Armchair Alps

In the Swiss/Italian Alps was little Bourg-St.-Pierre, where we were given fresh currant juice, kir, cheeses, when we visited before lunch.  There were pieces of our Roman temple there, all over town—in window frames, in the 9th-Century church tower, capping stone gateposts, forming the roof of a low structure behind the church— fragments of columns and inscriptions.  The town was fragrant with wet hay and with the camomile, thyme, and fennel growing wild there.  I crushed herbs with my clunky hiking boots wherever I stepped.  I was overwhelmed by the relative lushness of the rich, wet, deep-green valley; by being below tree-line again; by the beautiful Alpine garden we hiked to, where a temple cornice was found; by the chickens living it up in a grand old stone structure, grand as what was left of the Norman castle, as the high bridge crossed by Charlemagne which spanned a breathtaking precipice.


image:  Christie B. Cochrell, Bourg-St.-Pierre2