Our journey begins at 7:30pm on Tuesday 8/26 w/ an 11 hour flight on Swiss airlines to Zurich, Switzerland. My first experience on this airlines was overall pretty good. Economy seats were comfortable, the food was pretty good (dinner and breakfast), and there were lots of in-flight entertainment options. The 2 things that need to be addressed before I will fly this airline again are the power outlets and wifi. I knew ahead of time that this flight would not have power outlets for economy, so I planned ahead by bringing a whopping 18-cell laptop battery. I did not, however, realize that there were any large airplanes left that did not have any on board wifi... doh!?!
In-flight entertainment review
I watched LEGO Movie and the Grand Budapest Hotel. "[LEGO movie] is awesome. Everything is great when you're part of a team." This film exceeded my already high expectations. Great humor, and interesting incites into the manual v. free-lance lego debate... along w/ some decent twists at the end to keep it unpredictable. GBH was ok. Some of the humor was pretty funny, but the plot was just meh.
Heading to downtown Zurich
We arrived safely in Zurich around 3:30pm local time. With a 21 hour layover, it was time to hit the town. Our checked luggage remained under Swiss Airlines guard. We exchanged some monies for Swiss Fancs, locked up our backpacks, and purchased some rail tickets. Before arriving downtown, we noticed that the whole experience so far was eerily quiet. The airport was very quiet, despite being full of people moving in every direction, and even the train itself was quiet, with very little rail noise and nobody talking on a half-full train car. We helped to get the atmosphere going on the train. Seen below is Casey planning, Nora plotting, and Ryan... well... doing his thing. What a weirdo!
Snack Time
Next we rented free bikes to cruise around the area. Many of the attractions were closing as we headed out, but we saw some cool building, churches, and clock towers. Our first real stop was at a local cafe recommended by Nora's guide book. We ordered hot chocolate and a 12-pack macaroon sampler. Superb. The best macaroons were the ones that tasted like lemon bars :) The hot chocolate used local swiss dark chocolate & was super fancy. This was no Swiss Miss kids!
I'm on a boat!
Our next adventure was a 1.5 hour boat ride around Lake Zurich (free with the 24 hour transit pass we bought at the airport). We overheard some guy explaining how the west bank of the lake is referred to as the gold [coast?] and the east bank as silver... meaning the east bank was expensive, and the west bank properties were extremely expensive. There were some great views of homes, factories, etc.
Sausages and Kings
Next we head out to dinner. I went with the sausage sampler with grilled onion sauce, potato salad, and a 0,5L dark wheat beer. All of it was excellent. The sausages came on a skewer w/ bell peppers between each sausage and bacon on each end for good measure. The beer was quiet excellent. I don't know the proper beer terminology, but there was a little tanginess to it, and it was pretty heavy and smooth. We got a free ice cream cake w/ cognac in it w/ our rail ticket.
Queue the first terrible life decision!
Next we found a hostel that offered rooms are ~$50 USD per person. We opted to save up funds and just head back to the airport to sleep before our flight out to Istanbul. This was a terrible life decision. First, we went to see if the Raddisson at the airport had any rooms that we could use for just a few hours, but they were fully booked. Next, we found a really comfy padded booth to sleep in at a closed coffee shop. Just as we were falling asleep, a really nice Swiss guard informed us that we were not allowed to sit at the closed coffee shop, but we could sleep on one of two other floors at the airport center. To sum up the rest of our night/morning, Casey slept 0, I slept maybe 2 hours and got a decent crink in my neck, and Nora won the day w/ perhaps 4 hours of sleep before a shopkeeper came buy to open up her shop and kicked us out. Now Casey and Nora are trying to sneak in some early morning naps while I type up this post.
Summary
Overall, a pretty good start to the trip! I'd definitely consider spending some time in Switzerland in the future. Next stop, Istanbul!
No comments:
Post a Comment