- category: "Switzerland" -

October 08, 2004

Big Blue House in Nyon

Wednesday morning I said goodbye to Yazmeen in Zurich and headed south. Surprisingly my Let's Go guidebook even told me a good spot to start hitching from, even though they notoriously always follow it up with "Let's Go does not recommend hitch hiking as a means of travel" - yet the sometimes tell me exactly where to go. Does anyone know of a comprehensive resource, be it online or in print, that gives good hitching suggestions for popular cities and desitinations?

So anyway, it took me about an hour to realize I wasn't in the best of spots afterall. I don't mind waiting so much now because a) i had loads of time until I was meeting up with my next host, and b) i have about six weeks of commercial-free Howard Stern shows I downloaded to my iPod. Waiting is no problem anymore. But after I moved down the road a bit and around a corner I noticed a huge increase of southbound traffic heading in the direction of Geneva. Once I moved down there I had a ride fairly quickly.

Instead of taking me all the way to the Geneva area my ride was only going to Bern - the capital of Switzerland and around half way to my destination. Right as he was about to drop me off the sky erupted in a huge fit of rain. "To the trainstation, please."

41 CHF later (about $32 - did I mention Switzerland is expensive?) I was on the train to Nyon - about 15 miles north of Geneva. After two hours of walking the rainy streets of the small city I met up with Karim, my host and guide to the Blue House.

What goes on at the Blue House? You'll just have to wait until next time to find out. :)

Posted at 04:00 AM


October 04, 2004

3 rides to Zurich

I made it to Zurich, Switzerland in record time today. I don't meet up with Yazmeen, my 40th host, until 20:00 so I decided to save a little money and spend the day hitching here from Freiburg, Germany. I left at around 11:00 this morning and made it in about 2.5 hours. The TRAIN even takes longer than that to get here. AND it took me three seperate rides to do it! Usually it's the downtime in between good rides that takes the longest part of the trip. Today I don't know if I ever waited more than 10 minutes. Well, maybe 15 :)

My first ride taking me from Freiburg across the border to Basel, Switzerland was a german theater actress. She definitely had a booming voice that belonged on the stage. She was a lot of fun and I was sorry she was only going to Basel (not even 40 miles away). Next up was Harry. He was also from Freiburg and was driving a huge truck of car parts for a friend to somewhere on the way to Bern. He dropped me off at a gas station where a swiss family picked me up almost immediately. They were on their way to Austria to visit grandma for a week. Only the mother spoke english and we had a lot of fun on the ride into Zurich. She had learned english by bumming through Australia for three years. Three years! How fun! I was amazed to hear that she not only spoke german and english but also french and italian. Wow! The fact that most people back at home I know (including myself) only speak one language is one of the big things that makes me feel like an ignorant American. It's amazing to get this kind of perspective.

So I'm off to meet up with Yazmeen. I've been lugging my pack around this beautiful city all day today and it'll be great to sit it down in someone's home. And hopefully she can help me find a way to eat a bite in this expensive city without having to take out a bank loan. I heard Switzerland was expensive but I was a bit unprepared for what I've found. Still, it's beautiful!!

Posted at 12:24 PM