Weihnachtsmarkts

One of the common sights across much of Northern Continental Europe at this time of year are Weihnanchtsmarkts or Christmas Markets. In the UK people seem to jump onto coaches, trains and planes to come over for markets in France, Germany, Austria & Switzerland. Now we don't need to bother as Basel has a renowned market along with the German town of Freiburg, which is only 45 minutes away by ICE! We went to the German market with Monica & Peter today and spent some time at the Gluewein bar as well as wandering around the pretty old town. The it was back on the train and back to Basel for more Gluewein!

The wonderful world of podcasts - 1

I really don't know how I would survive without the downloading of podcasts. How did we ever manage to survive without these wonderful snippets of UK radio. Whether listening on the Train to Basel, whilst cycling in the gym, whilst cooking in the kitchen or just at my PC, they have become a perfect accompaniment to an Englishman in Switzerland. The reason they are so good is I've never time to listen to the radio when the actual progammes are on (the same reason the recording feature on Bluewin TV is used so much) so you just set up iTunes (no iPod required thank god) and subscribe to the podcasts of choice. It started with the obvious football ones like 606, 5live daily, Guardian Football Weekly, Arsecast and the truly wonderful Fighting Talk. Now it includes comedy shows from Radio 4, the return of Danny Baker & Danny Kelly along with cricket, Jonathan Ross and any other that I see recommended!

A Swiss Xmas meal

Tonight we visited a really "tacky" but truly fun restaurant in Basel. Each year (at Christmas) this restaurant closes for 2 days to get itslef ready for the holiday period. Inside the guests find cycling Santa Claus', Flying angels and evry 90 minutes or so - a cabaret show of xmas songs performed by miming puppets of singers such as Freddie Mercury, Tina Turner and ending with Bocelli (see picture). Each accompanied by sax playing reindeer, dancing christamas trees and a spoon wielding ratatouille rat! If you're ever here make sure you visit the Statdtkeller in Marktgasse.

England Lose - Basel wins in more ways than one?

So it was very hard not to laugh at Scott Carson's complete disaster yesterday evening but the resulting abject performance was met with sadness here in Switzerland. The free newspapers such as 20 Minuten and .ch both said the tournament will miss the team and the fan invasion (gone are the days when countries actually fear the "hooligan" element) though it will make policing the city much easier. A big cheer went up in the pub (MacGuinesses') when the 3rd Croatian goal went in but NOT because the Swiss were pleased for Croatia (or Russia even) but for the scorer Petric (an ex-FC Basel PLAYER). I just hope the lack of England won't affect my Euro 2008 volunteering prospects.

A winter walk and a b#####ed camera!

The snow that arrived this week in Switzerland persuaded us to try and find a little close to home for a fresh winter walk. We took the train to Sissach, whereupon I took my camera out for a quick picture only to find it knackered - just showing a black image where a view should be. After a grumpy 15 minutes I was relieved to see that our trip had been worthwhile as we started climbing into the hills South of Sissach. The snow would be best described as a light dusting but we were only 600m up. No need to say that I've got no picturesque wintery scenes to show!

Mulled wine and Ikea

We're looking after a flat for some friends (whilst they have a trip back home to the USA) and as part of our deal we've borrowed their car for a couple of hours and headed off to get wine for a mulled wine party in December plus a quick trip into Ikea. Of course, any trip to Ikea always seems to result in about 30 items that you had no intention of buying before you went there. At least, I got teh wine rack for all the recent wine delivered.

Es gibt keine schnee (noch nicht)

The weather has got decidely chilly and the forecast across the country is for snow, though it seems that most is arriving to the East and South of us here in Basel. We did see some sleet today but since Davos has had 72 hrs of snow (1m) we're still lagging behind here.

Our Wine Arrives

Remember the Weinmesse of a couple of weeks ago - well the wine arrived today so we can start planning that "weinkeller" now.

One to One Lessons and a quick hop across the Border

My German class comprises just the three students (including myself) so with one on holiday and one looking after their ill son it was a solo lesson today. This was good practice and also meant we finished a lot earlier as it was that more intensive. This gave me the time to hop on a tram (the Nr 10 tram is apparently the longest tram route in Europe)to the French border and a quick trip to Geant for bits & bobs you can't get here (like Paté and Bran Flakes :-) ) as well as some cheaper fish and meat. Never quite sure what language to speak half the time though as my small brain juggles French and German words around!

Winter approaches and that means....

the ski season is not that far away. So today I collected our skis from their service in readiness for the winter ahead. The shops, of course, are all set up for ski services and ours only cost 44CHF (around £20). It even looks like some snow may hit Basel this weekend!

Another quick dash home..

..this weekend and it was with BA this time. I know they get stick from many sides (partly due to their status as "national airline" and partly due to their own cock-ups) but I always find them a standard up from the Easyjets of this world. Nothing wrong with easyjet at all but I feel more like a customer with BA. If only the taxiing around at Heathrow wasn't nearly as long as the flight! Good result as we came back twice to maintain our unbeaten record and stay top of the league. The old Arsenal shirt induced many conversations with Heathrow staff on the way home on Saturday night.