SAY MUUUUH by Nan van Daalen

Say Muuuh, to me or Ed and all the joy of holidays in Switzerland comes up.
In Switzerland also do not live cowboys, while on the slopes it mostly is to dangerous for the faster, slim-legged horses, so the herdsmen do all by foot with the help of their dogs and a sling.
We made wonderful walks through the Swiss Alps, although only once over 2500 meters (with a group by train, up by cable, and walking down to the train again)
High up, above the tree-border we did see marmots, running between the first grasses, drinking at a high up lake, that was emerald green. Wonderful!
More and more smal animals were seen, but the most attention went to the views and the blooms, different from what we knew from the lowlands.
Than finally, there was enough grass for the famous Swiss cows: just as docile as the Dutch ones, fully domesticated. But walking free on the Alm, the Swiss word for high meadow, walking in for milking in the end of the day.
The farmers have mostly wooden sheds with living quarters, and there they make the wondeful variety of cheeses, we wanted to try. (Also made for the even famous cheese fondue, that sticky stuff. where you do dip in pieces of bread)
That is not problem: paying guests always are welcome for a milk, bread and cheese meal. What we did not know was, that these cows do like bread as much as grass, so suddenly we were distracted from one side by a curious cow, while on the other side her mate already started to empty our plate. Great fun, but the 'lady-robbers' were gone before our laughing fit was over and we found our cameras.
It happend a second time, les unexpected on another Alm. Again the muuuh from the cow, and this one was almost a scurious as a monky, sniffing our rucksacks, as if she did know: there the food must be I like more that that booring grass.
While there are so much walks, where we met those muuh-sayers, and besides eating our bread they never interfered a lovely walk, it is a precious holiday memory. So never say muuuuh to us, unless you want to make us laugh!
But no cowboy or girl story, unless it is heroic enough for a flat-lander like us to climb up the mountains to meet them and look in their great brown eyes...