Hike, work, cook, eat, ski, repeat.

Yesterday was another hike to the usual waterfall, Engstligen. Like I said, we don't have many hikes open in the winter due to the snow level, and this one's popular with the guests in any season anyway. I don't mind going there every other week. It's still a decent hike, and I get to spend four or five hours hiking through a Swiss valley as part of my job. Hardly anything to complain about. Also, the scenery is slightly different each time, depending on whether we have had fresh snowfall, a melt and freeze, or just sunshine lately. We had another snow barbeque, as well, this time for just a small group. We took a couple of Welsh women with us this time, as well as the six Brits from the igloo day. These first few pictures are all from the hike.

We've a volunteer family working with us for a week, which means we can foist all our least favorite tasks off on them for a while. We won't be mean, but it should be nice to get a bit of a break. They were supposed to be doing a deep cleaning of the mini chalet on the hill, but we have a British family booked in there for the week. The Brits are great fun, actually. The parents are witty and intelligent, and the kids are a hoot. The son's only eight, and he's an adorable ginger boy, full of questions and energy. The daughter is eleven and more pensive, and she's very quick to catch on.

The volunteer family will be working on two of our other small buildings instead of the mini chalet, then just helping out. The mom's a nurse, so she'll go through all our med kits and organize them. The daughter will just pitch in here and there, and the father's an engineer. He'll be fixing the little things around here until our maintainance guy comes back next month. On his list are a few floorboards, the guest dryer (which is some kind of condenser, rather than the usual type with lots of hot air), and, most importantly, the table-tennis table, which has a broken leg.

Finn and I stayed up late in the kitchen last night. She's going on a business trip to Geneva soon, then spending a week back home. She started here in my position and then got hired on for another year, so she needs to gather up her summer gear and say goodbye to her friends and all that. But she was thinking about Finland, so she decided to make us a treat.

Karjalanpiirakka, and yes, I can say it, are Christmas food. They're mash tucked into a thin circle of rye bread, almost like a little tortilla, and then crimped up into the center. I told Finn they reminded me of beetles, and Sydney came by while we were working and said they were witchity grubs. Finn let me cut the rye dough into little bits and then flatten them into pancakes. She rolled them out until they were nearly crepe-thin and about the size of my handspan, then carefully shaped the mashed potato into an oval in the center and performed the special crimp. We made at least seventy, and she got up early to bake them. They're quite tasty, probably because the final step is to brush them on both sides with butter when they come out of the oven. Finn says her family eats them like bread in the winter, serving them with every meal and smearing them with mustard and ham like open-face sandwiches.

Today may as well have been a holiday, it was so full of fun. I got up early to hit the slopes. They're closing the World Cup run on Chuenisbärgli, and we only have a couple more weeks on the pistes at Silleren, Hahnenmoos, Metch, and Lenk. I keep hoping they'll extend the season due to all the snow we're getting. It's glorious up there. Finn and SAussie didn't think it was glorious enough, probably due to the powder level, but there were sunbreaks today and I had a good time. I got tired around three, though, after six hours in the drifts, and it started whiting out on my run home. I ran into the Welsh women twice this afternoon, so I got to hear a bit about their country. I'd like to visit some day. After skiing, I parked my gear at the bottom of the lift and headed into town for an hour. Nobody steals anything here, so I could just leave my skis in the rack on the side of the parking lot and enjoy my fries and beer worry-free. Finn gave me a ride back up the hill, and we grabbed a quick dinner before heading back into town to meet up with SAussie.

The pool in town is part of a spa complex in the bottom of the main hotel. It's not very big, and it's clearly designed for plashing around rather than swimming laps, but it has some nice features. There are two shower-jets that will rain hard on your shoulders and neck if you stand under them, and the whole pool is kept rather warm. You can swim through a doorway into the outdoor portion, where you can recline on some curved metal tubes that are shaped into a rather horizontal couch. They emit bubbles every now and again. I felt like I was soaking in champagne while watching the sun set and the stars come out. There are also heated seats outside the pool and a rail running around one side of it, presumably for playing on. We stayed in for a couple of hours to get our twelve CHF worth, then jumped out and ducked into the little Kino, where "The Other Boleyn Girl" was playing. After a month of living and working at the chalet, it was nice to feel like we had a real social life in town.