July 31

An excellent day. To start off with we headed south east along the Lake Geneva and stopped to visit Chateau Chillon (just South of Montreux). It is a really neat old castle (mostly constructed in the 1200s) right on the lake of Geneva. Jack liked it because it had “chains, cells, and towers to look all around from”. There were some cool latrines too. The Chateau was made famous when Byron wrote the Prisoner of Chillon based on the true story of Francois Bonivard, a Genevois who was imprisoned there in the 1500’s for opposing the local Duke. When we were finished we went for a swim at this little crescent beach right beside the castle. It was clean blue water and very refreshing.

Very weird coincidence, as we drove south from Monteux through a neighbouring little town called Villeneuve we heard Smoke on the Water being played on the radio. The weird part is that this is apparently where Deep Purple got the inspiration for Smoke on the Water as they watched the wooden concert hall in Monteux burn after it was lit on fire by a flare at a Zappa concert.

We then drove a little further south east to a little town called Sion. We drove past several vine vineyards that creep up the hill side so far that you wouldn’t think that anyone could possible stand and pick the grapes let alone plant them. It was so beautiful. The wine is supposed to be some of the best in Switzerland…so we bought a couple of bottles. We then proceeded along a long, steep and winding road for about 16 km. to one of the largest (highest, as high in fact as the Eiffel Tower) dams in the world, ‘Grande Dixence”. It was definitely high and large! Quite neat to see. Mind you, several comparisons were made between this particular sight and Clark Griswald’s “World’s Largest Ball of String” which was only "three short hours away".

On the way home we stopped in Vevey and had a picnic (apparently pronounced “peekneek” in French) on the lake while watching the sunset.