The jury is still out on our trip to Switzerland. What started as a great time in Interlaken slowly escalated into a bit of a fiasco by the time we hit Zurich.

While in Interlaken we booked through Easyjet to take advantage of cheap flights, in this case to Brussels from Geneva on November 10th. Geneva it seems, is one of the main hubs for Easyjet flights. We thought it would give us adequate time to enjoy Switzerland of the North as we had such a great time in the Bernese Alps. Well, I suppose we were wrong. Not entirely though, as Luzern was a nice relaxing place with beautiful buildings and a great hostel (Backpackers Lucerne) which we would soon find out can make all the difference.

We spent 4 days in Luzern (taking in the amazing Swiss Transport Museum, saving a man’s life and trying to get over our colds) after which we boarded a train to Zurich to fill the final two days before training back to Geneva. As soon as we got off the train station we had a feeling we should have booked a different destination. It’s not that Zurich isn’t beautiful, it is, but it looks almost exactly like Luzern (I’m sure some would disagree, but we are looking for variety here!) The only discernible difference being that Zurich is larger and more expensive, if that is even possible. We trudged through he dreary weather to the Hotel Biber (Beaver) and up its creaky, dirty stairs for 4 floors before we came to it’s overcrowded ‘common room’. We then walked up two more flights to our final destination, our dorm room. Here we were exceptionally blessed with 4 bunk beds separated by a narrow corridor. The total dimensions could not have been more than 8 x 10, and we were expecting more roommates to come! Luckily when they finally arrived they came in the form of two equally unimpressed girls from Australia. A big sign of relief for us. Over the next two days we made the most of it by making sure we carefully researched into the final legs of Germany, Austria and the Czech Republic. We also buried our nose in our books and avoided all stores and shopping districts (although we did the walk-by tour) including Europe’s third most expensive street, Bahnhofstrasse. Instead, we opted for the CO OP and used our ‘full kitchen’ sans microwave and oven to create such delicious meals as chicken and peppers on tortilla chips sprinkled with stinky cheese. Haha, does anyone else detect the sarcasm?

We may not have picked the best final destination, but Switzerland is indeed worth seeing. There are always lessons to be learned and we are fortunate to have seen such a large portion of Switzerland, knowing for next time exactly where, and more importantly, where not to go.