Friday was spent in transit to Switzerland, the transit bit not helped by road works on the M3 and poor sign posting, however I managed to find the car park and get myself to Gatwick where the usual two hours of boredom became three as my plane was delayed, according to QueasyJet, by the atrocity in Nice, the night before. Anyway, my broomstick finally landed at Basel and eventually I found the right exit where mine host was patiently waiting. The traffic to Bern was not helpful but we got there in time for lasagne - a favourite of mine.

Just in case you, dear reader, didn't appreciate the cause of my departure to parts exotic, it was nothing I've done that I'm going to admit to anyway and the bloke who pinched my parking space the other night was seen the next day, honest officer. So what might cause l'il ol' me to pack a case and head southish? A bike race perchance? Well that and a chance to confer with another esteemed author with whom I shall watch bits of said bike race probably wearing my TdF - Yorkshire Grand Depart.

For those of you who've never been to Switzerland, the bad news is William Tell died a while ago and he didn't ride a white horse and have a pal called Tonto, so instead I was taken sight-seeing and the sights are heavenly. It took us just over the hour to ride up the Brienzer Rothorn, not as quick as Froome might do it, but he is a bit younger; besides, the funicular railway doesn't do fast (you didn't think I was on a bike did you? Duh!) For those unsophisticates wot hasn't travelled like wot I has, I refer to a mountain from which the views were magical. I mean whodathunkit, wossername, scribbler of pointless dormouse tales was in the Alps and sitting eating lunch while looking across to the Eiger and the Jungfrau; but I was and with two wonderful companions. It's probably just as well I wasn't riding in the TdF because I'd either have fallen off my bike looking at the views or at the delights of watching Alpine choughs cavorting in the rarefied air, not to mention a plethora of new wild flowers.

Down the mountain, and no, the train doesn't go any faster helped by gravity, we stopped at Interlaken, so called because it's between two lakes (obvious really, innit?) the Brienzersee and the Thunersee and yes we did see both of them. From there a short trip to Harder and a stop to see marmots and Ibex at a wild park. Marmots, for them wot doesn't know, are like a cross between small beavers and giant guineapigs. They used to be numerous in the Alps but like everything else have not profited from human proliferation. They're not terribly bright, mind you neither are marmots unlike the ibex who were accosting the chap who looks after the reserve, for treats - poking him with a foot for attention.

Our awww factor sated by the baby ibex, we came home and after a delicious dinner of fish and rice with mushrooms and courgettes followed by an evening stroll to view the old city of Bern in the setting sun, we settled down to view the highlights of le Tour. Our discussion about whether that nice young Mr Cavendish cut up that foreigner Kittle, took all of five seconds and we cheered the sprintermeister's latest win. Now, after offering appropriate sacrifices to the gods of cycling, we hope on Monday to watch him add the expected bunch finish in Bern to his palmares. Seeing Cav sprint, in the flesh, how else would he do it, would be the icing on the Swiss roll, so to speak, for this fan, anyway. C'mon Cav, Allez Cav.