Blogs from Switzerland, Europe - page 311

Blimey, we thought it rained as we crossed the mountains into Switzerland last week, but today... Solid downpour from dawn to dusk without a break. I saw a man with a beard building a big boat and pairing up animals. After Austria we drove a hellishly long way to Lake Garda, experiencing the deep joy that is Italian traffic management. They simply don't see two-hour queues as any sort of problem that might need attention, and when you finally crawl to the holdup it turns out to be... a badly parked moped. Or a tricky left turn crying out for a traffic light. Or a pedestrian crossing by an icecream shop. Mind you, Italian drivers don't help. I'm not exaggerating when I say we saw an accident every single time we drove on Italian motorways. Anyway ... read more

Hey everyone! Its great hearing from everyone thanks for the messages and emails. This post wont have pictures bc we cant get to a computer that will let us plug in the cord but as soon as we do i will put up some pictures from Switzerland bc this place is amazing!! I have to write really quickly about our time in Venice. We had a great and relaxing time. We roomed with 2 other girls, one from Newcastle England and one from New Jersey. We basically hung out with them the entire time. The gondola rides were way too expensive for us but we were fine with just roaming around the city getting lost in all the side streets. The way the city is laid out with all of the canals and bridges is just ... read more

Despite the popular belief that there is no such thing as abandoned buildings in this country, I managed to find one in Zurich, my first day here. I did not attempt to go inside as it is on a busy street and attached to a couple of occupied buildings, but I did take a couple of photos. The rest of the city is... great?!? Many old buildings, with the typical old building architecture... Ok, so this is the one place that I did not really like. I don't know why, but the people were cold and the city was too clean, making the experience too... sterile.... read more

Hello- Yesterday we ventured to St Remy just to check out another provencol village. I'd heard about renting farmhouses nearby with chef-owners catering to their boarders and wanted to see if this might lead to a future venture with my husband. We wondered into a perfume factory where I purchased a scent I like. The highlight was walking into a chocolatiers shop! The most intense chocolate smell-taste Ive'experienced. FYI: St R is where Van gogh was hospitalized after cutting off his ear. Also Nostradamos birth place.. Now were located in Switzerland. Our trip today was cut short due to a missed connection. There was a bomb threat in one of the French stations. These days are intense but the scenary was incredible. We followed Lake Geneva several miles. With the snowy Alps as background, the lake ... read more

i've now moved on from bern, back to lauterbrunnen and now in lucerne, which is a much bigger city than i imagined. bern was ok. nothing too flash but nice enough. not many people around as they'd all gone away for the long weekend. they had their national day yesterday and nothing was on. parliament house was open for free and that was it. i went (and they gave out free chocolate at the end so i was happy). no parades or performances or anything exciting. i got to lauterbrunnen last night and they had a massive fireworks display which was awesome. it was so strange, because we're in the valley, it was soooo loud and it just kept echoing. switzerland is really nice though. ... read more