August 28, 2024
After a long day of travel including crying kids, chaotic boarding process and getting lost in Heathrow we finally made it to Geneva our first stop in Switzerland.
Geneva is a global city, a financial centre (a 130 banks mostly private), and a worldwide centre for diplomacy due to the presence of numerous international organizations, including the headquarters of many agencies of the United Nations and the ICRC and IFRC of the Red Cross.
My first impression of the city is how clean it is and how little car traffic there is. The city provides a free transit card for all tourist to encourage them to use transit rather than cars.
After we dropped our luggage at the hotel we walked a short distance to a quaint little bistro Cafe du Soleil that featured Malakoffs. What are Malakoffs??? They are a chunk of Gruyère cheese coated in batter and then cooked in butter. YUM and so worth the calories!! What a perfect way to begin our adventures in Switzerland!!!
This morning we headed out early to the city centre to start exploring. First on the agenda was to take the tourist train through the old town area. We are at the stop early but the train never arrived and we were left standing in the sun for a bit so we headed to a cafe for coffee and people watching. Later we found out that the battery on the train had exploded so it was running late. We were able to catch it an hour later. The old town area including the water front is beautiful with lots of green space and historical building. The Flower Clock is to celebrate the watch making industry and is changed seasonally. Do you think Disney copied them???
Then we headed to the bus that took us to the international part of the city. The plaza in front of the United Nations building with the broken chair sculpture that symbolizes the campaign agains landmines is inspiring especially when you look across the street at the flags of the United Nations. Yes, I paused for a bit to acknowledge how countries working together can accomplish great things including peace in most of the world.
By the time we got back to the central plaza and all of the restaurants other than the Four Seasons were closed and we were really hungry and thirsty so we decided to treat ourselves. There was a bit of sticker shock when a club sandwich was $60 but we were hungry. Note to self restaurants in Switzerland close at 2:00 and don’t reopen until 7:00. The food was really good, the atmosphere was incredible and they put our leftover (AKA take away) in a beautiful Four Seasons gift bag. So worth it!!!
Exhausted we headed back to the hotel. A great first day!
Tomorrow we head to the mountains. Hopefully the ice cave will be open!!!
OMG!!! So beautiful. now, I have to look up Malakoffs!
Glad you arrived safe and sound! Sounds like a very full first day. Hope the ice caves are open for you!
Always go Four Seasons!
Swiss ….Very clean, orderly and on time. Have fun!!!!