Euro trip - by Team Clayton

On the 29th of January I fairwelled Uganda after spending 3 incredible months there, and flew out of that beautiful continent to my next and perhaps biggest adventure yet... a month travelling around Switzerland, France and Italy with my parents!!!!!

Mum, dad and me chilling at a skifield somewhere in Europe, loving the bluebird day and the beers!!!!!!

So I flew into Geneva airport and found Big Mumma C (Bronnie Clayton my amazing mum) waiting for me. It was great to catch up with her for the first time in 8 months. We had a week before Petersauraus Rex (dad - Peter) flew over to join us, so me and mum jetted between France and Switzerland daily to go and eat good cheese, drink good wine, go shopping, do some extreme cross country skiing, and hang out in the nicest wellness centres in the world!!!

Mum having a brief stop while X-country skiing out of Charmey, Switzerland

What else do you do in Geneva?

The action started when Big Pete turned up, as we started travelling and skiing and travelling and skiing and skiing and skiing and doing abit of toursity things in between. It was great fun.

Dad loving another day on the hill, in the sun with his favourite ladies!!!

Rando old dudes playing chess very very seriously in the middle of Geneva

Trying to teach dad how to "blue steel" into the distance... quite funny

We started by exploring a few local French ski resorts which were incredibly impressive... especially the size of skiable terrain and the beautiful weather!!!! The snow was fine, but it didnt snow the whole month we were there - just continued with beautiful bluebird day after beautiful bluebird day!!!!!!! No complaints... it was amazing.

Geez cut it out kids... we're here to ski!!!!

Then we ventured on an awesome roadtrip through Switzerland, Italy and France basically circumnavigating the Matterhorn (biggest mountain in Europe) and skiing all around it. We started in Geneva and then went through Switzerland, via Charmey where I had a malaria and Scarlett fever scare but it just turned out to be Strep throat-which was good but still dumb to be in bed on antibiotics when I just wanted to go skiing!!!

Going on day missions because I was sick, and then almost overheating the car... was sweet tho because mum went adenturing and tested her French language skills out on some locals and they gave her water filled vino bottles to sort out the car!!!! Legends!!!

Then we moved onto Interlaken, where we went sledding which I would recommend to ANYONE!!! Seriously they had a purpose built sledding track and it was STEEP!!!! I swear I barely go that fast on my skis let alone sitting on a plastic sled with no brakes and no steering other than your feet!!! Man it was hilarious!!!!

Pete the speed demon on his sled

Dad leading the chance while sledding in Interlaken, Switzerland

Me and Mumma stoked by the Interlaken sunset, after another amazing day

Then we moved around the Matterhorn to the Italian side and hung out in Lake Maggiore for a while. One day we started skiing in Italy and then dropped over to the Swiss side and back throughout the day. We caught a ski lift (that holds 100 ppl at a time) that took us higher than Mt Cook!!!! Then we got to ski for 19kms downhill completely by OURSELVES back to Italy. Absolute highlight and probably the best skiing experience of my life!!!

Mum leading the charge on our solo 19km run!!!

Dad, me and mum plus half of the Matterhorn behind us... dont trust tourists to take photos of you and inportant landmarks!!!

The Italian couple that hosted us (and only us in their whole B&B)... and one of the mean feeds that they cooked us!! YUM!!!

On our journey we tried not to ski everyday so we could still check out the places that we were visiting. We saw some very interesting and incredible places and saw some random things!! Like these...

A weird and freaky museaum we went to in Switzerland... weird stuff - this picture is the tame stuff... and it had an Adults Only section - I was too scared to go in!!! Strangest exhibition I have EVER seen

Mum chilling with the dude who founded the Red Cross

1 of 20 rows of cheese... the Swiss know how to do it!!!


Also on our last day together dad decided that he wanted to go flying... so we did. The coolest thing is that mum didn't think she would do it, but we got there and (the legend) went first!!! Big ups to Bronnie!!! Whatta superstar!!! It was the best day of the season appartently so the skies were filled with at least 60 other pilots flying around for at least 1 hour each... it was crazy!!! I thought we were going to crash into so many people all the time, but it was all good.

Dad getting ready to take off... after mum was the prope and went first followed by me then dad

Our perfect day flying over Lake Annacey in France... with 60 other gliders


It was such a great trip and I loved hanging out with mum and dad so much - its the longest that we have probably ever hung out... (a month straight with only one day apart) but it was fantastic. We saw some beautiful places, experienced some awesome times and skied some amazing snow together. I would go on holiday again in a second with Pete and Bron cos they are absolute legends and I love them so so much!!!!!

Cheers to Pete for sponsoring the trip... I hadn't eaten that good in months/years and I haven't since youve left as well!!!!! Cheers daddio and mummamia