn, Eiger, Moench, Jungfrau and Gspaltenhorn ;-). As such, Muerren offers some of the scariest places to teach the kids their first steps on skis. Mind you, they really only wore one ski at the beginning, and on the learning slope there was hardly any snow to slide much more than 50 metres, but our holiday home was close enough to ski all the way right in front of the door.

This time, the scenery was scary in a way that the surrounding hills were grass-brown and releasing a perfume of the typical local mountain cheese - a sign that the weather was way too warm and dry for the season. In fact the first week round we never recorded temperatures below zero. By way of the news we learnt that a strong weather current was bringing above zero temperatures all the way to the North Pole at a time where the Sun hadn't shone there for over three months. There was definitely something scary going on with the weather. For the kids this wasn't all too bad, in contrary, this was probably the best opportunity to get accustomed to snow and skiing - no freezing cheeks and fingers, and plenty of energy left to follow up with sledging the bob run and ice skating to close off the day. And as the sharing of these activities was so much fun, even their grandfather Yeye joined in wherever he could.

Gugu and Momo were generally on a calmer rhythm, enjoying walks and views in the beautiful winter sun in between catching up with us for brekkie or dinner or the occasional ski session. They had agreed to rent a nearby appartment in order to be able to spend some quality time in the extended family, something really rare for us living abroad, which even compelled Rafa to leave Barcelona and come and join us. Towards half-time of our stay Anh-Dao's parents Madou and Papi-Phuc, brother Thang and sister-in-law Yaya joined in to make for an absolutely epic family get together (by our dimensions). A second chapter had started, with staff changes being accompanied by snow falls that transformed the hiking resort into what we had initially dreamt of - a ski resort. We even found some "Pulver-Gut" to enjoy a couple of pristine pow-pow descents.

After five days on the learning slope, the kids were ready to explore some of the pists in the higher sections around Birg and Schilthorn. They were so keen we agreed to guide them down the long, extremely steep and pretty narrow black runs from the very top to the village. They demonstrated a lot of courage and this got them onto the fast learning track. After just twelve days, Laetitia started to develop some early carving skills, while Oceane's focus remained more on the old school parallel turns. I am almost certain this success is not only due to the morning routines at ski school, but also to heaps of Roeschti and Schnitzel which the kids devoured eagerly many times. One can imagine their dad's smile so wide you can't see the ears any more ;-)

As usual, time passed too quickly, but I believe we made the best of it and we will deeply cherish the wonderful time spent with our families and a few good friends who joined in shortly. Hard to say goodbye, but then again, there's more to look forward to... After just two weeks in the snow (and one night jointly celebrating my Dad's and my birthdays), Anh-Dao and I returned to Perth for work, but the kids continued feasting with their grandparents and godmothers on an extended holiday in Switzerland before returning back home with Momo who will spend another four weeks with us in the scorching summer downunder.