BACK FROM INTERLAKEN

We've just returned from a week in Interlaken. It's the second year we've been there and no, I definitely didn't go for the beer! The local brew, Ruggensbrau, is a rather bland, uninteresting beverage that typifies 'Eurofizz'. Not sure where their malting barley comes from, certainly not Wiltshire!

But other than the beer, it's a great place to stay. The produce in the local COOP shops is on a par with that which you'd find in Waitrose, and far cheaper. Just can't believe the steak - it melts in one's mouth. So yes, we enjoyed all of our evening meals on the large balcony overlooking the mountains. Sorry, Interlaken restaurateurs!

The scenery is so breathtaking that it often makes one envious of the people who live there. But then, according to a retired company director whom I met in 2006 in a distillery in Villé, Alsace, and who'd travelled extensively in his career, 'Switzerland is the most beautiful country in the world.'

No need to deck off to the US for scenic photographs when you live at the crossroads of Europe!

Our appartment, with a balcony looking straight on to the Jungfrau, was very comfortable and we frequented the swimming pool/ spa in the hotel. I also enjoyed walking around the park opposite and broke last year's record of 38 minutes by 5 minutes. Suppose it's about 2.2 km all round. So, 30 minutes next year is something to aim for!

We went half way up to the Jungfrau to the Kleine Scheidegg where, at 2,061 M, it was alarmingly warm at 13 C. Our coffee (a mere snip at CHF4 or £2.80 per cup!) was ruined by the continual buzzing of a low-flying helicopter ferrying crates of lager and supplies into an adjacent field for the James Blunt concert, which took place on the following Saturday, 09 April.

No, it wasn't beautiful!

More like a pain in the rear end as Lexi, my wife, would say!

Got back on Saturday afternoon to hear the sad news of my great Auntie's death. Still, she'd had a great innings and was seven weeks short of her 94th Birthday. During WW2 she worked in Baker Street, London for Leo Marks, the genius who invented the poem code for SOE agents operatiing in occupied territories. The Silk and the Cyanide by Marks is a cracking read.

Death, or passing from this life, comes to us all. But the amazing story of Easter - Jesus Christ's suffering and death on the cross - put an end to death.

At the church service on our Sunday in Interlaken - where it was nice to sing English hymns in Swiss German, but I understood very little of the sermon and had to rely on Lexi to translate as the dialect is off the wall! - the preacher said that Jesus is the bridge between man and God

'For God so loved the world that He gave his one and only Son so that whoever believes in him will not perish but have everlasting life.' John 3.16..

Now that really is something to smile and be joyful about. And all you have to do is believe that Jesus Christ rose from the dead and then live as his disciple. Then you'll be on the path to true happiness.

Will there be any beer in heaven? I hear you ask.

Hopefully not Ruggensbrau!