Annecy

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4 December 2021 - Annecy

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This month's race was a vertical kilometer on the mountain of Semnoz, which lies above the French town of Annecy. It's a beautiful little town on an alpine lake of the same name, much like Geneva, Neuchâtel, Zürich, Thun and so many others in the Alps. I arrived last night, so there wasn't a lot of time for sightseeing but I did get a tartiflette for dinner and visit the Christmas market along the river. The race was not designed to be attended by the carless, and I foolishly didn't bring my credit card so I couldn't rent one. So this morning I took a taxi up the mountain to catch the busride down the mountain which was required to collect my race bib. You needed to be on the bus by 8:15, but the race didn't start until 10 and then went in waves. My wave was at 10:20. That meant waiting an hour on the bus including the 20 minute ride down the mountain to the start and then another hour waiting in a cold tent by the startline. All the waiting was a little frustrating, but the race was worth it. Straight up the snowy mountain gaining 1000 m of altitude in under 5 km. The rain was also a constant even as the snow went from a dusting to I don't know how many feet deep on the upper slopes. We started off right into a stream of snowmelt that we ran up ensuring no one had dry feet. The trail was mostly through forest, although it did open up at the top. At some points on the icy cliffs I did feel a little acrophobia, but I just sped up to compensate. It was not really running, but a brisk sherpa cadence of hiking. 10 steps, stop, 10 steps, stop . . . Afterward they had a spectacular spread of meats, cheeses, chocolate and fruit, but nonalcoholic beer and nonalcoholic vin chaud. For the ride down I hitched a ride from a skier named Louis who was the same age as Maxwell. He was interested to compare his own life to that of Maxwell's in Norway. The lovely little hotel I stayed at by the château was run by a cute family complete with children and grandmother and dog. They were incredibly helpful and I don't think I would stay anywhere else in Annecy if one of their rooms is available. After picking up my bags I went down to a café for some real vin chaud and to finish writing my Christmas postcards. I used the photo of me in the Santa outfit from the HHI Marathon last month, and have managed about 50 this year. Probably I have forgotten some people, but it seems to be a dying art although I will keep it going as long as I can. So I'm going to head to the post office and then the bus station. Hopeful there's no trouble getting back into Switzerland; apparently they've tightened restrictions since yesterday. These politicians are so destructive in their rush to appear like they're "doing something".