Abenteuer Zwölf: Zürich

This was how my day in Zürich began:

That's right--a cream-cheese pretzel thing. This cream-cheese pretzel thing was, however, no ordinary cream-cheese pretzel thing; rather, it was a cream-cheese pretzel thing of celebration.

Namely, celebration of the fact that I'd managed to single-handedly find my way out of the Zürich Hauptbahnhof.

The Zürich Hauptbahnhof is the biggest train station I've seen in Europe so far. I mean, it's winding and multileveled and enormous. Picture every shopping mall you've ever walked through combined with every airport you've ever been stuck in for more than ten minutes, add a few groceries stores, liquor stores, cafes, and incongruously fancy designer clothing stores, and you've got a vague approximation of the Zürich Hauptbahnhof. It probably took me at least fifteen minutes just to find the light of day again.

Hence, the celebratory cream-cheese pretzel thing.

When I finally made my way OUT of the train station, this is what I saw:

River walk along the Limmat

This is the second thing I saw:

I have one of these at home waiting for me

I could tell right away that, even though I only had a few hours, I was really going to like Zürich.

At first glance, Zürich is basically just a bigger version of Bern. They have their own giant river, giant bridges, steep hills, ornate churches...Zürich is also in the German-speaking area, so its architecture and language are very similar to Bern's too.

Zürich is also one of the main banking capitols of Switzerland. Knowing this when I arrived, I had fully anticipated the legions of bankers strutting around in their ties and suits. What I hadn't anticipated was

Werner's Head Shop, open for business

All the hippies! For every suit, their was at least one barefoot person with dreadlocks. For every insurance agency, there was at least one Alpaca clothing store or instrument boutique. It was really fantastic.

Another amazing thing about Zürich was all of the sales in the clothing stores. I found more cheap clothing in Zürich than I have anywhere else in the whole of Switzerland. This was exciting to me because I was really starting to worry that, in this country, things like sales simply didn't exist.

Anyway, I spent the remainder of my time in Zurich walking along the river and lakeside, seeing what else I could see.

 

Gary enjoyed the riverfront

 I came across the Zürich Grossmünster during my meandering--a church which supposedly was founded by Charlemagne and which later was the birthplace of the Swiss Reformation. It's also supposed to house the burial sites of Saints Felix and Regula. 

Unfortunately, however, after the Bern Münster and the Milano Duomo, it really wasn't terribly impressive-looking. 

One cool feature of the Zürich Grossmünster was its windows. In the Zürich Münster, a lot of the stained-glass windows are filled with ultra-modern-looking circle and spot patterns. Apparently, these windows are the work of Swiss artist Sigmar Polke. I guess that makes them...

                                                      Polke-dots?

Here are some more pictures I took in Zürich:

Europe's next summer blockbuster--ENDLICH im Kino!

A plaque dedicated to the memories of those brave manatees who gave up their lives protecting Switzerland from the last Sharknado  (or maybe just an artist's depiction of what Lake Zürich used to look like..?)

Lake Zürich now. I believe it's manatee-free? 

The Zürich Opera House, with busts of all the famous German composers along the top

Unfortunately, the Opera House was the last stop in my tour of Zürich--upon reaching it, I had to hurry back and catch the train to my next adventure. And where was my next adventure, you ask?

Simply put, the Rheinfalls. 

The largest waterfall in Europe.