…And that’s when our luck turned around. Yay! We finally got a response from a “couch surfer” agreeing to let us surf his couch for a night. (If you aren’t familiar with Couch Surfing, you should really Google it; it’s a pretty awesome organization). But anyway, this couch surfer’s name was Sebastian, a 26(ish) year old living in Luzern, Switzerland. Our plan was only to go to Switzerland if we found a couch to surf, otherwise Switzerland would be far too expensive for our low budget Euro trip. Fortunately, we were in luck. We hopped a train in Lyon early Tuesday morning and arrived in Luzern by 1pm.
Sebastian wasn’t ready for us when we arrived at the Luzern train station, for he had to work that day until 8pm. Therefore, he told us to explore Luzern ourselves and he gave us directions to take the bus to his apartment as soon as he got back from work. Because we had our million pound backpacks with us, we stored them at the train station for 6 Euros until we were ready to leave for Sebastian’s, as to avoid any broken backs. Before we were ready to explore the city, I of course, having such a small bladder, had to pee. Tim and I were shocked to find that the train station’s bathrooms were charging TWO FRANCS just to use the bathroom! We thought this was absurd. Tim was not going to let me pay two francs to pee, so we set off to find an alternative to the train station bathroom. Burger King turned out to be our best option, although it still wasn’t so great. While Burger King’s bathroom is free to use in the U.S., it cost us a 4 dollar plain hamburger for me to pee. This was the cheapest thing on the menu! Just to give you an idea, a basic meal at Burger King in Luzern costs TWENTY FRANCS!! But, I emptied my bladder, and Tim and I shared the mediocre Burger King burger. We were then energized and could begin exploring.
Tim and I had an amazing time walking around the small city of Luzern. It was one of the most gorgeous places I had ever seen. I know we have said that for just about everywhere we have gone, but I mean it. I think Tim might have started getting annoyed because I had to stop every two minutes and take a picture of the Alps off in the distance. Everywhere we stood just looked like a post card! Lake Luzern’s water was such a gorgeous deep blue/green and there were two covered bridges over the river, which were really neat. Tim and I walked across multiple times. One of them was the 14th-century Kapellbrucke. This bridge had a wooden roof and was decorated with Swiss historical scenes. The other bridge, which was a little further down the river, was the Spreuerbrucke. Tim especially liked this bridge because it had Kasper Meglinger’s “Dance of Death” paintings hanging overhead (he learned about these paintings in his art history class he took this semester in Dublin, so was happy to get to see them in person). Aside from the amazing view of the Alps and Lake Luzern and its bridges, we also had a magnificent view of Luzern’s charming frescoed houses across the river. As you can see from the photos, Luzern was a beautiful place.
Tim and I found that there was no need to pay an entrance fee for a museum or other activity in Luzern, walking around and taking in the city’s beauty was more than enough. We strolled through the small city (not much bigger than Branford), and walked up a hill we came across until we found a nice picnic bench with a great view of the city. We perched here for a while and enjoyed a Baguette with some real Swiss cheese we bought at the train station.
After our picnic, it started to rain. We continue walking, but instead of walking out in the open, we changed our direction and began around the awning-covered part of the town. Because Tim was with me, we of course made our way into a Lindt Chocolate store (the famous and delicious Swiss chocolate) and found it impossible to keep ourselves from buying a souvenir. We splurged and got three chocolate bars before leaving Switzerland (as chocolate was virtually all that we could afford there, no exaggeration here).My pick was a milk chocolate hazelnut bar and Tim chose two different dark chocolate bars which we shared (one with chili in it and one without) – all the bars of chocolate were amazing, but I must admit (shh) Tim’s was better.
By the time the rain had slowed down and we had devoured part of our chocolate bar, we were ready to go to Sebastian’s. His house was easy enough to find, only a short bus ride away. We showed up at his door, looking like bums – a bit smelly, clothes a bit dirty, hair a bit greasy. But he was still very welcoming. He led us to our room, an empty room with an inflatable air mattress. It was more than we expected. His house was very clean, partly because there was nothing in it (he was getting ready to move to Zermatt, which was where he grew up). He also had a very nice bathroom and kitchen, all of which he let us use. He told us to make ourselves at home. After we put our backpacks in the room and settled in, he offered us some dinner. Having had nothing but Nutella and peanut butter sandwiches for a while, I quickly accepted his kind offer. Before no time, Sebastian had prepared us a plate full of sausages (Swiss sausages, bratwurst, and a few other kinds), pasta, and some pork chops. He apologized that he couldn’t make us a salad because his lettuce was past the date, but we were in no shape to complain…his dinner was the best thing we had eaten in days. Not only did he fill us up, he also poured us some nice Swiss wine, which was also appreciated.
Sebastian sat and ate dinner with us and the three of us talked for a while. We told him about Branford and our schools, while he told us about Switzerland. He will be going to the States (California) for the first time this summer, so we also gave him some advice. He told us if we ever come to Switzerland again, to come visit him in Zermatt (which is supposedly incredibly beautiful). The three of us bonded and chatted until about one in the morning. Shortly after, we were both “Facebook friends” with Sebastian…so we will be sure to keep in touch with him. We then all headed off to bed, as we had to get a good night sleep so that we could leave for Munch in the morning and he had work the next day.
Wednesday morning, Tim and I each took a nice hot shower in Sebastian’s clean bathroom (which was a nice treat after some grungy hostels) and also took advantage of his free WI-FI he had set up in his house. We sent a few couch surfing requests for Munich and then left for the train station.
No comments:
Post a Comment