Our first house guest arrived from London late Friday night with grand plans to spend the weekend hiking the nearby mountains and sailing Lake Geneva, but Saturday’s weather refused to cooperate (rain, rain and more rain). When we woke up Sunday to a forecast predicting a few dry hours, we shoved some breakfast down our throats, took a quick bus ride to the Swiss-French border and walked past the security hut into France. We arrived at the foot of Mont Salève a few minutes later, determined to get a hike in before the sky opened up again.

Conscious of our narrow window, we bought round-trip tickets for the téléphérique (cable car) that goes up and down the mountain every 12 minutes and rode it to the top. We spent the next couple of hours hiking a muddy trail up to the observation point, taking in the scenery and delicately making our way back down to the snack shack for a few beers. After an ear-popping descent in the téléphérique, we crossed back into Switzerland just as a light drizzle turned into rain. Pretty darn perfect timing.

The sweeping view from the top of the Salève is spectacular, even on a cloudy day, and I like how you can select the intensity of your visit based on your energy level: Are you in the mood for a quick téléphérique ride up the mountain to have lunch at the panoramic restaurant, a fresh-air hike from the base to the summit, or some combination of the two? On a drier day, I hope to try the full hike. My new boots, which I broke in Sunday, appear up to the challenge.

Below you’ll find a few snapshots from our afternoon on the mountain with Geneva visible in the background (can you spot the Jet d’Eau?). Also, a quick PSA: I created two new blog pages that are now available in the top menu bar. The first is my “Travel Log,” which organizes my posts on travel destinations by country in case you’re looking for information about a particular city. The second page, “Expat Musings,” lists my posts about living abroad in descending chronological order. Enjoy!