Tuesday in Val d'isere

Last night while I called Thomas in Bern (our former neighbor) Steve started talking to some friends of Bernard (Shannon's host dad). W/o me knowing it, he had planned a bike ride w/ a 58 year old Spainerd up the mountain here in Val d'Isere while I was planning for us to go to Bern. Needless to say we were a little disappointed we wouldn't be heading to Bern.

We had a deluxe multi course meal w/ Shannon's host family last night along w/2 other couples, friends of theirs from here. Lots of wine and cheese and other exotic meats. My favorite was the dessert which was very large figs boiled in red wine w/cinnamon. We didn't finish eating till after 10:30 pm.

We woke up to overcast skies and it was too cold for Steve to do his ride, so we briefly debated heading to Bern even though it was over 5 hours away and we would only see Thomas for a few hours. But our better judgement prevailed and we decided to stay in Val d'Isere another day and call this a rest day. We lounged around, had a late breakfast, the skies cleared up, Steve went off to rent a mountain bike in town and took off riding w/Antonio, his new best friend that doesn't speak English. Steve's been using his high school spanish to converse w/him and they seem to do ok.

The girls and I watched the Tour de France TTT from Tours to Bois for an hour and then headed off for a beautiful hike in the mtns for several hours w/Joelle. It was very cool today w/clear skies. The flowers are gorgeous around here and many are the same as we see in our Colorado mtns.

We head to Nancy tomorrow so we'll be there in time to see the Tour de France arrive their on Thursday.