We Need to Rob a Bank

---

I wake up in a cold sweat. It's 7am and I don't know if I'm allowed to stand up to go to the toilet yet. I've read a lot of articles telling me that this is strictly verboten after 10pm, but nothing about when this "curfew" finishes. I decide not to risk it and sit down.

We head down to breakfast. There's an open bottle of champagne on the breakfast bar. I wonder if many of their guests guzzle down a few glasses of bubbly for breakfast. There don't seem to be a lot of university students staying here.

It's overcast and cool. We wander across the Reuss River on one footbridge and then back again across the Chapel Bridge, which is over 200 metres long and crosses the river at an angle. It was built in around 1365 as part of the city's fortifications, and is believed to be the oldest surviving truss bridge in the world. It formed part of the city's fortifications, and originally contained 158 17th century paintings on wooden boards. Two thirds of the bridge was destroyed by a fire in 1993, including all but 30 of the paintings. It was very quickly rebuilt and reopened again in 1994. The fire's believed to have started from a discarded cigarette butt.

We wander along the shore of Lake Lucerne and get great views over towards Mount Pilatus and some of the higher snow covered Alps to the south and east. There are walkers, joggers and cyclists out in force, and it looks like they're all well catered for. The lake's not short on ducks and swans, not to mention a diverse variety of boats. We pass some tennis courts, and I start to wonder whether they play much tennis here in mountainous Switzerland .... well I did until I remembered Roger Federer.... The lake shore's lined with fancy looking hotels. Our small apartment stuck away in a back street overlooking an alley was expensive enough; I think we'd need to rob a bank to be able to stay along here. I think Switzerland's renowned for having a lot of banks; surely there must be at least one that's not too well guarded. We see a large group of important looking businessmen standing around drinking champagne (we're starting to notice a pattern here) in the gardens of one of the fancy hotels. I wonder if they're Swiss bankers, and if so how well their particular banks are being guarded while they're standing around getting sloshed before lunch.

We walk back along the lake shore and up to the famous Lion of Lucerne statue carved into a cliff face. We read that it commemorates the massacre of nearly 800 Swiss Guards during the French Revolution. It shows the dying lion impaled on a spear, but still trying to protect people with its paw. It's very poignant. The original Swiss Guard was formed in 1506 and its soldiers were deployed to protect various royal families all over Europe. Most of this stopped in 1874 when the Swiss Constitution was changed to outlaw foreign military service, with the one exception being the force protecting the Vatican City.

We head into the small Gletschergarten Lucerne Museum next to the Lion statue, where the main subject seems to be everything glaciers. We have lunch at the museum cafe. Issy asks if we can have our hot dogs with tomato sauce. The lady behind the counter says that they don't have any of that, but we can have them with ketchup if we like. Issy tells her that they're the same thing, and that she's just learnt something Australian. She says that this'll come in handy when she visits her daughter in Perth. And it seems we've learnt something too - everything here is ridiculously expensive - nearly thirty Australian dollars for two small hot dogs and two small bottles of soft drink. Really?? I think again about robbing a bank. We take photos in front of some fancy mirrors, and then climb an observation tower where we get good views over the town and across to Pilatus.

Next stop is the Bourbaki Panorama - a 108 metre long and ten metre high 360 degree painting. It was painted in 1881 and depicts a famous incident during the 1870 to 1871 Franco-Prussian War in which 30,000 French troops crossed the border into Switzerland in the middle of winter to escape the Prussian armies. They had to surrender all their arms, and the many injured were then sent all over the country very quickly to be cared for. The panorama's both an indictment on war and a celebration of the Red Cross. It was painted by a team of about ten artists, the head of which was a Red Cross volunteer who witnessed the incident. The panorama and the audio that goes with it are very impressive and moving. I ask Issy how a team of ten painters could all contribute to the same work without all the sections looking different; if Issy and I both painted something, I think my stick figures might look a bit obviously different to her Rembrandt like portrayals.

We head back to the apartment for a siesta; although I'm not sure that they have siestas in Switzerland.

We go out in search of dinner. As we cross the Chapel Bridge we hear some splashing. We assume that some of the ducks and swans have got a bit over-excited but as we look more closely we see a young couple walking down the steps on the riverbank into the water, and start swimming. It's cold and overcast and it's been raining, and I think that this river's fed mostly by melting glaciers. It's also nearly dark. We're feeling cold just watching them, and most onlookers are shaking their heads in disbelief. We decide that they must be tourists from Siberia. The river's flowing fast, and although they're swimming hard upstream, they're not making any progress. After a few minutes they climb back out again. They now look very out of place standing in their bathers in amongst the well-dressed diners at restaurant tables along the riverbank. We wonder if maybe they did this for a bet; I hope so because we're struggling to come up with any other plausible explanations.

Finding somewhere to eat's proving a bit challenging. We're told that there are no tables available in the "wintergarden" of our chosen restaurant, which it seems is the popular bright part of the establishment, with lots of lights, and windows on three sides with good views out over the river. We're instead shown to a dark table in the very back corner, lit only by a small candle. It's next to a door they use to take out the rubbish, and if the number of times it opens and closes is anything to go by they must throw out an order of magnitude more than gets eaten. We hope that's not indicative of the quality of the food. Our view is of a tiny dark courtyard decorated with an abandoned bath tub full of dirt. We think about finding somewhere else to eat, but we had enough trouble finding this place, and it's now raining. We then consider asking for a view-based discount, but by the time the bill arrives alcohol's made the bathtub full of dirt look surprisingly attractive.

---

Comments

[Lee Edel]

Fly Me To The Moon
This old stewardess wants that Swiss Air DC 3 in the museum you visited. Looks to be in flying condition. Fly that home and you can save some money, no need going to the bank ! ( I would suggest you do not rob a bank, although the Christmas holiday season is lovely in that country....however, you will not be let our of your cells to enjoy it.