Skip to main content

Winter is Coming

Zurich, Switzerland - The title of this blog is both literal and figurative. The pandemic has been on a bit of a tear here in Europe. It seems many European countries, Switzerland included, got a little lax over the summer thinking the pandemic was behind them. The Swiss reopened bars, nightclubs, and even some large-scale events. The results were predictably not good, with cases spiking rather drastically in October and November. Tragically and also hilariously, a Swiss yodeling competition that attracted ~600 people was one of several superspreader events this fall. While case counts have settled down a bit recently, they are still about four times higher than they were at their previous peak in March.


Indeed, the Swiss seem rather more cavalier with coronavirus than what I understand is happening in the US. Restaurants are routinely packed with customers. People wear masks indoors to shop and on mass transit, but rarely outside, even if city streets are crowded. 

All this means that Hannah have resumed living in fear: we no longer see people unless we're outdoors and wearing masks, we don't go out to eat under any circumstances, and we don't take mass transit. So what's left to us? Renting cars and going hiking. Below is a brief run down of some of our recent hikes.

Chli Aubrig

We had a lovely time hiking up Chli Aubrig, wandering among the meadows and through some forests on our way to the top of a truly lovely vista. Unfortunately, we're still not entirely sure how to pronounce it. We'll get there.











Sisikon, near Bugglialp

A lovely hike that rises straight up out of Lake Lucerne and provides beautiful views of said lake. We didn't quite make it to Bugglialp, as getting there entailed another considerable climb into the snow and we felt ill-prepared. Before the hike we spotted a vending machine selling rather atypical items: pasta, cheese, condiments, etc. Of course the Swiss always want you to be prepared for a cookout on the mountain. 











Obersee, Näfels

There's a lot of Obersees in Switzerland and Germany, since obersee is literally "upper lake." So, its pretty important that we specify here that we visited the Obersee in Näfels. On the other hand, it's very hard to use umlauts on an American keyboard, so I'm just going to stop referring to the place altogether since it would be pointless to say obersee and its too hard to type the specific name. 

Anyway, this was a great hike. We started by a frigid lake, which was especially cold because it is constantly shaded by the mountains towering up on all sides. It was sufficiently cold that people were ice skating. From there, we climbed up the mountain through forests which got considerably warmer with the sunshine. Eventually we reached another shaded valley with some primitive cabins in which people were camping. From there, we hiked back down into the valley through some pastures where we encountered some goats. Hannah was - not pleased - at the lack of barriers between ourselves and the goats and at one point made herself scarce when she thought perhaps we were going to be the victims of the first ever goat stampede. Fortunately, we survived.




















Uetliberg

We took another trip up our local mountain, the Uetliberg, earlier today. When we left our apartment, there was no snow, but as we rose up the mountain it went from wet to slushy to winter wonderland at the peak. It's remarkable what a small change in altitude (~400 meters) will do to the atmosphere! Hannah was quite taken with the adorable swiss children dressed in their one-piece snow outfits tumbling through the snow. 
















Labels:
Location: Zürich, Switzerland

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

We're Back!

Paris, France - We've returned to Europe for a three-week sojourn in France, Switzerland, and the UK. We're obviously very excited. We arrived in Paris Sunday around 11AM. Our approach to jet lag is akin to tearing the bandaid off quickly: We purposely sleep little if at all on our transatlantic flight (below is a photo of Hannah, trying not to sleep on the flight), consume copious amounts of caffeine after we land, slowly descend into irritability and mild delirium, and then collapse after staying up as late as we can on our first night in Europe. Our body's, overcome by shock from this maltreatment, eagerly accept a full night's sleep, even if it's offered at an hour that's entirely out of keeping with our normal schedule. Works like a charm.  After depositing our things at the hotel, we aimlessly wandered around Paris for a few hours before meeting up with Maggie, an acquaintance of Hannah's from work. Maggie took us to the wine bar Delicatessen where we ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Fording the Fjords

We stayed one night in  Ålesund and for a few days in  Øye. These cities are fun for me at least partly because they use letters unique to the Danish-Norwegian alphabet, the 'a' with the circle on top and 'o' with the line through it (official letter names pending further review). Ålesund  is a port town of about 70,000 on the western side of Norway on the Atlantic coast.  We landed there  around 1100PM, but it looked more like 700 or 800pm, owing to the latitude (about 62 degrees north). Throughout our stay here, I've been very excited about the (nearly) never-ending daylight. The sun sets at about 1130PM rises about four hours later, but the hours between are marked more by a duskiness rather than a true darkness. We only stayed in  Ålesund overnight (if you want to call it "night") before departing the next morning for  Øye, which lies at the tip of a remote Fjord, the Norangsfjorden. Some locals told us that another nearby town, Urke, had less than...
1 comment
Read more

Edinburgh

We stayed in Edinburgh for two days to conclude our Scotland adventure. Hannah spent a semester in Edinburgh in her spritely college days and she remembers it fondly. As we wandered through the city, Hannah would point out various places and reminisce. Here was the restaurant where she would gather with friends to celebrate special occasions (The Outsider), here was the local café they frequented between classes (Peter's Yard), this was the park she walked through to get home (The Meadows), and there is the shitty hostel she stayed in when she arrived (less interesting!).  Edinburgh was fun. We liked it more than Glasgow. Edinburgh had more to see (more ancient castles, museums and monuments) and the city was denser and more lively. Glasgow just felt more utilitarian.  Hannah - of course - led me to the far-flung corners of the city in an effort to find the newest and best food, including marching me straight out of Edinburgh and into the neighboring city of Leith. We ate well...
Post a Comment
Read more