Switzerland! (Personal)

This weekend I went to Zürich, Switzerland! People warned me that it would be expensive but I had no idea. We arrived around dinner time and we decided to just get McDonald’s so we could have a quick and inexpensive meal and start doing stuff. We spent 20 Franks on chicken nuggets and a small fries. 20 Franks. And this was the cheapest meal we could find! We went to the bed and breakfast we were staying at to check in. The lady who owned the house was very sweet and friendly and had 3 crazy young children. After checking in we went back into the city center to look around. The city center is between two rivers. We walked around the Promenade, which is a park in between the rivers where they connect together. Then we walked to the Altstadt. We saw the rathaus, which was built on the lake, some nice looking churches, and a bunch of cool different shops with Swiss watches, expensive antiques, instruments, and all kinds of other shops. It was so fun getting to wander up and down the alleys next to the river, and just explore the city.

On Saturday we took the train most of the way up the U mountain and hiked the rest of the way to the top. They had an 8-mile trail where you could see the sun and planets accurately scaled in size and distance apart. One millimeter in the model represented 1000 kilometers. We didn’t walk the whole trail but we passed by the sun, mercury, venus, and earth (and the moon) on our way to the top of the mountain. I thought it was a really cool and effective representation to give you an idea of the scaling (especially just how far apart everything is). At the top of the mountain we climbed a seemingly endless stairway to the top of a lookout for a panoramic view of the city of Zürich and the surrounding mountains. Climbers were rewarded with a food stand at the bottom of the stairs, and we enjoyed grilled sausage and fries.

Next we took the train to the Rhinefalls, Europe’s largest waterfall! We had a nice walk from the station, walking between gardens and the river. When we reached the falls they were simply breathtaking. It is estimated that around 700 cubic meters of water go over the falls per second. We took a boat past the falls to the other side of the river, where I got some Swiss chocolate and a pin inside a tourist shop. Then we walked up to the Adventure Park, which was a super fun ropes/challenge course with obstacles and ziplines. Once we were trained in using our harnesses and hooking into the ropes courses we were allowed to go through the park on our own. It was such a cool experience because we were climbing around in the trees right next to the falls, so there was a great view. I especially loved ziplining past the falls! Some of the courses were actually really challenging, and I didn’t even do any of the expert ones. We stayed until the place closed and then we walked around the other side of the waterfall so we had seen it from pretty much every side. We walked back along the river to the train stop and road back into town. We walked around Altstadt and got dinner there. It was really fun to walk around there on a crowded Saturday night and hear live music playing.

On Sunday we went to Bahnhofstrasse to walk around the expensive shops. There were a lot of cool high end names and a lot of watch stores! The street ended at the lake, so we sat at the lake for a while and listened to a street performer playing an accordion. Then we ended the trip with coffee at a nice outdoor restaurant on the lake. Switzerland was beautiful and it was a great trip!