The Struggle for Creux-de-Van

Saturday was going to be packed. That we knew full well.

We got up early, having slept well and made an early dash for the l'Aubier, the eco-friendly farm that we stayed at during the week.  The organic bits and pieces there were too tempting to overlook for gifts and trinkets.

By some bizarre twist of physics, we were still below the cliff!

Unfortunately, l'Aubier is in Montezillion, well outside of Neuchâtel and I had to drive.  I knew, positively knew, that this would not end well for us.

We started by stopping just outside of town at a recommended Chocolate maker.  It was so decadent and rich so early in the morning, that we were actually repulsed.  Plus, the chocolates weren't going to keep for another potential month to see their new owner/consumer.  So we thanked the friendly owner and moved on.

I predictably got lost on the way to Montezillion, but only lost a half hour before realizing I had been initially correct in all my judgements.  We got to l'Aubier just before noon.

We browsed for a while and after purchasing gifts, made full intention of heading back to Neuchâtel to relax before meeting the girls for dinner at 7:30p.

However, fate led us in an entirely different direction.  Out of the corner of my eye, as we pulled onto the main road out of Montezillion, I spotted a spectacular gorge.  It looked like an enormous sheer wall.  I was stunned only long enough to make my turn awkward in the direction of the gorge.

The gorge is called Creux-de-Van and is a sheer 1500 foot drop absolutely straight down.  The gorge then falls down another sheer foot at least another 500 feet.  Apparently, it was carved out of ice and glaciers.  I imagine it would require something of that magnitude to create such an event.

Anyway, I was struck by an impulse to stand on top of it.  There was no turning back now.  And Jason, by virtue of sitting in the passenger's seat, was going to be taken for the ride.  I felt mildly sorry, but I wasn't going to turn around now.

We got lost again on out to Creux-de-Van and ended up going down rather then up, into the dizzying gorge by tiny one-way roads.  After criss-crossing a number of times, we ended up in a spectacular little town called Champes-de-Moulin at the base of the gorge.

We parked the car in a mowed field next to a couple of other tourist cars, cursed our luck for being extremely unprepared for a hike, and then took a walk through town.  With the curvature of the gorge wrapping around the town, the walls seemed even a bit pressed in on the town, which to me, made it even more beautiful and secluded.

***

Jason, meanwhile, in his completely straight, heterosexual pursuit of taking thousands of pictures of flowers, found a couple nice manly red ones near a very masculine house (I tease of course, it was a masculine barn).  It seems these sitting on a window sill of, what seemed to me, to be an effectively abandoned house.

Jason, however, found out that the exact opposite was true, and was startled as a woman burst open the window doors as he took a picture.  The woman was much older and extremely jolly.  She spoke to us in French at first and asked us if we liked the house.

Amazingly, though, when she heard me stumble through the French, she laughed and spoke in a crisp mildly-American english.  Taken aback, I tried initially to respond again in French, and she said not to worry, she enjoyed speaking English.

This lady turned out to be one of the most interesting folks we met on our travels.  Speaking 7 languages, she traveled all about Switzerland taking on odd jobs.  She was Swiss-German born, but had worked at the Gare (train station) in Neuchâtel, and had accompanied Americans through to their destination for years-- hence the mildly American accent.

We spoke for 25 minutes about her house, her life, and what we thought of Switzerland (orgasmic, we said).  The time flew by, and it wasn't until we belatedly remembered that we had a schedule did we politely take our leave and move on.  There are truly fascinating people in this world to meet, provided you take the time (and love taking pictures of flowers).

***

The town was quite the opposite place we wanted to be (that is, we wanted to be on top of the gorge).  So, we took some convoluted directions in French to the town of Norraigue, where we would park and hoof it to the top.  This seemed dodgy, but we obeyed.

We arrived and immediately realized we were extremely far away from the gorge, so we drove on, irritating cyclists and hikers alike.  We arrived at a small dot on the map called Ferme Robet, a farm and restaraunt, where we could drive no further.  We had made it. Hoorah for the car.

Except that, by some bizarre twist of physics, we walked towards the gorge and realized that we were still below it. Frustrated, we decided to settle and just walk up to the beginning of the drop off and look up.  The hike took a little over a half an hour (with Jason pausing every so often to take pictures of flowers), but we still couldn't find it.

We passed a number of hikers and everyone said 'Bonjour!'  This was because no one knew where each other was from, and it seemed polite to say hello in the French as this was Swiss-French territory.  If I had my guess though, a lot of them seemed very German.  Only a hunch.

Having given up on pretty much everything, but still having to make it back to Neuchâtel, we left our hopes and dreams for another day.  We got into the car, smoked down the mountainside and back into the dizzying autoroutes of Neuchâtel.