My first Christmas present of 2015

Grüezi mitenand !

Today in the morning, not the Santa Claus but UPS delivered my first Christmas present 2015. It's from me to myself : -)

For a long time I've been looking for a small laptop. I'm not an Apple guy, so I didn´t want to buy a Macbook Pro or something like that. I know that Macbook Pro is really good, but also one reason not to buy, is that I already have a lots of expensive programs for Windows, like Photoshop, Lightroom, Office etc. And another, more important reason is that my wife won't let me buy an Apple products : -)

My old computer, 15" HP Envy dv6 is about three years old, and it's still working very good, and I like windows 10. There´s a few reasons for an update. One problem along with big size and heavy weight is only less than two hours of battery life. To me in my situation now, when I'm sitting a lot of my time in trains and buses, i need something more compact. It have to be small and light, but it also have to be powerful enough that it can handle big graphic files in Photoshop and picture editing with Lightroom should run without lagging. I also like sharp screens with big resolution, and I'm a big fan of touchscreens. At home when I'm working with large graphic files, I'm using my 24" screen for that.

I was waiting for Microsoft's new models Surface Pro 4 and Surface Book, specs are great but I think that Surface Pro 4 is not so good to use in my lap, and the price of a Surface Book rised too high for my budget. After many days searching and comparing, I finally choosed DELL XPS13. It has everything I need and it also looks very good :-). I choosed a model with 13.3" QHD touch display and i7 prosessor. I know that with these specs battery life is getting shorter, but that will be still double, or even triple comparing to my old laptop. Actually in many trains in Switzerland, they have power plugs which you can use while you are travelling. But for me a small size and light weight (and how it looks) are the most important specs. Also with these specs price is getting higher, but i´m sure that now I have a computer for many years.

Time will tell how it's working in my use, and later I will post some info of that. It's always nice to have a new gadgets, I can't wait to open the package and start the computer up, but sadly I don't have time for that now, because I have to go to a German language school and first I have to do some homework.

Bis später

First Sunday of Advent

Hallo

Today I experienced a new tradition, First Sunday of Advent. For me it´s a quite new thing, in Finland I never really had anything special at that day. I can´t remember, if we had something like that when I was a child.

Now here in Switzerland, for my "new" family, Advent has been a small tradition in many many years, for them it means spending time together and doing something together, like Christmas decorations, cooking, eating etc. And I like the idea that even when childrens are getting older, they still have that tradition. Yesterday and today we baked different types of cookies. Maybe I can´t really say we, yes, I tried to help, but I´m not sure that did I do more harm than good :-) But it was fun. And my wife said that that´s not all, not even close, more cookies are coming before Christmas. Today evening we tasted some of those cookies with mulled wine, in Switzerland you would say, Glühwein.

Some winter decorations in our livingroom.
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22. November 2015

Cookies
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29. November 2015

Table decoration with Advent candles
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29. November 2015

Table decoration
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29. November 2015

Glühwein
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29. November 2015

For me, Advent tells also that Christmas is coming soon, and that means in our family, like in many other families, Christmas presents. And that´s always hard for me, what should I give to my wife ? Of course nothing too expensive, but it should be also something useful. I can´t buy clothes, I´m very bad in that, I can´t even buy clothes for myself, so how could I buy clothes for someone else ? I can´t give jewels, because I´m also bad to choose something like that. Once I really nailed it with jewels, when I bought to my wife a pair of earrings and a necklace from Finland and they were also made in Finland, she´s wearing those a lot, so I think she likes them. But that was a lucky shot. I could maybe ask some hints of my wife´s sister, but I think that´s kind of cheating. I could easily give something like electronics stuff, gadgets etc. but my wife is not so interested about that. And it´s really not helping if my wife is all the time saying, that she doesn´t need anything... Luckily I found something small and nice from the Zürich airport few days ago, but even if my wife won´t read my blog, I can´t tell you yet what it was. But still I would like to give something else. I´m taking a German language school in Luzern twice a week, and there is lot´s of nice shops, I think I will find something from there. Few weeks ago I saw something very nice behind the window of a small shop, but I was too slow to decide, because now it´s not there anymore, I think it was kind of a unique piece, and that was the only one :-( But I won´t give up yet, I still have time. Tomorrow i will go again to Luzern, and I will find something !

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Summer of 2015 (Disentis)

9.-11. Oktober 2015
Disentis, Switzerland

Our next destination was Disentis/Mustér. A small village in the Alps. Population a little bit more than 2000. Lowest point is at about 1000m and the highest point is a mountain Tödi at 3614m. In summer time Disentis is a great location for hiking and in the winter time village is full of downhill skiing people.

