Jennifer in Geneva

I love a challenge. So naturally, I love to create challenges for everyone else in my life too. Having swapped from unlimited annual leave last year, back to a finite number this year, I knew I'd have to holiday plan with surgical precision. So I briefed my dad (whose in charge of booking our family holidays) on the dates and duration I needed to go with for our family city break this year and he really aced the assignment. He kept it a secret until Christmas and then (through a series of fun clues) revealed we were off to Geneva! I'd never been to Switzerland before so I was super excited to explore a new country, revel at the scenery and eat lots of cheese and chocolate.

After a nice early flight from London where we were essentially the only people on the plane not going to Switzerland to go skiing, we arrived in Geneva and went to check into our hotel. Eastwest was actually so much more grand and impressive than I'd remembered the photos looking, and the rooms came complete with walk-in wardrobe!

Then it was time to head out and explore! Call it global warming, call it irony, call it the universe having a laugh; but Geneva was actually really warm. And I'd packed all my very thickest clothes, including a fur coat and a puffer coat. On the day we arrived, it was sunny and 15 degrees! The wardrobe choices may not have been matching up much, but it was actually warm enough to go out with no coat, so I stuck with acid wash jeans, black River Island top, chunky knit black cardigan and big black sunglasses and I was just the right temperature. The walk was lovely and we were staying pretty centrally, so we started at the Brunswick monument, Jet d'Eau and Jardin Anglais. I loved the vibe that Geneva was giving off, it was actually very Parisian. So many pretty buildings in every direction, beautiful wrought iron balconies, open green spaces, super blue water. It was as postcard-like as I'd been hoping and it might have been somewhat imagined, but I could've sworn the air felt cleaner.

The map said Switzerland but the heart said Italy, as it does no matter where we are in the world. We decided to go for pizza for lunch and hit the jackpot with Chez Marino. So many of the pizzas on the menu sounded incredible but I eventually chose one with bresaola, rocket, burrata, truffle oil and parmesan and it was literally amazing. A flying start food-wise.

Jet d'Eau (literally named 'water jet') seemed to be the main attraction in Geneva so we had a little wander round the lake to get a closer look. I say 'round the lake' but the lake is literally massive (I mean, it spans multiple countries) so the area we covered was very very small. Jet d'Eau itself was massive too at an impressive 140 meters high and being almost directly under it made for an amazing view of the city. It also made for some fun 'holding up the tower of Pisa' type photos á la Ollie.

It wasn't overly surprising to find that Geneva had a beach; it's near a giant pretty lake and gets warm in summer after all. What was surprising, was the number of people sunbathing in bikinis and swimming in the lake in February! I mean, I know I'd said we were surprised by how warm it was, but I wouldn't stretch to saying it was swimsuit weather. Needless to say we didn't sunbathe on the beach, but we did have a lovely sunny walk before catching a shuttle boat (basically a floating yellow bus) back to our hotel.

When you're only away for 2 nights, and travelling with a cabin bag suitcase, you have to outfit plan wisely. I'd decided to wear dark green heeled boots and matching bag both nights with my grey faux fur coat, so then I basically just built the rest of the outfits around those things. For night one, I went with bright pink faux leather shorts, stripy black and white top with black lace trim and black tights. It was just the vibe I was going for; dressy casual with a wintery air to it. Parfait! The food in Geneva was a lovely European mix but the restaurants that I was feeling the most were the French ones. We were worried we'd made a rookie error when we were getting ready to head out at about 9 and loads of the restaurants we'd been looking at on Google were due to shut at 10. We'd already found that a lot of the restaurants there have a lunch and dinner serving and close in the afternoon, rather than serving food all day. We needn't have worried though, as we got seated straight away in a beautiful quaint place called Entrecôte Couronnée (you'll laugh if you google it and see far we ventured from our hotel). It was very classically French, with a green awning and empty wine bottles used as decor. Ollie and I always love to share food when we go out, especially when it comes to steak. So we just had to get the T-bone sharer and it was honestly incredible. I love the French way of cooking steak (basically barely cooking it at all). We were bursting at the seams afterwards but they had a pistachio crème brulée on the dessert menu which are 2 of my favourite things so naturally I couldn't resist.

The next day, the sun was shining again and we were ready for a full day of exploring. Not before fuelling up first though, which we did at this beautiful little tea room where we had fun and games trying to order in French, and then devoured a selection of cakes and pastries.

