I can’t think of a better place to watch meteors that laying in a field on a crystal clear night in the Swiss mountains. Up way too late, telling myself, “just one more meteor”, I finally feel asleep watching the sky through the door of my tent.
That said, I didn’t sleep all that well, and decamped by 9 am. A very rapid descent into Yverdon followed by taking cycle path 5/22 to Lausanne. When the path forked, I followed 22, as Max warned via email that Path 5 wandered all over the place through fields. 22 being an alternate local route didn’t wander as much, but took a straighter, closer to the mountains, up and down approach. I eventually broke away from 22 to find a supermarket, and then just followed whatever road lead down towards Lausanne.
With a hostel in Lausanne, I thought I’d change things up a bit, but as the hostel was a) full, and b) $50-$70, I’m camped again on a lake at the campground only a few blocks away. Arriving before lunch, I set up camp, ate lunch, and headed into town. Lausanne gives all visitors free public transport, so I grabbed a bus to city center to visit the local churches and museum.
Sitting on the shore of the lake, I finally found an open hotspot. The last few places offering free wi-fi (including the free Lausanne public wi-fi), require registration, where a code is sent via SMS to your local phone number. Not having a local phone number, and only SMS via Google Voice once I have Internet access, makes registering for most free wi-fi (including my go to standard – McDonalds) impossible.
Poor connectivity meant I could just barely message Marnie. Off in the distance, I could see a storm rolling in across Lac Leman. With the first real crack of thunder, a pigeon crapped on my head.
Washing my shirt and head in a local fountain, I found I wasn’t the only person to have encountered that problem. Fortunately my hi-tech wool t-shirt really does provide warmth when wrung dry. The storm continued to roll in, and I retreated to Tourist Information. Winds ripped limbs from branches and pushes waste bins down the street, with the driving rains soaking the passersby for over an hour, leaving me wondering about the campsite.
When I expect bad weather, I’m super-vigilant about setting up the tent, and leave the gear sealed up. Given that when I set the tent up I had clear skies and scorching weather, I’d left everything spread out in the tent to let the heat bake out any moisture. Little I could do from the other side of town, so I went ahead and grabbed dinner, and then headed back. The winds abated, but rain continued to fall. My shirt, mostly dried by that point, back to damp again as I walked back.
Back at the campground the tent at least still standing, but covered with leaves, and broken off limbs. I unzipped the tent, to find everything absolutely and completely dry. I love this tent.