This final week of the year was a week off, and I took it slow accordingly.

Tuesday after talking to our dear friend P we decided to indeed spend New Years Eve with them, visting them in their home in Switzerland. We got ourselves tested Wednesday as Switzerland currently demands a test next to proof of vaccination or recovery, and filled out the entry forms we also needed to submit. It’s been a while that traveling around Europe took this type of paperwork. Reminds me of the 70s and 80s when my dad would arrange travel insurance, traveler cheques and foreign currencies before we left for holiday travel.

Other things this week included writing and posting my annual Tadaa! list, I made good progress on a php script that can create OPML book lists directly from my markdown notes, and I bought baking powder mix for oliebollen. Oliebollen are traditionally made in the Netherlands for New Years Eve, and it’s our own little tradition that P and I make them when we’re in Switzerland at the end of year. Visiting P and B was great. Seeing them again for the first time in two years made me realise how I’d missed them.

Around noon today we said goodbye to P and B and their teenage sons, and drove from Lake Zug along the beautiful Vierwaldstättersee to the nearby city of Luzern. We rented a small 8th floor two bedroom penthouse apartment with what turned out a beautiful view of snow covered Alps, amongst which the Pilatus, Luzern’s ‘home mountain’. The apartment comes with a parking space, for which you take the car two floors down in a car sized elevator, much to Y’s (and our) surprise. This afternoon we walked around Luzern for a bit, had coffee with pastries and generally enjoyed hanging out with the three of us.

I wish you all a great and healthy 2022.

Luzern, Unter der Egg with the Rathaussteg bridge at dusk today, seen from across the Reuss.