As Lily loves windows, here is her beloved window view in the Swiss Airbnb. We stayed in Basel just a block away from Anthony and Malika.
And here is the front door. Isn’t it cute?
Anthony and Malika were the most incredible hosts. They fed us a wonderful breakfast before we headed out for the day.
Our first activity was at the paper museum, but we needed to cross the Rhine to get there.
We saw a lot of people floating down the Rhine. Lily especially was excited at the idea, and it gave her an idea for the next day.
We found this incredible model of Basel for blind people. Their are braille labels and buildings so blind people can get a sense of the city and what is where. In All the Light You Cannot See, Marie Laure’s father makes her a models of the cities they live in to help her navigate the cities. It was awesome to see a real one of those.
The paper museum was a blast. Gutenberg invented the printing press near Basel, so not only was Basel one of the first big printing cities, but it also was big into paper production once demand went up from the printing press. It was amazing to see how some of the machines worked in the olden days.
All of the kids got to make their own paper from old jeans. We learned later that in the early days of European paper, paper was made from old clothes and rope. They would be put in rotting cellars until they got damp, rotten and even moldy. As the cloth started to decompose, it would break up and be great for making pulp for the paper.
We also go to use a real quill pen!
When we were finished inside the museum, all the kids and me did some marbling.
Switzerland has these awesome small public pools all around that people can just dip in as they are going about their day. It was so fun, and refreshing as the weather was quite hot!
This was such interesting fountain they took us to. Apparently this is from a famous artist who made art out of junk.
I believe the same artist also made this sculpture. Anthony said that public urination is a problem in Basel and the inside of this sculpture often smells like pee. To our surprise we also found what appeared to be human poop in there. Yeah, that is a small problem. Basel overall was very clean, but Anthony said that the rest of Switzerland views Basel as the dirtiest city.
Anthony also said that every February, Basil has a massive carnival and people start drinking and partying at 4:00 AM. I’m sure that adds to the problems of people needing places to pee. So the city put up make-shift potties, even branding them with images of carnival goers to suggest their extra importance during carnival.
Apparently, needing places to urinate was also an ancient problem, and around Basil there are ancient public bathrooms.
As we were walking Lily and the kids interacted with what Lily said was the cutest dog she had ever seen. Mary got some sweet licks from that adorable dog.
We then spent time around Basel’s main ancient church building.
We crossed back over the Rhine and went back to Anthony and Malika’s place where they fed us the most delicious pasta with mushroom sauce.
Afterwards the kids all played in the yard while Lily and I relaxed in the yard.
I also played in the sandbox with Ammon which was really fun. We made pastries out of sand.
I can’t remember why Clarissa was so sad. She probably didn’t want to go when it was time.
After leaving Anthony’s we went to a nearby park for the kids to play at before bed-time. We had lots of fun with their swing.
We are so grateful to Anthony and Malika who fed us, showed us around, and gave all of us such great company with their family. We loved this day. It was one of our favorites of the whole trip!