You would have thought I would have remembered

View toward Col de Creusaz

Bob frequently reminds me that I graduated from college magna cum laude. It's usually when I can't remember something, ask a question I should know the answer to, or I don't rapidly put "two and two" together. He actually teases me that I was summa cum laude, but I have to remind him, that no, I was only magna.

Col de Creusaz, from the part way up

You would have thought I would have remembered. After all, I have spend quite a bit of time sharing with others about how we learn and how to help your children increase their ability to remember what you teach them. Maybe I need to do these things myself!!

If you have read this blog for a while or have kept up with our activities, you know that we spend as much time as possible in the mountains hiking. If you asked me to choose my favorite activities, hiking would be way up on the top of the list. Rogers and Hammerstein must have enjoyed hiking as well, or understood the impact that the beauty of God's creation can have.

The hills are alive with the sound of music
With songs they have sung for a thousand years
The hills fill my heart with the sound of music
My heart wants to sing every song it hears




Path along the ridge of Col de Creusaz

Ah, but I digress. We went to Evian, planning to spend one of our days there hiking in the French Alps, knowing we were in the Haute Savoie area of the Alps (also known as the Chablais region). Asking for suggestions from the hotel, we were sent to the tourist office in the town of Bernex, just a few kilometers away.



We were able to purchase a hiking trail booklet, which was only available in French. But since it appeared to have good maps, we thought we could use it to at least head us in the right direction. And so we looked for a 3-4 hour hike and set out for the town listed as the trail head, found the listed parking lot, put on our hiking shoes and....



Well, it wasn't clear from the signs we saw which way we were to head to follow the trail. None of the signs listed what seemed to be the next location on the hike. Hmmm. There were two main options. One headed off up a slight grade up a road. The other was a path straight up. If you know Bob, you know which option we took. I'm glad we took that path. Not initially, but eventually. It soon became clear that whatever trail we were following was not the same as the one listed in the trail book. But we've done this many times in Switzerland. Follow signs pointing somewhere. When we get there see if we can figure out a way to make it a loop and head back to where we started.



After a while, I realized that Bob had decided to follow the signs to Col de Cruesaz. (Cruesaz was the little village where we had parked the car.) The trail keep going up and up and up. Bob hikes with his GPS watch on so that after we're done, he can have a record of our hike with elevation information, distance, time, and even get a cool look at our hike via a google earth map application. I enjoy having this record after the fact, although sometimes when he tells me how short of a distance we've traveled in a long time period, I have threatened to throw his device off the side of some cliff. I would have had many opportunities on this hike.

After hiking 3 km, with 1 km of elevation gain over that stretch (thanks, GPS), we reached Col de Creusaz, laid down on the grass and enjoyed the view down to Lac Leman. We continued on along the ridge line to the next peak, Pic des Memises. We continued a bit farther and then went down into the valley and followed a route that Bob had been watching to make our path at least somewhat circular. Without a complete trail map, we weren't sure how far of a hike it would be if we tried to go around the mountain we had traveled around on our way up. As we came back, it did look like we would have encountered some steep cliffs, so Bob had, once again, found a good route back for us. It was a beautiful area. Driving back to Evian we passed many beautiful chalets. I hope one day we can return and hike again. If we do, I might buy the book Walking in the Haute Savoie, by Janette Norton.



But it was not until we were almost back to the parking lot when I remembered the meaning of Col. All those hours spent watching the Tour de France with Bob. All those mountain tops they climbed. How many of them were Col de something or other? A lot of them. So when we're hiking toward Col de Creusaz we were hiking a mountain. I have always said that experiential learning is critical part of education, because when it involves all of our senses we are not soon apt to forget.

I watched it on TV. I heard it mentioned, I even read the names of the mountains. But once I hiked a Col, believe me, I will remember it. And with very fond memories. Thanks, Bob.