Rainy Zurich

After Prague came Zurich. We brought food with us to Zurich since it’s so expensive there (definitely a good call). It reminded me of Brussels a little bit because the people here primarily speak Swiss German, but you also hear French, Italian, and English being spoken around town. And it definitely feels more metropolitan than Budapest or Prague, but we stuck to the old town part so it had a bit of a similar atmosphere.

There are a few main places to see in old town. First there’s the Lindenhof, a square with amazing views of the Limmat River and the city. Then there’s the 3 main churches: Grossmunster, Fraumunster, and St. Peter’s Kirche. Grossmunster has the two towers on its front and is the biggest. Fraumunster has one green steeple and has stained glass by Marc Chagall on the inside. St. Peter’s Kirche has the biggest clock face in Europe on it.

Then there’s also several museums. We went to the Beyer Watch Museum, or the Uhrenmuseum, which was a really interesting place. It’s not just watches, it’s a museum of ways that people kept track of time across history. Then there’s the Swiss National Museum, or the Landesmuseum. This was really interesting for me since I didn’t know much about Swiss history and that museum has everything in it!

Then we visited the opera house. It’s a really cool building, but tours in English are expensive so we didn’t do that. It’s across from the arboretum on Lake Zurich, which is a good place for a walk. Apparently the lake is great for swimming in summer, in January not so much. After that we went on a chocolate adventure! Sprungli and Teuscher are the two expensive Swiss brands, so definitely try them. And the hot chocolate is great as well, skip the Starbucks and find a local place.

If you go out to eat, try to find the cheapest place. Then splurge and get a fondue or a raclette (30 francs each) one night. Fondue is melted cheese, raclette is similar but you melt it yourself with various veggies or meats and scrape it onto potatoes that come with it. A great way to consume carbs and cheese!

Zurich was lovely, I just wish that it wasn’t so expensive! Definitely a good stop to make though.