Am I able to drink that?

Laura came in on the late bus last night. We had grand plans for the weekend that involved lots of hardcore hiking in the alps. I had hoped to climb to Bunderspitz today, but mountain climbing isn't quite as exciting when it's cloudy.

Instead, we decided that it would be a good day to do some shopping and find her some new hiking boots. She's been wearing my old Vasque boots that I bought in about 1997 for $50. It's about time. Adelboden is a good place to do that sort of shopping because every other store is an outdoor store, and they're all called Intersport. Intersport Roesti, Intersport Oester and so on (There are even two Oesters with slightly different inventory). You can select from 80 different kinds of mountaineering boots, but you can't buy a book in this town.

We left my mini-flat and headed up the hill to main street. It became apparent very quickly that Adelboden has a fair too. The street was lined with booths selling all sorts of candies, breads, socks, shoes, cowbells, work pants...they even had rides. They don't have as many rides as Delemont, but I did see a small, rickety looking carousel in the parking lot behind the hardware/kitchen supply store.

Laura did find her hiking boots. I think it took two hours and we only had to go to three different stores. Not terribly bad for someone who typically makes spreadsheets to thoroughly consider all her options before making decisions such as buying a new raincoat.
We tried to hike to the waterfall after that, but we only made it a few kilometers out of town before we decided that we didn't have enough water to carry on, I think secretly we were being lazy. The waterfall is actually more like 4 miles away. Distances are quite deceiving around here. Maybe some day I will actually hike somewhere, instead of getting half way there and turning around.

When we made it back to town we walked back through the fair. Licht Strom Wasser (the appliance/electronics store) had a 2000 franc coffee machine on the street and they were giving away free espresso. We milled about for a few minutes without being offered coffee before we gave up and walked away because we didn't know how to ask politely without pointing and playing charades. But I really wanted the coffee. So we went back and I said "Darf ich das trinken?" Which I understand to mean something like "Am I able to drink that?". The man at the counter looked at me and laughed and said "Cappuccino?" And we got our coffee. Laura had to then talk me out of buying a 179 franc espresso maker. I settled on a 30 franc 6-cup stove top espresso maker. Sigh. When I'm rich I will own the 2000 franc machine that makes cappuccinos, espresso, and will knit you socks if you ask nicely enough. I think that was one of the options, but my german is still pretty bad.