Zürich!

This past week has been the prep week at the school, which means that we all have been quite busy! The first day of school is on Monday and that means there was a lot to be done (and probably still is). After such a long and busy week, Dorina and I decided to go to Zürich for the day on Saturday! I was pretty excited since my only time in Zürich before today was at the airport, which is not actually IN Zürich (the canton, yes, but the city, no), so it doesn't really count ;-)

When we got to Zürich, we walked down Bahnhofstrasse, which was named the most expensive street for retail property in Europe, and the third most expensive worldwide! There were some pretty big names on that street, but there were also some more inexpensive shops, like H&M. Shops like Chanel, Louis Vuitton, Rolex, Cartier and others definitely make up for the more wallet-friendly shops though! We didn't go in many stores, but did some window shopping (which I learned is "Schaufensterbummel" in German). I didn't take any pictures of this because there were so many people and I was so busy looking at everything. Bahnhofstrasse reminded me so much of Vienna, especially living right off Mariahilferstrasse (although Mariahilferstrasse is not so expensive--the comparable street in Vienna to this street would be Graben). I felt so much Heimweh for Vienna, being back in a big city with so much to see. (Heimweh=homesickness, but I feel like Heimweh just fits better. That's Denglish for you.) So far, I love Winterthur, but I do miss living in the heart of everything.

After walking down Bahnhofstrasse and wandering through a Flea Market (with so many cute antique things!!), we stopped and sat by the lake (Zürichersee) and listened to an American performer while we ate lunch. We had some fresh bread and cheese, followed by a piece of cake for each of us. Yum :-)

This is the Zürichersee (Lake Zürich)

Me in front of the lake. Not where we ate lunch, but the lake nonetheless :-)

We then walked through the Altstadt (the old part of the city) before deciding to go up into a tower of a church to look out over the city. The stairs up to the top were very very narrow and steep, which was slightly terrifying. We started going up about 15minutes before the church tower closed, so a lot of people were going down, which meant squeezing by and clinging to the rope railing for some kind of stability. One woman joked that it would be rather awful if one was pregnant going up or down these stairs, just because of how crowded it was. But, once we got to the top, it was very worth it. I love looking out over European cities because they are not the perfect grids like our cities tend to be. The roads are curved and hilly, making the buildings look haphazardly placed. Don't get me wrong, our grid cities are great for navigation, but I think the curvy, not-so-planned cities are more aesthetically pleasing.

I love the color of the water!

Dorina and I at the top

Dorina and I asked this man to take a picture of us (see picture directly above). He was taking pictures with a large, fancy camera, so we both thought it would end up being a great picture. It's not bad, but he told us to turn our heads to face towards the sun otherwise it would be too dark, which was a good idea, but then we ended up looking slightly awkward. Or at least I did. Oops! :-)

Afterwards, we wandered through the Altstadt again

Steep hills, cobbled roads. Yep, I'm in Europe :-)

After all this, naturally we were exhausted so we headed back to the train station to go home. Tomorrow I plan to just relax and enjoy my Sunday because Monday is the start of school, and I have a feeling things will be quite busy with all of that ;-) Stay tuned for details about school!