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apricot photo from here (source)

Sorry I haven't updated this blog in so long but apricot picking really makes you tired after a long 10 hour day. I finished working at Pitlou Fruits yesterday and I guess I should start off explaining exactly how it works.

every morning I would get up around 5.30am, prepare some lunch maybe some pasta, bbq chicken, sandwiches or just bread and cheese, not forgetting to pack a litre and a half of water.

at 6.30 I was picked up in a small minibus from the train station with a crazy bizzaro mix of people who had managed to score the same job as me. The language of choice was Portugese, not good for me, especially after hoping I would get some time to practice my french. Among the crowd of fools were Polacks, Moldovians, African political refugees and the odd french or german dude.

It was ten 15 or 16 people to a 13 person minibus winding up the mountainside to the depot where we would split up and assinged a patch for the day, after that its just lots of picking using a basket with a hook to hang it on the trees.

There was ridiculous views of the mountain and sion airport where I would watch planes cruise into the blue sky, plenty of birdsong, awesome banquets for lunch and even the odd garbled french conversation. Sometimes I was lucky to be paired with an English speaker which is probably the only thing that stopped me from getting brain damaged from lack of conversation. I met some awesome guys from Normandy, one with a outrageous understanding of international slapstick humor, making me laugh without speaking a word of any language and another who spoke amazing English who really helped me with my french!



Anyway im tanned, happy, have a little money and I'm waiting to start work at somewhere that turns fruit into something useful... Alcohol! Next I'll be working at the famous Morand Distillery in Martigny, Switzerland

helping to make this


anyway enough about work, now lets talk about play...

I've had so much fun and awesome adventures, most recently at the weekend it was my friends Pablo & Julies birthday party held 1299 metres up on the north face of mount-che, the views were breathtaking, we had bbq's and beer and raclette and french boules with finnish cyclists and lost scouts, I have too much to write and none of the motivation to do so, there are a lot of pictures I will upload too when I get the cable to get them off my camera. In the meantime heres a photo of looking confused with a giant beer in my favourite bistro in sion, La Grenette.


and one or two from when we climed Mount Noble

my friend Steffan showing me where all the cool places are including a fascicst village :O
At the top
map at the top showing us all of the mountains in site! including Mont-Blanc!


Steffan and Bastien enjoying a well deserved sit down and coffee afterwards in a small stereotypical wooden swiss village.

Stay Safe
Sam x

Cow Fight!

sorry I haven't made a post in a while, I've been busy adjusting to being back home!

anyway on the 13th of April....


we started the day at Bastiens mothers house for pancakes and coffee, i also tried every single jam under the sun from hazelnut to kiwi all really great and all homemade by Bastiens mum! I even got given a jar of Quince jam home with me!

we piled into two cars (Me, Bastien, Julie, Nadia, Pablo & Bastiens Mother) and set off down the straight road through the centre of the valley to a small village near sion for an afternoon of cow fighting & raclette. Both of these I knew very little about!



the place was packed with excited specatators, proud owners and of course the cows themselves, I was suprised bulls weren't the ones fighting but the local herens breed of cow is used and apparently the cows fight naturally in the mountains to establish hierarchy
 in the herd. hence the name of the sport 'combats de reines' (combat of the queens)
the prizes are shiny new bells!


its traditional for people to drink white wine and eat the mysterious local delicacy 'raclette' 
i had heard so much about whilst watching the cows fight, so we headed straight over to the food and drink tent! If i haven't mentioned already, swiss white wine is great, really fresh lots of peach and pear notes, not too dry and a great length.
They don't have much room to grow the wine though so not much gets exported, they just drink it all! Raclette turned out to be anothe cheese based meal, basically the raclette cheese is put under a heater until the top layer starts melting, this is then scraped off with a knife onto a plate, the melted cheese is served with a gherkin, some pickles and a potato. you don't need any salt but i found black pepper went down a treat! Raclette is even more localised than fondue, being a completely Valaisian tradition (Valais, the region of switzerland i spent most of my time in!)

this is pablo eating raclette!


Then it was up to the arena where we found some wooden supports on a hill to sit on giving us a great view of the action, behind us two cow fight enthusiasts talked excitedly, Bastien found out what we had missed and which cows we should look out for! then it began! its a lot like arm wrestling really except instead of them just using their arm they use their whole humongous body to try and push their opponent to the point of giving up! its quite exciting, especially when the dust is flying and the crowd is cheering! everyone reassured me that its rare for a cow to get more than a chipped horn in combat, which made the animal activist part of me feel alot better however in the similar japanese sport 'Tōgyū' they apparently sharpen the horns!




after a few hours of watching cows tussle in the beautiful sunshine , drinking white wine I felt i had absorbed enough swiss tradition for the entire trip but the day (my last day) wasn't over yet! so we hitched a ride down to Sion, one of my favourite places in switzerlan and went to went o one of my favourite bars of the trip, La Grenette! owned by a crazy bearded dude, this tiny place is overflowing with characters, traditional swiss wood layouts and probably just about enough room to swing un petit chat! cheap beer and everybody smillng! we met up with Bastiens friends (and now mine I guess) Christian, Eilda & Frederic who had come straight from a birthday party and we spent the majority of the evening with them talking and laughing before catching a train to sion, grabbing a great pizza and chilling at the appartment.

it was my last night and I thanked Bastien for the amazing hospitality he had shown me, it was great to hang out with someone so far from home who was exactly the kind of person i would hang out with now im back here! Can't wait for him to come to manchester in a few months and i can buy him a beer!

The next day i caught a train through the longest tunnel in switzerland to the german speaking city of Basel where i caught a flight to Liverpool airport, I've been back for a week or so now and although its great to see some familiar faces, i'd love to get away again! I've got the bug!

Stay Safe
Sam x

les jour du tshirt rouge en martigny!

yes today was red tshirt day but everyone here is french so im kindof forgetting how to speak anglais haha anyway martigny is amazing and beautiful, today we climbed a mountain, walked through the apricot orchards and then ate traditional swiss fondue.


the fonduewas actually really nice! then we played some babyfoot (table football) in some traditional swiss bar with some reallyy nice french and english speaking people from france, russia, australia and obviously switzerland. anyway im having an awesome time been so busy so theres been no time for blogs but hopefully tommorow morning ill post a full update of whats going on! tommorow evening we are going to a recording studio in the mountains near montreaux to record some music and hopefully i can upload that here too!
also my french is improving!
aussi mon francais s'améliore!

staying safe
sam x

Switzerlannddd

my flight was delayed by agesss but ive arrived in Martigny Switzerland now and its amazing! tonight me and bastien watched the roma vs manchester united match in some crazy bar full of rock formations but mainly my day was travelling! tommorow we will see the world!

of mice and men

Im going to be staying with my friend bastien in switzerland arriving in martigny on the 1st of april a day before my birthday, theres an ampitheatre and apricot orchards