Forty years ago we were in Geneva for the first time, when we drove through France in our little Renault 12 station wagon. Last weekend our Saturday outing led us to this beautiful city, and we realized we we were on an "anniversary visit".
The first visible landmark was a gigantic jet of water rising up out of the lake to the height of 140 metres. We don't remember seeing this before.
Having bought a Geneva pass for the day, we headed for the first attraction on our agenda, the museum of the Reformation. Terry especially appreciated having a hand held audio commentary; he actually said it was the best museum we'd seen in Europe because he could understand every little detail about each display. We read all about the formation of the Protestant church started by Martin Luther, who said the Bible was the authority for life rather than the church. The Swiss leader was John Calvin, to the left. In another wonderful part of the museum one could smell different scents of the Bible like various spices, and myrrh.
After eating lunch in the amazing sunshine, we looked inside the Protestant Cathedrale de Saint Pierre, whose plain interior with its high gothic arches closely resembled the Lausanne cathedrale. Walking back to the lake, we decided to take a boat ride featuring beautiful mansions, famous villas, and the parks and gardens bordering the lake. We could even see Mont Blanc, but it was too hazy to get a good picture.
After an hour's cruise around the harbour, we were just in time to hop onto a little train for a tour of the "vieille ville", the old town. Finally, as we rode through a beautifully landscaped area, we spied a familiar landmark, one we'd also seen forty years ago, with the four famous reformers in relief -Calvin, Beza, Farel, and Knox .
We didn't have time to inspect it up close.
 |
Cathedrale de Saint Pierre on the right
We wanted to go on one more "train" ride at 5:00 pm, but when the driver showed up he said "Route barree", and his sign language did not help the waiting people understand he wasn't doing the final ride of the day. They kept pointing to the schedule, but to no avail.
We manged to get back to the Base at the decent hour of 7:30 pm, happy with our day's outing. |
After eating lunch in the amazing sunshine, we looked inside the Protestant Cathedrale de Saint Pierre, whose plain interior with its high gothic arches closely resembled the Lausanne cathedrale. Walking back to the lake, we decided to take a boat ride featuring beautiful mansions, famous villas, and the parks and gardens bordering the lake. We could even see Mont Blanc, but it was too hazy to get a good picture.
No comments:
Post a Comment