Tis the season to be jolly!

Feeling quite festive today, because I went to a Christmas market yesterday, and have just spent a while finishing off the Christmas wreath thing I'm making for mum (I'd call it a holly wreath, but there is no holly on it).

Anyway, the Christmas market! Went to Basel (it's about 2hours away by train) to check out their market, even though I was rather hungover from my trip the previous night to Schaffhausen (one of the Swiss cities bombed quite badly in WW2- look it up on wikipedia!). I just about
managed to drag myself out of bed in time for the train, and met Elaine there around midday. She was in a similar state, having been out the previous night- although I think she hadn't quite managed to get to bed at all, so I was definitely better off.

It didn't take too long to find the market, and it was lovely- some really gorgeous stalls, mostly quite traditional things. There was a fantastic stall selling authentic German stollen, but it was ridiculously expensive so I couldn't buy any. Sorry mum, will get some before I come back though, I promise!

We didn't buy very much, and what I did buy, I can't really disclose here, because it may have involved Christmas presents, haha. I did get some lovely glühwein though, and the best bit is you paid 4fr for the drink itself (£2.40) and then you had to pay an extra 3fr (£1.80) as a deposit on the mug- basically, you could keep the mug, and if you didn't want to, you got your 3fr back. We kept ours, of course.

We spent a couple of hours at the market and then just wandered about the city itself. It's a nice city, quite big, lots of nice shops and then the normal sort of high street shops. We also took a quick trip on the tram, just for a laugh, and decided to go to the St Louis Grenze (French border!) and had a quick walk around France, haha. It was very strange when all the signs were suddenly in French, instead of German. We did try to find the 3 borders, where France, Germany and Switzerland all meet, but we were unsuccessful. I will do that sometime though!

After our quick trip to France it was back to Switzerland to wander about the shops, then back to the train station so poor Elaine could get the 5hr train back to Lyon. She got some raclette- looked interesting, but I didn't have time for it. So I was back here in my flat by about 7.20, having had a most pleasant festive day- shame it's still so bloody warm here (for November, that is- still 10-13°).

I have my own Christmas tree now though! It's quite small really, but it's fairly festive. Unfortunately due to its small size, the fairy lights I have are a bit big for it.. oh well, it's the effort that counts- it took 3 or 4 goes to get the lights looking half decent so I'm happy to leave them as they are. And I have my festive Christmas music playing, c/o parents- thanks for the cd!

JUST LOOKED AT THE FORECAST FOR TOMORROW AND APPARENTLY IT'S GOING TO SNOW!!!

Although it's set to rain the rest of the week.. boo.