Weeks 21 and 22 - Da Vinci (Part 1) and Biking to Yverdon

After our whirlwind Austria (and Liechtenstein) trip, we took it easy the next two weekends. (Ok... to be honest, M wrote this sentence before this past Saturday's activities... more on that in a bit.)

Last weekend, we went to the Neuchâtel Museum of Natural History (Muséum d'histoire naturelle de Neuchâtel) to see the temporary Leonardo Da Vinci exhibit that closes August 1. The exhibit included posters of his drawings/sketches, as well as wooden replicas of some of his machines, many of which visitors were allowed to operate. Exhibited machines (remember fabricated from wood) included, but were not limited to, a bicycle, a piston, a water pump, a helicopter, a car, and a tank.

The overall impression from the exhibit was that Da Vinci was an amazingly intelligent, creative, and crazy guy. We'll hopefully get a chance to see more about Da Vinci during our Italy trip in the Fall.

In addition to the Da Vinci exhibit, there were also the taxidermical displays one would expect to find in a natural history museum. Being that Neuchâtel is on a lake, there was a very large bird exhibit, complete with push-button bird calls. Another highlight of the museum's permanent collection was the bug exhibit where you could examine specimens under a microscope.

During the week, we got an invitation from some co-workers to go biking along the lake. So, this Saturday morning, we met them in town by the lake with our bikes and started on a "leisurely" tour along the lake to the southwest. A month or so ago, we biked along the lake for a few kilometers, had lunch, and biked back. This weekend's outing, however, turned into a 40 km bike-ride to the city of Yverdon-Les-Bains at the other end of the lake as Neuchâtel. Portions of the ride are were pleasantly flat or downhill, but a good percentage of the ride involved biking up grimace-inducing, thigh-quivering hills. By the time we arrived in Yverdon, there was no way that K or M would bike the 40 km back; there was, in fact, only person in our group of six that was considering biking back by the time we arrived at our destination. After a picnic lunch by the lake in Yverdon, we caught the train back to Neuchâtel, with our bikes and all. Needless to say, we were filling a bit broken after the ride. Besides the obvious sore legs, M had a bruised butt despite her cushy bike seat with shocks, and K had a sore neck due to handle bar position on his road bike. On our tour, we were rewarded with beautiful views of the lake (although anyone attempting this ride should be forewarned that the ride does not hug the lake, but goes up the hillside for pretty vistas), and we may consider the ride again, but not until we've healed. Also, it may be a good idea to go on some more modest rides in between. Perhaps biking 4 times further than you've ever biked previously is a bit ambitious. Perhaps before we quit Switzerland, we will try to ride all the way around the lake.

Saturday night, we walked (or rather, limped) around Neuchâtel to wander through some of the festivities tied to Swiss National Day. Since Swiss National Day is actually on Sunday, some local towns were having fireworks shows Saturday night. We drove up to the Vue des Alpes and got to view two of the shows from above. Since we missed 4th of July fireworks this year, this felt like a real treat. Tonight (Sunday night) we have to decide if we will watch the fireworks over the lake from our apartment balcony or down at the lake edge.

Lessons learned:

1) Swiss National Day is August 1st to celebrate the initial alliance between the cantons of Uri, Schwyz, and Unterwalden in 1291, which signified the birth of Switzerland. The alliance was formed to fight against the Habsburgs, the leaders of the great Austrian empire.

2) K's maths (yeah...with an "s") skills have become a little distorted by his new-found language skills. Example, K says that he was in a work meeting where he spoke mostly in French. Now, normally, mostly means greater than 50% of the time. However, in this case mostly meant more than 25%. (But after K set off the alarm at work early Saturday morning, he spoke entirely [100%] in French to the nice security guard who came to investigate the alarm.)