This Train Station is Bigger than My Town!

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On my way to Zurich I took a night train in a sleeper car. It was a pretty interesting experience; the train didn't leave Salzburg til about midnight, by then I was really tired. The train car had 6 bunks (3 deep on both sides) in it and I was in the middle on the second level. It would have been ok if the people below me would have quit talking!! The bed wasn't that bad and there was enough room for me and my bag, but I couldn't sleep because they were too loud. Unfortunately my Ipod died because I forgot to charge it, so I didn't have anything to block out the sound. I think I managed to sleep for about 4 out of the 6 hours though. At the end of the train ride they gave us breakfast with coffee, so that was much appreciated! I arrived in Zurich around 6:30am. I had to change money right away because you have to pay to use the bathroom...a side note to anyone traveling in Europe, always carry spare change for this exact reason! Then I had to wait for about 45 minutes for the tourist office to open because I forgot to print directions to my hostel...or as I later found out, I printed them, but forgot to pack them, so I had no idea how to get there. The tourist office was very helpful, they had a lot of information about things to do in Zurich and were willing to give lots of advice, which is always nice to find.

The hostel was kind of difficult to find, but once I found it I realized how centrally located I was. My room wasn't ready yet, so I just dropped my bags in the office and took off to explore in Zurich. I did bring the walking tour suggestions that I printed off, so I went on a self walking tour of Zurich. I walked down the main shopping district and looked in the windows of the designer boutiques and the chocolate shops. It started to rain while I was out, but I carried on anyway. I walked all the way to Lake Zurich, but really couldn't see any of the surrounding mountains because of the dense fog and mist. I must admit the weather in Zurich was crappy...it kind of dampened my mood. I tried to walk around as much of the city as I could in that morning and I saw Fraumunster, a church that has stained glass windows made by Marc Chagall. Later that afternoon I decided I didn't want to be out in the rain anymore so I went to a neighboring town to attempt to see a chocolate factory. I am going to categorized the trip mostly as a bust. The Maestrani Chocolate factory is located near Flawil, Switzerland. The train ticket was pretty expensive and I arrived excited to see the factory, but was informed it was quite a ways outside of Flawil and the clerk in the station was not very helpful and he just sent me to a map on the wall. I went next door to a store and asked the ladies shopping in there, and luckily one of them spoke English!! One of the ladies flat out offered to take me out to the factory! It was so nice of her! I think this was the best part of my trip to Flawil. She drove me out to Maestrani and I went inside to look around the factory. It is kind of neat how it is set up...above the workers in the factory there is a glass walkway where observers can look through and see how they are working below and how the production lines work. There are also some explainations along the way. IT was neat, but it took me about 15 minutes to walk through then all there was to do was go to their store and buy chocolate. Needless to say, it probably wasn't worth my time. I hitched a ride back to the trainstation and then had to wait 30 minutes until the train arrived to take me back to Zurich.

I think my first day in Zurich I spent more time in the train station than anywhere else. The station is HUGE!! There are multiple levels and one of them is basically like a mall. There are also a lot of resturants inside the station. When I came back from Flawil there was a market taking place inside the station. The stalls were mostly for food. They sold many all types off meat, pastries, and sausages. I tried a hazlenut strudel, it was pretty good. For supper I just went to the grocery store and picked up somethings for that night and for the next day; grocery stores are the cheapest places to find food and I had a full kitchen back in the hostel.

On Thursday finished walking around the city in the morning and around lunch time I met up with Anna, the girl I met on the train from Budapest. She showed me around some of her favorite places and the University where she studies. It was pretty cool to see a foreign university. The campus was really spread out and had a lot of buildings, I don't remember how many people she said studied there, but it was pretty big. We also took the funicular up to one of the highest points in the city to look around, but again it was kind of foggy so we couldn't see much. We ended walking down the hill so we could see more of the city. For lunch Anna took me to her favorite sausage stand. It was a food stand that had a kitchen behind the counter and then had tables and umbrellas outside. They serve you a sausage, like a bratwurst, wrapped in paper and dijon mustard to dip it in. The mustard was REALLY hot, so I stuck with ketchup. Then along with the brat there were bread rolls that you ate as well. After lunch we walked by the lake and then to Anna wanted to take me to get a hot chocolate. We went to one of the most upscale chocolate shops in Zurich where they have a restraunt upstairs. It was so busy we had to sit with another lady and share her table, I'm sure it was more awkward for her since we were speaking English. We just ordered hot chocolate which came in tall steaming cups. The chocolate was really thick, not like the powdered kind I drink at home! They also put cream (homemade) on top, which was so thick and it tasted like butter. I almost hemmoraged when I saw the bill! Anna treated me to the most expensive hot chocolate I will ever drink in my life; they were $7.50 CHF a piece! I suppose in USD it would be about $6--way too much for a cup of hot chocolate! Anna and I spent the rest of our time walking and taking turns picking places we wanted to see. We saw the old walls of the original city, a water polo field(?) in the river, the Swiss stock market, and she also introduced me to the city tram system--which are much easier to navigate than the Italian bus system. On the tram we went to the northern part of Zurich to find a place called Techno park...we thought it would be an interesting park, maybe with some sculpture or something...no. it was just a building that housed new businesses. Oh well, we tried. After returning to the station we parted ways because Anna had to go pack...she was supposed to move in 2 days! The rest of the evening I scouted around the city for souvenirs and found myself a swiss pocket knife...mwahahah--now i can open wine, some canned vegetables, and cut something all at the same time, and, maybe, even pull a splinter out of my finger! (because it comes with tweezers)

Friday morning I woke up early and left on the train for Perugia at 7:45am. The ride through the Alps was gorgeous! It is amazing they were able to build the track through the mountains! The entire trip back to Perugia took almost 8 hours! I was so tired by the time I got home I basically just went to bed! Two of my other roommates arrived around the same time and after we all shared our stories we headed to be... so we could wake up and go to Eurochocolate on Saturday...

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