Following the Dream

Christian October 17th, 2008

On the train ride into Switzerland from Italy, one thing was very obvious, mother nature had spent a little extra time here and created some very beautiful scenery.  Our train chugged along slowly through mountain passes,  crystaline lakes, sheep dotted hills, and the snow capped alps.  All throughout the 5 hours it took to reach Luzern, we constantly had our noses pressed to the window. We were not disappointed by our destination. Luzern or Lucerne, is situationed on Lake Luzern and surrounded by mountain views, which rarley appear from behind the clouds. 

 We arrived late in the afternoon and were greeted by a chilly cloudy day. We had to walk about 1 km to our hostel which overlooked the lake. We checked in and were given a very nice room, complete with a balcony and heating.  We had to share a bathroom, but they were clean and most importantly had hot water. We had to walk back to the train station to use an ATM and luckily the grocery store was located below the train station. We quickly discovered that prices were a bit high, and people hadn’t exagerated the high costs of visiting Switzerland. If you looked hard you could find some deals, but we decided on our usual, spaghetti.  Everything else seemed out of reach for our meager budget.  Since we had passed the lake and saw lots of people out running, I decided to head out for a run around the lake while Casey enjoyed a hot shower. I quickly discovered 2 things, it was very cold out, and I was quickly out of breath.  The cold air burned my lungs, but I kept trudging along next to the lake, taking in the views as I ran.  We made dinner while listening to a whiny girl tell her life story to a poor guy who was quite obviously trapped. 

The next day we set out to discover the town, and see the sites in the “old town” which is the historic part of the city, and is closed to traffic. We followed along the recomended walking tour from the tourist office. Okay, so we did get off the provided route due to not following the map correctly, but we still saw all of the major highlights.  We first saw Chapel Bridge built originally in the 1300’s and lined with flowers and paintings on the ceilings. Unfortunately, in 1997 the original bridge burnt down and has been carefully rebuilt. It was still very beautiful with swans and ducks swimming underneath waiting to be fed from tourists. We continued along to the historic district where Casey quickly sped a pretzel shop and handed over $3 for a warm freshly made soft pretzel. Casey was in heaven and it quickly disappeared. We then headed uphill to the a wall which originally protected the city and walked up into 2 of the watch towers. The second tower contained a clock bell tower so we decided to wait around to hear the bell ring. We waited in the actual bell tower, right next to a bell taller than me.  As soon as it struck 12 noon (Actually 1 minute before) the bell came to life with a deafening loudness that could wake the dead. This gave us the gift of hearing ringing in our ears for the rest of the day. Not our smartest idea! We then founded our way over to the “Lion Monument” that is to commemerate the Swiss Guards who died during the French Revolution. It is a very beautiful and sad sculpture. It depicts a very sad faced lion laying dead next to a shield bearing the swiss cross and a spear.  The lion has a broken spear in it’s side.  After a few mintues of admiring the sculpture we were of course invaded by another tour group, so we evacuated the area and spent some time nosing around in various tourist shops. Switzerland has some of the best souvenirs, including swiss army knifes, butane lighters, gourmet knives, cow bells, and coo-coo clocks. We left the shops with just a few postcards and found another grocery store to buy some lunch in, which was quite large and had lots to choose from. We choose a few goodies and headed back to our hostel for some lunch.  Casey took an afternoon nap and then we decided to catch a movie at 5:30. 

 It was about $15 a ticket, but we decided to splurge and see the movie “Wanted”.  We arrived about 15 minutes early and had to wait in the concession area till we were allowed into our theatre about 10 minutes early, which was two floor down in the basement.  The theatre was small by U.S. standards but there was only about 5 people total in it. We were about an hour into the movie and right into the action when the screen goes to a commercial then goes black and the lights turn on for a 10 minute “break”. We thought you have got to be kidding the movie isn’t even 2 hours long! Evidently this is standard, as most of the 5 people in the theatre took bathroom breaks, and purchased some food. Otherwise, the movie was good and we enjoyed an evening out.

Once back at the hostel we made dinner. That night the kitchen was full of miscellaneous people, including 2 Australians whom we started talking to as we made dinner. We had been asking every Australian’s option on what to do once we get to Australia. As we talked about what cities to visit they in passing were saying not to visit Adelaide, that it is very boring and is one of those places that everyone does not like but deals with, they compared it to New Jersey. ha ha! But wouldn’t you know right then 2 more people had walked into the kitchen and “surprise” they were Australian and from Adelaide. Opps! The Australian girl quickly apologized and we tried to quickly move the conversation on to new topics. Including the mystery to them of why we tip so much in America.  Since in Australia a 10% tip is left only in cases of extreme good service, but then they make over $11 just serving tables. (This is their minimum wage) The rest of the evening was spent eating and enjoying a $.60 generic beer from the grocery store. (Think bitter beer face!) Casey was extremely happy having found cranberry juice for only $3 to enjoy some vodka with.

The next day was spent relaxing. We splurged on a huge pretzel we had spied the day before for lunch and bought some souvenirs. 

After the lunch the weather was nice and sunny so we grabbed our cameras and headed out to take some better photos. We also stopped and bought a huge loaf of bread to feed the many swans and ducks in the lake, even though we ate half ourselves.  The city is very beautiful and relaxing.  We cooked an early dinner of surprise; spaghetti and then headed back out at night to take some shots of the city lit up at night. We were not disappointed by the views. It was Friday night and many people were out enjoying dinner and a drink. The art museum next to the train station seemed to be an especially popular hang out. There were tons of teenagers hanging around in groups talking, smoking, and drinking. We even saw some groups with cases of beer.  Once again it was back to the hostel to pack-up for our train ride to Zurich.

So far we loved Switzerland, it was clean, modern, and possessed more than a fair amount of natural beauty. The relaxed, peaceful days were much appriciated after our rushed tour of Italy. The people were nice, and spoke enough English to get by. We were excited to check out our next city and enjoy some Lindt chocolate.

• Switzerland
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