Switzerland: Below the Alps

Jebus, finally posting this, am I lazy or what? You’ve probably been waiting and waiting and thought, he’s never going to post the Switzerland stuff, and then BOOM! I post it, but you’ve already unsubscribed from this amazing blog. Any way, we’re approaching xmas and I am seriously still hoping to get all these posts up before then. Because Switzerland was so good, I’m going to split it into two, well, mainly cos there are too many pictures from the Alps to post. So I’ll be talking about, Zurich, Lucerne, and Geneva (even though we visited that place after we climbed the Alps). I mean, really, there’s not much to tell about these three cities from our point of view, we only spent one night in each place and half a day in each place.

The first thing I’m going to say is that Switzerland is bloody expensive, if you don’t know anyone there (and they better be thrifty), good luck finding a cheap eat that isn’t a kebab or something similar. Secondly, a lot of Swiss people smoke, or at least, a lot of people in Switzerland smoke, which I found very surprising considering that they’re very outdoor-sy, and the natural beauty of the country (I thought that people would be into clean living lol). All three cities are based around lakes, beautiful settings with beautifully laid out buildings and architecture. There isn’t a lot to see in town, wander around the lakes and shops, and the olde towns and that’s about it, they’re all pretty close to some great natural scenery though. That’s it, next up, the Alps, I promise to get that one up in a more prompt fashion.

Transport and Accommodation
We stayed in airbnb.com places in Lucerne and Zurich, both really nice and clean, and short distances from the town centres, we were going to stay at the YHA hostel in Geneva, but decided to stay at a hotel, the Admiral Hotel which is only a couple blocks from the Geneva train station, and a couple blocks the other way from Lake Geneva, a pretty good location, and it was relatively cheap compared to the other places in the area. It was small, but comfortable enough, although we could hear doors slamming outside, there was also a breakfast buffet provided with a reasonable spread.

In terms of transport we got around using the Swiss Half Fare card and regular train service, as well as trams within Zurich, and buses in Lucerne (although we could have just walked). In Geneva we really too tired to bother doing anything other than walking by the lake a bit.