travel – Page 2 – B I J A N

Switzerland, Day 3

June 2, 2015by bijansabet

Yesterday we took the 12:05pm boat from Weggis to Lucerne for the day. And it left the dock at exactly 12:05pm. The Swiss attention to detail is extraordinary.

Foursquare has been really fantastic along this trip. We had a late lunch at Brasserie Bodu because I saw my friend Roger left a great tip. The food was delicious and their outside seating is in a lovely square with a beautiful old church. From the table you can catch a view of the river down a stone staircase. It is also a great people watching spot.

After lunch we spent the afternoon exploring some more. We went well beyond the touristy shops near the river. It was nice to see all the quiet streets and bicycles lined up everywhere. The people here are so kind. Each cafe or shop has a friendly face and a warm conversation.

One of my favorite things to see are all the children return home for lunch every day to be with their families before returning to school for the afternoon. The older ones sit outside with friends exchanging stories and a laugh with fresh bread in hand.

By early evening the sky grew extremely dark so jumped on the 6:12pm ferry back to our hotel in Weggis (yes, it left at 6:12pm). It only rained for 10minutes or so and then two rainbows appeared that went completely across the width of Lake Lucern. My iPhone photo didn’t capture what we saw with our eyes and hearts.

When we returned to Weggis, the rain had completely stopped and the warm weather returned. We enjoyed our first Hugo before dinner and experienced some amazing Swiss cheese. Our favorite was the heuboden.

The sun finally disappeared by 9:30pm and by then the moon was big and bright. The lake’s surface was sparkling with moonlight. It looked magical.

Today we are leaving and taking the train south to the Interlaken area.

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I am starting to feel a little awkward tweeting my daily journal from Switzerland. I’m still planning on writing about our days but I won’t be tweeting a daily link in case it is annoying some of my followers. But for those that feel otherwise, feel free to come back to my blog anytime :)

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Switzerland, day 2

June 1, 2015by bijansabet

After breakfast Sunday morning we took another walk around the old town area of Zurich. All the shops are closed on Sundays and the streets were mostly empty. We walked aimlessly while making photographs. Lauren brought along her Rolleiflex and I’m carrying my Hasselblad 503cw.

By mid morning our friend Yen came by the hotel and walked us to the train station which was about a 15 minute walk from our hotel. Along the walk I noticed the Apple store is located directly across the street from a large Swiss watch store. I feel a bit funny wearing my Cupertino watch in this town.

The train station in Zurich is quite large but amazingly well organized. We had our espresso, gave our last hugs and kisses to Yen and boarded our train. Our train was scheduled to leave at 11:34am and guess what time it left? Exactly 11:34am. Everything here runs exactly on time. It gets us every time it happens.

The train to Lucerne was a little less than an hour which felt like no time at all. Lucerne is beautiful. The Reuss river runs through the center of the city with fountains, shops and restaurants on both sides with bridges connecting it all. There is a gorgeous and famous wooden bridge called the Chapel Bridge. It’s has flowers all along the outside and you can feel the history of this bridge.

By noon we were both starving and had lunch outside at Rathaus Brauerei which sits on the Reuss. We had a delicious pretzel lunch and then walked across a different bridge to the dock and caught a boat to Weggis.

The boat ride on Lake Lucerne is less than hour and absolutely stunning. All around are mountains.

We quickly checked into our hotel in Weggis, dropped off our bags and then took the local cog-wheel train up the mountain to the very top to Rigi. From there we took a 3.5 hour hike which I will never forget. I don’t have any photographs to share just yet but I can still see in my minds eye the green grass with wildflowers everywhere and panoramic views of the snow covered Swiss Alps and the crystal clear lake.

After dinner we connected with the kids back home on FaceTime and then crashed for the night.

We do not have any particular plans for today. We may take the boat back to Lucerne and explore or may call today at lazy day and just chill here in Weggis. It feels good to just be here and in the moment.

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(I forgot to mention in my post yesterday, Yen is quite the photographer and adventurer. She spent over a year living and documenting life in a prison in Mexico and published this photo book some time ago. It’s a powerful collection of images. All captured on black and white film.)

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Switzerland, Day 1

May 31, 2015by bijansabet

I have always been inspired by my friend Joanne Wilson’s travel blog posts where she shares her thoughts and observations after each day of travel.

So I thought I would give it a try and see if it works for me.

(My posts won’t have any photographs since I’m shooting film but I will be share the scans a few weeks after my return)

This past February my wife and I celebrated our 20th wedding anniversary. We went to the Caribbean with the kids for an extended winter getaway but also wanted to do something for just ourselves and started thinking of places to go that was easy to reach from the United States, somewhere with great hiking and outdoors and new to us. That led us to a spring visit to Switzerland.

So on Friday after my morning meeting in Boston with a really cool entrepreneur, I set my ‘out of office’ setting in Gmail went home, picked up Lauren and we left for the airport to fly overnight to Zurich. I slept about 2 hours, Lauren did much better.

The drive to our hotel was easy and fast. We checked into the hotel and I took this panorama photograph with my phone.

We met up with Yen, a friend of Lauren’s from our undergrad days who now lives in Zurich with her family. After a lunch outside at Kindli, Yen and her daughter took us for a wonderful walk around the city.

I opened the Uber app on my phone just to check and yes, Uber is here. But we didn’t use it once. I love how everyone walks or bikes everywhere. The beautiful Limmat river runs though the city with walkways on both sides. I’m told the river is so clean that people swim in it during the summer months, jumping off the one of the bridges closest to Lake Zurich. I couldn’t help but compare that to the impossible notion of swimming in Boston’s Charles River or the East River in New York City.

The cleanliness of Zurich continues in the streets and buildings everywhere. Window boxes adorn the old windows along the main streets and smaller alleyways. Kids and adults drink from various fountains in the many squares in the city.

By mid afternoon we needed a little boost, so Yen took us to Sprüngli for some amazing chocolate. Oh my god. If you visit Zurich, please make sure to find your way here. Lauren had a champagne truffle and I am still having day dreams of the salted caramel.

Afterwards, we walked to Yen’s apartment and met the rest of her family. We brought a few gifts and I taught their oldest boy, age 13, how to throw the American football we gave him. After thirty seconds he was throwing a perfect spiral. He asked me how much time the quarterback has to make the pass. I showed him a clip of Joe Montanna & “The Catch” on YouTube and we were both smiling.

By late evening we said goodnight to our friends and Lauren and I had dinner at Kronenhalle. I felt a little awkward showing up in a t-shirt while the rest of the customers had a jacket & tie on in this 140 year old establishment. But the people working at the restaurant where super friendly and my anxiety faded as I enjoyed a beer with my dinner in comfortable clothes.

After dinner we walked some more and called the kids back home. We were happy they had such a good day themselves and I’m grateful to my mother in law and parents who are taking care of them this week.

Today is Sunday already and it’s about 7:30am. Lauren is still fast asleep and I’ve been up for about 2 hours. We are going to leave Zurich mid day and take train south to Lucerne. The weather forecast looks great. And I couldn’t be happier to be here with my soul mate.