Pictures from this day can be found here.
We woke up very early this morning (around 5:45 am) and then checked out of our hotel as the sun was starting to rise. The clerk was very nice and apologized for not having breakfast ready – she offered coffee, but we had limited time to get to the station to catch our train. I would have liked one more cup of that coffee – good stuff.
At the station I bought a ticket for the train for both of us. The total was 30 Swiss francs, so I put in a 50 franc bill. Unfortunately all I got back was an IC card that was charged with the balance. Not very useful – so I have a 20 franc souvenir. Kuniko and I laughed at that for a long time – live and learn, I guess. Our train took us to Chateau St. Denis, and there a nice passenger told us that we had to catch a bus because of some construction, so we managed to get on board a bus to Palevieux, and then we caught a high-speed train to Geneva through Lucerne. We had just enough time to buy tickets at the station before the train came. There were a lot of people on the platform going to work, so we bought first class tickets this time hoping that there would be less people. As it turned out first class was far, far away from our position on the platform, so we had to hustle down the platform a ways, and then get on the train and keep walking through the train to find our section. It was pretty full, though – we managed to get a couple of seats next to a sleeping businessman.
Once we reached Lucerne many people got off, so we got some seats to ourselves for the last leg to Geneva. Arrival in Geneva was at 9 am, and there was some light rain and clouds. We went looking for our hotel, and I led us in the wrong direction. By the time I figured out that I had screwed up we were near a department store/restaurant that we had seen before in Zurich, so we went in to get breakfast and plan our next move. I was hoping for some hot eggs for breakfast, but unfortunately the server said that breakfast wasn’t served until eleven o’clock. Hmm… we settled for a sandwich and a chocolate-filled croissant.
After breakfast we looked around the store for some souvenirs. We got some good ideas, but didn’t buy anything yet – we had all day to shop, so no rush. Finally, we found our hotel back near the station. We were even able to check in early – they had plenty of rooms, so we put our stuff away, emptied out one of the backpacks, and took it with us out for some shopping and sightseeing.
The first priority for me was to get some business shoes that fit. Shoes are a big challenge in Japan, so I was hoping to get a couple of pairs of decent shoes, as that is pretty much all I wear at work. We scored twice in two different stores, and then we went out to see the Jet L’eau – a huge stream of water sprayed straight up in the air. At the time it was still cloudy and a little rainy, so it wasn’t very impressive.
We walked around town looking at buildings, churches and cathedrals, and finally decided to sit down at a café for coffee. The owner kicked us out, however, because she said we needed to buy food. We ended up walking across the street to Starbucks, of all places, just to get something hot to drink without any hassle. I wonder how much money the owner has lost to Starbucks this way…
Finally we did some souvenir shopping and loaded up on stuff to bring back to Japan. Chocolate is big in Switzerland, so that was the natural choice. We’ll have to be careful to stay in air-conditioned environments on the way home, though. Along the way I made a reservation at Alliance Gourmand, a restaurant that was recommended in one of our guidebooks. They were open for lunch, but a 6:30 dinner reservation was pretty early for them, and it took some convincing for them to agree to it.
Back at the hotel we stayed out of the drizzle – I took a nap and Kuniko sat around doing sudoku, and when I woke up outside was sunny and beautiful. It was our chance to do some more sightseeing in a better environment, so we hiked out to the United Nations building. The neighborhoods around the UN were filled with dormitories and pre-fab houses. It seemed to me that there were more than a few refugees living in the area, but it could have been my imagination. In front of the building was a huge crowd of Sri Lankans protesting, and it didn’t seem like a good place for us to hang out too long. We left and went back to the lakeside, and the scenery was much more beautiful.
After killing time at the lake we went out for a couple of beers sitting out front of a Middle Eastern restaurant called EGE restaurant. There were really a lot of ethnic restaurants in Geneva. Just about any country you could think of had a restaurant there – talk about a city with a lot of choices. I saw Libyan, Mexican, Iranian and even a Nigerian restaurant while we were walking around. The beer went down very well in the increasingly warm temperatures, and afterwards we slowly walked to Alliance Gourmand for dinner.
The place was in principle a Spanish restaurant, but the menu was more a combination of European flavors – almost California style. The waitress that took my reservation at lunch translated our orders for the owner of the restaurant, who went back to prepare everything. The waitress was really nice – she was apparently the only worker there who spoke English. Unfortunately nobody spoke Spanish or else I could have taken care of the ordering myself.
Due to the French menu what Kuniko thought was foie gras ended up being pork with a foie gras sauce. It was good, but not quite what she had expected. I had two beef filets with a delicious risotto, and we polished off a Spanish wine with our meal.
Afterwards we went back to our hotel to pack everything up and get ready for our departure the next day. The return trip was pretty uneventful – we just slept now and then, and I read two Lee Child books on the way back. Our first flight was a short one from Geneva back to Frankfurt, and in Frankfurt I waited in line for 40 minutes at Burger King to get a double Whopper. That’s how much I miss Burger King, I guess – it hasn’t come to western Japan yet.
On the next leg from Frankfurt to Beijing the guy sitting behind me snored big time. More than annoying – it was like he had some serious medical condition. Other people kept looking over, and Kuniko and I were exchanging laughs the whole way back.
In Beijing we had a little misunderstanding with the procedure for international transfer passengers. Although the instructional video on the plane gave us one procedure, the actual procedure was completely different, which was a little frustrating. The officials at the airport were not helpful at all, and gave us a bad impression of the airport. We’ve been through Beijing airport before, and although it is quite beautiful on the surface, the workers there have a long way to go in the hospitality department.
Anyway, finally we pulled into Osaka, flew through customs without a hitch, and managed to get our chocolate back unmelted to our home. Everything was in order back at the homestead, and it was nice to sleep in our own bed after so many hotels.
