Visiting Zürich

Zürich! This is a lovely city and a must-see if you are an avid traveler. It is the biggest city in Switzerland, situated in the mid-northern part of the country, right next to Lake Zürich.

zurich10 — One of several bridges across Lake Zurich.

It was officially settled more than 2,000 years ago – by Romans. It was also the main center of the Protestant Reformation that occurred in Europe during the early 1500’s (view source).

Although the official language is German, according to our Swiss friend (whom we met in the last blog), their dialect is quite different from Germany’s German. They are also much more open to speaking English than France was, and we had no problems ordering food, talking to locals, or communicating, in general.

flagsinzurich — Yes, the Switzerland flag does look like a medical symbol. Unique, isn’t it?

Our first experience in this new country began at breakfast. We were surprised to see that they offered lettuce, tomatoes, sandwich meat, and cheese to make sandwiches with. Apparently, this is a common type of food for breakfast. We were also beginning to realize that, throughout all of Europe, sparkling water is offered and drank just as commonly as regular water.

zurich20 — Typical Swiss breakfast. This was actually taken on our train ride through Switzerland on our way to Vienna the next day.

After breakfast, we walked to the center of the city and stood on one of the main bridges in the city overlooking Lake Zürich. Both sides of the lake are surrounded by houses, shops, and churches. The first thing that really caught our attention was the clearness of the water. I am not sure if our pictures do it justice because it was so blue and looked very inviting. We ended up wishing that we had brought our swimsuits.

zurich9 — Notice how ancient the arch of the bridge looks.

zurich11 — An attempt to capture the clearness of this lake.

Fortunately for us, most of the town was involved in a big race that happened to be taking place the day we were there. Because of this, we almost had the place to ourselves. Well, not really, but there were very few crowds and it made our time extra enjoyable.

We toured several churches, took a taxi boat ride on the lake, enjoyed the local food (sausage and a bread roll), and walked as many streets as our feet were able to take us in just one day.

churchinzurich — One of the many churches that we saw. This is the only one that we entered.

zurich21 — Taxi boat ride – the view from on top of the lake.

What we loved most was the atmosphere and the overall exquisiteness of the city. Cobblestone covered every street. Swans swam romantically across the lake. We even ran across a group of people taking waltzing lessons in a gazebo in the middle of the street.

With all our hearts, we wished we could have stayed in this city a little longer. We were thankful for the time that we did have and we certainly planned to come back.