Switzerland vacation: Friday in wine country (Lavaux)

I saved my favorite vacation day for last.  If you've been following my blog regularly you'll know that I have frequently posted about the Lavaux vineyard region since we go here often for wine festivals and scenic drives.  But there was just something about this particular day that made it magical.  The combination of absolutely gorgeous weather, the vineyards in bloom, the azure blue lake, frolicking  in the vineyards with one of my best friends, and a surprise afternoon adventure, made this day one of my favorite yet in Switzerland.  Here's how the day went...

We took the train from Geneva to the little town of Epesses in the wine country (this is about a 40 minute train ride from Geneva).  From Epesses we wound our way up the hill through the vineyards to Rue de la Corniche, one of the main (and only) local roads through this area.  The road makes for an easy and beautiful stroll throughout the region.

The view from the town of Epesses

After walking around the town of Epesses, we kept meandering our way on the Route de la Corniche to the town of Chexbres.

The view in between Epesses and Chexbres

Unfortunately the clouds were stuck over the mountains on the other side of the lake, still beautiful though!

We arrived in Chexbres around lunch time. The nickname for Chexbres is called "Balcon du Leman" or in English, "Balcony of Lake Geneva", a name that it acquired for its drop dead gorgeous views over the lake. Having researched thoroughly beforehand (can you tell we are both Type A's?), our destination was to have lunch at "le Deck".  This restaurant hangs over the vineyards and the lake, what better place to have lunch? 

Le Deck has a amazing deck -- ironic, right ;) -- in the middle of the restaurant with a vanishing pool in front of it which provided for some spectacular photo opps.

The view from the vanishing pool

Looking over the restaurant

The next part of the afternoon was one of the most authentic and entertaining parts of my time in Switzerland thus far... we spent our afternoon with the lovely Swiss gentlemen below (and about 4 others that Sarah wasn't able to slyly capture all in the same secret camera shot)...

Who are they?  Well, let's back up. After lunch at Le Deck, we walked across to a hotel and asked the concierge to recommend a "cave ouverte" for us in town.  He called Eric, the guy on the left in the above photo, who owns one of the larger vineyards in Chexbres with his brothers. Eric told us to come over at 4PM to have a tasting.  Said tasting was supposed to be 3 mini glasses of wine for 15 Swiss francs.  Well, said tasting turned into 8 glasses of wine for free and many hours of chatting with Eric and his neighborhood buddies about everything under the sun: the local wine industry, the Miami Heat, Puff Daddy's upcoming visit to Lavaux, Eric's anniversary, US taxes, Swiss politics, how we felt about our American heritage, and everything else under the sun. It started with Eric sitting down with us to explain the first wine we were tasting and telling us about the history of the winery that has been in his family for hundreds of years and it turned into him staying and then one by one, his neighborhood friends joined and each was greeted with more wine by Eric as he asked them to stay and join our conversation.  By the end of the afternoon, we were joined by Eric, his wife, his best friend from Belgium, his brother-in-law from Italy, the guy who grows grapes for him in the next town over, and the caterer who brought lasagna for dinner.  Swiss are known for being traditionally reserved and not overly open to making friends with foreigners, so I was loving this welcoming and friendly Swiss family.  They were just plain nice, warm, authentically Swiss people.  We kept wondering how we would ever escape; but, with free wine in our glasses, entertaining company and conversation, beautiful weather, this scenery, and a plate of local Swiss cheese and meat in front of us -- it was the quintessential way to end our vacation week in Switzerland.

We had to break away from Eric and his friends to meet Ryan in Geneva for dinner, so we bid adieu and purchased a few bottles of Eric's wine to bring back with us

View from Eric's vineyard

The sun setting on a beautiful day and vacation week

Here is how we met our cheese/chocolate/wine requirements for the day:

Cheese: Cheese at Eric's vineyard
Chocolate: Nutella on bagels on the train ride over
Wine: Duh! ;)

So that was vacation week! What a great time! Thanks Slac (aka Sarah) for coming over and joining me on this Swiss adventure.  Who is next?! :)