I got for a birthday gift a weekend in Disentis with my wife including a dinner in a nice restaurant. We roomed in a small, very nice apartment of our friends. Actually to Disentis we went straight from our fast visit to Finland. After we arrived to Zürich airport, we had to take three different trains to get to Disentis/Münster railway station. Last stage was very interesting with a small local train up to the mountains. It was late on Friday evening, you couldn´t see anything because of the darkeness outside, but you felt how much turns this train was doing in between of the mountains. And we had also four suitcases full of souvenirs from Finland with us :-)

I kind of "forgot" to take my real camera with me, and my wife almost killed me for that. So only camera that i had, was my Nokia 1520 windows Phone. It´s already two years old model, so even when that camera is 20MP with Carl Zeiss Optics and image stabilization, image quality is quite bad comparing to my Olympus mirrorless 16MP camera, which i´m normally using. In a screen of that phone, pictures are looking ok, but when you will move them to your computer, it´s a totally different story. Nokia is taking pictures also in DNG, raw high res. mode, but still the sharpness is soft and colors are flat and strange. One problem was the sun, well it´s not really sun´s fault, but the reflection and lens flare is very bad if the sun is just somewhere in front of you. If the sun is behind you, pictures are quite ok. Another problem is the noise, it´s getting terrible in low light and in the shadows. I´m using Photoshop Lightroom when i´m editing my pictures, with Lr you can try to do some improvements to your pics, but not much, if the original is really bad. Now i have Samsung Galaxy S6 edge + smartphone, and the picture quality is much much better, lens and sensor technology is getting forward all the time. But I learned from this trip, that in the future, I will take my "real" camera with me, always.

But like Chase Jarvis said: "The Best Camera Is The One That´s With You"

First picture is from Finland, from the Helsinki-Vantaa airport. We ate in a restaurant called Fly Inn Restaurant & Deli. Double Fly Inn Reindeer Burger, caramelised onion, truffle mayonnaise and smoked cheese with rustic chips.

Poroburger in Fly Inn Restaurant & Deli
Airport Helsinki-Vantaa
9. October 2015
15:10 local time

Next picture is taken quite much later in Switzerland in our last train to Disentis.

A route mad printed on the table in train to Disentis
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9. October 2015
21:49 local time

In the morning, after a good night sleep, that was the view from our backyard.

Disentis
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10. October 2015

Disentis
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10. October 2015

We didn´t have any breakfast with us, so we had to find some. Let´s walk to the small city centre of Disentis to find a nice place for a breakfast. It´s already October, but weather was quite warm.

Disentis
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10. October 2015

Disentis
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10. October 2015

Disentis
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10. October 2015

Disentis
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10. October 2015

Disentis
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10. October 2015

Disentis
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10. October 2015

Disentis
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10. October 2015

Train station, Disentis
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10. October 2015

Disentis
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10. October 2015

Disentis
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10. October 2015

We found it: Cafe / Bäckerei Goldmann, Disentis. Breakfast was great. They had also a terrace, but the weather was a little bit too cold for that.

Cafe Goldmann, Via Cavardiras
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10. October 2015

Breakfast in Cafe Goldmann
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10. October 2015

The view from the Terrace of Cafe Goldmann
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10. October 2015

After a good breakfast with full stomach, we wanted to go up high to the mountains with the cable car and walk back down... Hiking ! We still didn´t have hiking poles, but maybe next time :-)

Disentis

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10. October 2015

Disentis

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10. October 2015

Disentis

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10. October 2015

Disentis

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10. October 2015

Disentis

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10. October 2015

Disentis

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10. October 2015

We took the cable car to a Caischavedra panorama restaurant at 1860 meters above sea level. In winter time you could go more up to the mountains with ski lifts.

Disentis Sedrun cable car station.

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10. October 2015

In a cable car, Disentis Sedrun

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10. October 2015

In a cable car, Disentis Sedrun

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10. October 2015

At 1860 m
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10. October 2015

At 1860 m
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10. October 2015

At 1860 m
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10. October 2015

At 1860 m
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10. October 2015

At 1860 m
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10. October 2015

At 1860 m
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10. October 2015

At 1860 m
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10. October 2015

At 1860 m
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10. October 2015

At 1860 m
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10. October 2015

At 1860 m
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10. October 2015

At 1860 m
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10. October 2015

Ski lifts
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10. October 2015

Ski lifts
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10. October 2015

At 1860 m
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10. October 2015

Ski lifts
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10. October 2015

Ski lifts
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10. October 2015

At 1860 m
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10. October 2015

At 1860 m
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10. October 2015

Cold beers At 1860 m, Prost ! Kippis !
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10. October 2015

At 1860 m
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10. October 2015

At 1860 m
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10. October 2015

At 1860 m
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10. October 2015

Hiking time ! Duration 1h 30min

Hiking at the mountains
and in the forests of Disentis
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10. October 2015

Hiking at the mountains and in the forests of Disentis
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10. October 2015

Hiking at the mountains and in the forests of Disentis
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10. October 2015

Hiking at the mountains and in the forests of Disentis
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10. October 2015

Hiking at the mountains and in the forests of Disentis
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10. October 2015

Hiking at the mountains and in the forests of Disentis
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10. October 2015

