In September, Amanda and James came to visit from Australia. We took them to one of France’s most famous affineurs, Bernard Antony, about half an hour’s drive away. The exceptional selection of cheeses there was well worth the trip, and kept us in mouth-watering heaven for days. They also accompanied us on the boys’ first ever day hike, a 7km stroll down from the top of the Wasserfallen gondola in Reigoldswil. The reward for all that walking was a ride on the Solarbob at Langenbruck, a fantastic solar-powered cart track that includes a 540 degree turn.

Then it was time for the boys’ fifth birthday party, which had a magic forest theme. Aunty Sabine baked a fabulous cake in the shape of a tree stump with gnarled roots and a knotted face. This complemented the giant redwood in our back garden, which had suddenly acquired a face (seen above) and a crackling voice. The band of dwarves, elves and faeries that came to celebrate were captivated by the stories and riddles told by the tree. The fact that Uncle Edgar was spotted later with a walkie-talkie was merely a coincidence, of course.

Two weeks later we embarked on more hiking, taking the train to Interlaken on a beautiful Sunday. We caught the old cog-wheel train up to Schynige Platte for a short hike with views over both lakes and the Jungfrau mountain range. The boys were keen to show what strong mountain men they were, although we had to curb their enthusiasm when it came to throwing large rocks.

In early October, we spent a day at Europapark, Germany’s largest theme park, with friends from Freiburg, Elisabeth and Guido. The park is huge, and cannot possibly be explored in just one day. The boys loved riding the roller-coasters, especially the alpine coaster Enzian (seen below) and the Pegasus. Also popular was the Atlantis Adventure, in which visitors get to shoot lasers at creatures in an undersea tunnel to accumulate a point score.

We’re now in the final stages of packing up to leave Switzerland. We’ve de-registered as residents of the Basel city canton, a procedure costing a mere 80 Swiss Francs, and we’ve filed a tax return covering the part year up to our departure. The latter is legally required in order to leave the country, even though we won’t actually get the bill for the tax until sometime next year. The movers will come on Monday, and we’ll set off on seven weeks of travelling on our way back to Australia. For that reason, there’ll be a pause in posts on the Basilisk’s Gaze. But once we are back online in Sydney, we’ll be sure to update you here on the adventures we’ve had en route.