It was another sunny day in Geneva but it was definitely coat weather this time (although I did end up too hot in mine). So I wore dark blue skinny jeans, cropped white sweatshirt with pearl detail shoulders, cream trainers and brown puffer coat. I was super impressed when I bought this coat in the January sales for £30 down from £80; it's the most beautiful quality, it's super warm and the neutral palette makes it a great choice. In fact, I've just checked and it's still on sale and still in stock if you fancy a nosey.

Our main activity for Saturday was exploring the Cathedral. In fact, for a non-religious family, we sure do explore the hell out of a lot of churches when we go away. But god or no god, you can't argue that this building is super beautiful. You could pay to go up both the towers too (which we did) and the views were incredible. That Alps backdrop would never get old. The number of stairs was crazy though! And they had a very inefficient, very funny traffic light system that supposedly told you when it was clear to go up or down but seemed to have the opposite effect. We sure did burn off out breakfast with how much walking we did even just in the Cathedral (well, probably near enough anyway).

What's this, sat outside with no coat, in Switzerland, in February? Maybe global warming isn't all bad (I joke, it definitely is). I wasn't quite as brazen as Aidan and dad, although in their defence, Aidan would probably wear shorts and short sleeves in the south pole (he's like a Northern postman or something). It did feel very indulgent to sit in the sunshine with a beer, and by the time the shade had moved around, we had a bowl of steaming pasta to keep us warm. Mine was an amazing crab and tomato dish which took us to up 4 amazing meals out of 4 (if you can count a breakfast pastry as a meal).

We basically spent the rest of the afternoon on a little walking tour of Geneva. There are so many pretty buildings that it was easy to cobble together a little itinerary. Place du Bourg-de-Four, Église Russe (Russian orthodox church), the museum of art history (Musée d'Art et d'Histoire), the reformation wall, bastions park (with giant chess boards), and the grand theatre. A glorious day of exploring.

For my night 2 outfit, naturally it was the green accessories again so I stuck to a monochrome palette this time and focussed on prints and textures. This zebra print skirt is a lovely thick wool so it was perfect for this trip, and I paired it with this long sleeve lace top (Miss Selfridge do lace so well). I did add one pop of colour with a dark pink lipstick and then I was good to go. We figured that we should probably do a bit more restaurant research this time and head out a bit earlier, since it was a Saturday night. The restaurant that we ended up at, The Foundry, was a great find by Ollie, as it turned out it was literally brand new, had only been open to the public a few weeks and were actually fully booked that night but decided to squeeze us in. We're so glad they did, as everything was incredible; the cocktails, the atmosphere, the food. Despite the fact we had a steak sharer the night before, we went for pretty much the same again! We went for truffle mash this time instead of fries though, and salad instead of veg, so it's basically like a whole different meal.

The next day felt as though we were in the tornado that took Dorothy to Oz - it was SO windy! I'd saved my warmest outfit for the Sunday luckily, because the temperature had also dropped to about 3 degrees (although apparently the wind made it feel like -6). I went with black leather pants, striped jumper with ruffle shoulder detail, cream trainers, brown puffer coat and sunglasses that were more to keep the wind out of my eyes than they were to protect from the sun.

Worried we were at risk of blowing away if we had another day out exploring, we quickly decided we needed an indoor activity (because it was also really unpleasant to be outside getting battered by the wind). We looked at a few museums before deciding the natural history museum was most a bit of us, and then had a fun couple of hours wandering around and learning about various local species.

The only Geneva must-do that we hadn't so far ticked off was getting a cheese fondue, so we already knew what was on the menu for lunch. We just needed to find the perfect spot! I'm very anal these days about checking google reviews for restaurants whenever I go away, as I've fallen into too many tourist traps before that leave me feeling sad. So I was confident when we headed to Le Perron that we were in for a treat. It didn't disappoint! The restaurant had a lovely cosy vibe and Ollie and I shared the 4 cheese and champagne cheese fondue, Aidan got the normal 4 cheese one and then we all had bread and cured meats. It was actually amazing and definitely worth the weird dreams I inevitably had that night! We wrapped up a super sweet trip with a platter of sweet treats that ended the day on a high.

And then in what felt like the blink of an eye, it was time to head home (well, with a 2/3 hour delay added on for fun). I love our family city breaks and will listen to no nay-sayers who reckon that nearing-27 is too old to go on holiday with your parents. We always have a fab time and Geneva was an absolutely great choice from dad. It was only a 90 minute flight, they have loads of flights running every day from London, the food is amazing and there's just enough to do there for a long weekend. Perfect if you're on the hunt for somewhere you can go using only 1 annual leave day (or indeed none at all). You'll just have to stay tuned to see what I'm saving the rest of my allowance for! Let the holidays of 2023 commence.