Hiking at the mountains and in the forests of Disentis
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10. October 2015

Hiking at the mountains and in the forests of Disentis
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10. October 2015

Hiking at the mountains
and in the forests of Disentis
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10. October 2015

Hiking at the mountains
and in the forests of Disentis
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10. October 2015

Hiking at the mountains and in the forests of Disentis
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10. October 2015

Hiking at the mountains
and in the forests of Disentis
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10. October 2015

Hiking at the mountains
and in the forests of Disentis
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10. October 2015

Hiking at the mountains and in the forests of Disentis
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10. October 2015

Hiking at the mountains
and in the forests of Disentis
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10. October 2015

Hiking at the mountains and in the forests of Disentis
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10. October 2015

Hiking at the mountains and in the forests of Disentis
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10. October 2015

Hiking at the mountains and in the forests of Disentis
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10. October 2015

Hiking at the mountains and in the forests of Disentis
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10. October 2015

Hiking at the mountains and in the forests of Disentis
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10. October 2015

Hiking at the mountains and in the forests of Disentis
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10. October 2015

Hiking at the mountains and in the forests of Disentis
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10. October 2015

Hotel / restaurant Alpsu

We went back to our apartment, we took a shower and relaxed a little bit. In the evening, we had a reservation in a family restaurant / hotel called Hotel Alpsu in via Alpsu 4. At least we thought we had... We went inside to a restaurant, but there was some problems with our e-mail reservation, they didn´t find it anymore. Restaurant was full of people and the owner was of course very sorry about what happened and he said that come back after one hour. Ok, fine, no problem, accidents happen. We went for a walk. After one hour, we came back and there was a free table for us. They gave us some drinks for free because of that mix-up. We had a great evening and the food was so good !! We took the whole thing with starters, wines, special meat main courses and desserts. Nice place, but if you want to go, make a reservation because it seems to be quite popular place.

Main course in Restaurant Alpsu
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10. October 2015

Dessert in Restaurant Alpsu
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10. October 2015

Dessert in Restaurant Alpsu
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10. October 2015

Alp Tgom Cable car

Next day and also our last day and the weather was so great. Again it was time for a high altitudes, cable cars and hiking. We were heading to a cable car which was build in 1957. From the Disentis train station, we took the train to the station of Sedrun, from the station we walked to the Alp Tgom cable car station.

Disentis

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11. October 2015

Disentis

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11. October 2015

Disentis

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11. October 2015

Disentis

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11. October 2015

Disentis

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11. October 2015

Disentis

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11. October 2015

Disentis

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11. October 2015

Disentis

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11. October 2015

We arrived to a Alp Tgom cable car station at 11:00. There was about 20 people before us to go to a cable car. We read the timetable: Once between every hour, max eight persons plus the driver, great ! Luckily that timetable was wrong. This guy was taking people up to the mountain after every 20 minutes, and he was taking more than eight people. So we had to wait only about 20 minutes. Alp Tgom is at 1913 metres above sea level. Up there was a small kiosk, where we drank cups of coffee.

Alp Tgom cable car
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11. October 2015

Alp Tgom cable car station
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11. October 2015

Alp Tgom
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11. October 2015

Alp Tgom
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11. October 2015

Alp Tgom
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11. October 2015

Alp Tgom
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11. October 2015

Alp Tgom cable car
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11. October 2015

A cup of coffee at Alp Tgom
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11. October 2015

View was awesome, but it´s time to go back down. From the top, you will find a few options to walk down. Our route took about 1h 40min.

Hiking in the Alp Tgom

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11. October 2015

Hiking in the Alp Tgom

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11. October 2015

Hiking in the Alp Tgom

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11. October 2015

Hiking in the Alp Tgom

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11. October 2015

Hiking in the Alp Tgom

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11. October 2015

Hiking in the Alp Tgom

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11. October 2015

Hiking in the Alp Tgom

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11. October 2015

Hiking in the Alp Tgom

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11. October 2015

Hiking in the Alp Tgom

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11. October 2015

Hiking in the Alp Tgom

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11. October 2015

Hiking in the Alp Tgom

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11. October 2015

Hiking in the Alp Tgom

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11. October 2015

Hiking in the Alp Tgom

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11. October 2015

Hiking in the Alp Tgom

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11. October 2015

Hiking

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11. October 2015

Hiking

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11. October 2015

Hiking

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11. October 2015

Hiking

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11. October 2015

Hiking

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11. October 2015

Hiking

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11. October 2015

Train station of Sedrun

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11. October 2015

Train station of Sedrun

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11. October 2015

That was our day in the Alp Tgom. Our special weekend together was almost over, we went back to our apartment to pack our suitcases, and soon after that it was time to go home. I can just imagine how beautiful place Disentis is in winter time, but I have a funny feeling that I will experience that someday, I hope soon. It´s just a shame to live in Switzerland in winter time, because i don´t like to do downhill skiing :-) Maybe i should start...

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