Zurich, Furka Pass,Geneva and back to Paris

The world's a smaller place now

Geneva

Found all the bloody irons!

Furka, furka, furka

Snowball fight!

Julie Andrews, safe at last.

What a dump

Worth the drive.

Swiss safety

He saw me and waved.

Lunch at the Gerig

mmmmm, good

"I should not have eaten that."

The mighty SEAT

Well here we are. Paris again after a huge couple of days traversing Switzerland. We've crossed it twice, once by train from Venice and yesterday we crossed from Zurich to Geneva through the famous Furka Pass.

We wanted to do something spectacular after enjoying Venice so much and Switzerland was between us and Paris, our next connection. We managed to get a train to Zurich, a very pleasant university town, and hire a car for the drive to Geneva.

The landscape was the drawcard and we wanted the freedom to stop where wanted. Taking photographs from trains hasn't got much to offer the traveler. It was a great decision because we just guessed our way over the alps with the help of a map and managed to see the most spectacular sights yet.

The Furka (yes, it is very tempting to make puns) has the most turns per kilometre, or something like that, than any other road as it zig-zags its way over the range. It featured on Top Gear recently. We reached 2600 meters (about 8000 ft) at the top but it was beautiful sunny day and a balmy 10 degrees outside. We've had so much luck with weather. It has only rained when we were traveling by train.

There was two metres of snow at the edge of the road and the traffic was light. We were between seasons and it was Friday. Lucky. The pictures should be pretty good.

We managed a girly snow-ball fight, where no one was actually hit, and a great big Swiss lunch at one of the alpine towns. There were a lot of motorcyclists and signs encouraging them to come to the area. There were old bikes on columns to show businesses who wanted their patronage. I'd love to do that road on a bike. Though to be honest the drop-offs and the bollards don't make for comfortable 'come-offs'.

We made it into busy Geneva traffic after 400k of both mountain and Autobahn driving. We were pretty happy with ourselves. I guessed the route by seeing where a famous train went and connected the dots. Pretty happy with myself.

The hotel at Zurich was great, the hotel at Geneva less so. This is the problem when internet access is so difficult to get. One has to grab at whatever is available instead of researching it properly. I'd like to have wireless access like my mobile phone. It would be so handy.

We are in East Paris now. It's definitely a different place to the Paris we first met. We are staying in a big Novotel because Paris was booked out. The disadvantaged live out here on the edge of the Metro, there is little to no alcohol available, even in the biggest supermarket we've ever seen. We got around that little problem with a visit to a Japanese restaurant just over the road. Hot sake and a bamboo boat-load of sushi made us the happy little Vegemites we like to be. "More sake?", the owner would wonder as he weighed our empty mini-carafe. "Yes please!" we nodded.

We take the Chunnel to Heathrow tomorrow for the big anti-climactic trip home. We stop in at Singapore but we don't want to stop over. Our friend Shami will pick us up from the airport (Thanks Shami!) and my son Levi will pick us up from her place.

It will all be done.

As I said in the photo up top, the world is a smaller place for me now. I'm glad that I've done all the miles and am also happy with the way I've done them. I'm familiar with a great many places now and I've finally moved from pictures on a page to extended experiences in my mind of all those iconic places I've grown up knowing about.

The best thing is that I feel like I've gained a confidence with travel. I have moved beyond the chicken coop and into the long grass.

Venice re-floated

One in every crowd

Our first sighting of Venice

At the Peggy Guggenheim Museum

At Murano, real glass-workers

We've circumnavigated Venice and can now rest and drink to the glorious weather and the wisest decision I've yet made on my travels, and that is not to drink alcohol during the day. What a difference it makes. The map shows one WC for the whole of Venice. There are more but they all charge one and a half Euros each wizz. The ferries don't have WCs either and the trip to Murano Island was about 25 minutes. So, yay for brains!

Am enjoying the benefits of expensive (10 Euros) internet which must be used in the foyer. I shouldn't whinge. It is Venice after all. I would have thought that Europe would have got to the point where one could access the internet at any cafe, at any hotel or on any train. It is still seen as a cash-cow by all. I saw, whilst booking for Zurich, that five star hotels are charging over 30 Euros for a 24 hour connection. It makes it hard to do what one would see as normal life. Normal for nowadays anyway.

Besides the expensive toilets and internet, Venice has been a great myth-breaking experience. The place runs well and the transport system, consisting of clock-wise and anti-clockwise ferries every five minutes, works a treat. The place is amazing, much like Cinque Terre was, for its ability to make its own normality.

We've had a good time but Jane had a tough time with a cold and Venice was a focus for her. We took a day-pass on the ferries and she managed with the big sunny day very well. It was good to avoid to much exertion and the ferries took the brunt of that. We happened to have a very good sun-block too. It's strange to make much of it but it saved us today. Summer would be tough.

Venice is big, it's organised and it's five inches above high tide. Amazing.

Apparently Australia is freezing at the moment. Looking forward to that!

We're off to Zurich in the morning. No idea what to expect.

Last Rominations

Perfect angel-weather

The queue to the Vatican. (couldn't fit it all in the pic)

"The Typewriter"

Crap the Vatican didn't bother stealing

Pigeon poignant?

I liked this bloke

He who hesitates...

Gimme some of that!

We've spent four days in Rome now and we've earned our blisters. We sought out the few corners of the city that had been missed and we are ready for a holiday. We spent seven hours meandering through the streets and managed to avoid the Rome-bladder-trap (where you are stuck with a time-bomb in your belly) very well indeed. Jane didn't get veggies soon enough and is feeling a little ill but managed to pull through a big day.

We wanted to buy another bag today but left it too late. We've accumulated another few cubic feet of stuff and need a place for it. It will all fit within our baggage allowance though.

Jane put the difference between Italy and France very well. France will always be a stranger but Italy is someone you have known for a while. It's a big difference, and it makes normal life easier to attain. It was the Irish and the Italians (with a little Greek help) that made Australia bearable. I can see why here. The traffic is well-mannered yet complex. Everything is achieved with little aggravation, no road-rage, no rudeness, just flow. From buses to horses and carriages and bicycles, all is assimilated into the flow.

The only thing we don't understand is why so many motorcycle riders drag one foot in the air. Is it an off-shoot of GP racing? The French do it more but it seems to be modish here too. I can't figure it. A good rider rarely needs to touch the ground. Only Harley riders drag their feet like infants on tricycles. Any answers out there?



Apropos of nothing

I was listening to the Science Show on Radio National yesterday (podcast) and it talked about the Dunning Kruger Effect. It is the very common situation where the most confident are the least intelligent and vica versa. Arrogance is a direct offshoot of stupidity and modesty often arises from competency. It explains the Republican party, the Liberal Party (an Australian oxymoron), the futility of democracy and the paradoxical nature of ambition.

This idea seems to be proved, beyond doubt by George Idiot Bush yet completely undermined by Barack Obama. A tough one I know.
It is worth looking up because it causes even me to pause for thought.

We are booked into a hotel on Venice tomorrow. A very fast train will take us to the vanishing city and we will then be off to Zurich. Maybe we'll drive to Paris from there.