36 Hours in Switzerland

9/9 - 9/10ish

Bonjourno! We are writing to you from Greece (not in our original plan, but that went out the window 700 train rides ago) but want to update you on our Italian adventures! Ryan has suffered the slings and arrows of blogging for the last 5 weeks so I (Claire) have given him reprieve and taken the reigns.

Before we discuss Italy we must tell you a bit about Switzerland. It's only a bit because we were there for about 30 hours. After a wonderful breakfast from Dani and Dennis, they drove us to the train station. At the ticket window, we decide we want to go to Marseilles, France but we discover we must stop in Switzerland so we figure we should take a look. We get to Zurich at about 8pm and take a walk through downtown looking for a hostel. Switzerland is damn expensive! Thus far we've mastered public transportation in all other cities but Zurich gave us a challenge. Luckily a nice Swiss lady came up and offered to help. After 15 minutes of her explaining the buses and trams we must take to find our hostel, she asks if we have our tickets for the tram. We say 'no' and get out our Euros at which point she says 'we use Swiss Francs'. Whoops..dumb Americans strike again!

At this point we decide to go back to the train station and figure out train options or get money. There is a train right then for Laussane, SW so we hopped on knowing we wouldn't get in until about 11 and then our next train to Milan was at 6am. Laussane might be a nice place to travel in during the day but at night is was sketchy! We were directed to a late night bar about a kilometer or so from the train station. The entire walk was up a huge steep hill and all around us were sketchy dudes just looking at us. Even Ryan was a little on edge. We are even stopped by police officers are greatly confused at why we are roaming around and direct us to the bar. We have some pizza at the bar and Ryan orders two espressos and says 'i'll stay up and you can get a few hours sleep.'

We walk back to the train station and find a comfy metal bench to sleep on. I get situated to get a little rest and Mr. Two-espressos is already asleep. So I stay awake looking around at the other benches with bums, drunks and a few scraggly travelers on them. About 430 the train station opens and we find a bench inside. A man calls out to me 'you speak English?' as I'm walking by. I say yes and think that he needs help or something. Or course he's actually hitting on me and Ryan has to come make his presence know. HA. Men in train stations at 430am don't often need the help of a young lady.

At 6:30 we hopped on a train to Milan! Whew!

Loving the life of a traveler! Missing home a bit but soaking up every minutes here!

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