We flew from Lisbon, Portugal to Zürich, Switzerland which was one of our new countries to visit on this trip. I lived there with my parents when I was very young for about 6 months around Lucerne. We read that it was very expensive and that was a very true statement. I only booked 3 nights because the hotel prices were more than we care to pay.
When we got off the plane we headed to the train which was underground of the airport. The escalator was broken and it looked like it went down into oblivion so we decided not to carry our luggage down those many steps. I already knew the taxi would be nearly $100 dollars so that wasn’t happening. I saw a sign for tram and buses, PERFECT! We went out to that area and it was a self service ticket machine for both modes of transportation. Did I mention it was all in German? Oh yes, they gave me the option of English but it was still German. It was all unreadable for us so Jimmy was ready to get a taxi but I was determined we were going to figure this out.
German is the main language in Switzerland so I decided to ask one of the bus drivers what we needed to do to get to our hotel. He didn’t speak any English and neither of us were able to understand our communication through the game of charades. I went to another bus driver and he seemed to understand a little and pointed to the #1 on the ceiling where the tram had been. We walked back to the machine and I purchased tickets for $12 in franks that I had no clue if they were correct or not. Jimmy was terrified we were going into the land of the unknown. We got on the tram and it took us directly to the area we needed to be and no one asked to look at our tickets so I have no clue if we purchased the right tickets or not.
Our hotel room was on the top floor and then stairs to the attic. It was a cute room and we were happy to be there. We decided to go out for lunch and found a hamburger joint. The menu showed that the burger was about $30 with no fries. By the way this was a hamburger joint, not an upscale restaurant. It was the most beautiful burger and the flavor was absolutely amazing even with the shock of the price. The next day we decided to have steak at a restaurant nearby and the menu said $65 by weight. We asked for the smallest size they had and they brought us two 6 oz steaks that just melted in our mouth. That bill came to $310 which we had no clue obviously what we were doing. The last day there we decided to stick with having another $30 hamburger! We had to get out of there quickly before we ate all our savings, literally!
Needless to say, Switzerland is off our list to revisit. We did see some beautiful architecture on our walks and a lot of history which we always enjoy. Now off to the train station to go through the Alps to Milan, Italy!
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