Zürich-Arrival

After a rather uneventful flight we arrived safe and sound in Zürich to some pretty bad weather. But we were warned that rain was plentiful in these areas; where there are big lakes and mountains, it seems that rain is bound to follow. I had expected Zürich to be a thriving cosmopolitan center but the atmosphere turned out to be much more sedate than I expected. Perhaps the weather had a lot to do with the city mood (and perhaps mine too) but with the slower pace, it was easy to get into a vacation frame of mind.

On our first night in Europe, we walked down the river towards the Zürchner See. It was relaxing but wet! The swans in the Zürchner See though loved it. My friend Mia and I though were less enthused. The night was not good for taking pictures although I did get one picture of an amazing dark blue sky. It reminds me of some nocturne paintings my friend Jamie and I painted on the Hudson.

You can perhaps see from the picture how hard it was raining and perhaps the source of my camera's downfall. The camera only lasted until the third night at Stein am Rhein and then it permanently died - but not before I was able to take some interesting pictures of Zürich, Konstanz, and Stein am Rhein. The mountains in the distance are really rainclouds.

The food though was cozy food - just the right stuff on a rainy day. A colleague of mine who has family in Switzerland had recommended a beer hall called Zeughaus Keller and with its wooden beams, plastered walls, deer heads and assorted antique guns, it certainly looked the part. Long picnic tables coursed the room which was filled with the loud din of plates and glasses and voices. I imagine the hall could easily hold several hundred. Guests sat down at tables with complete strangers which was an unusual situation for Americans but one which I remember was more typical in Germany. Mia and I sat down next to this couple (or perhaps they weren't a couple and came in separately - who knows) who were funny and charming. The wurst and sauerkraut were filling and delicious and reminded me of the wurst I used to get at Schnellimbisse (Eng. wurst stands) back in Köln; however this time around, the Schnellimbisse were not to be found. A loss certainly since we didn't always want to sit down for a meal. The service was friendly but efficient. Those waiters had a routine going on and guests were marshalled in and out with the precision of military drill. It was fun but with the high noise level, it wasn't a place to hang around for a long time.

That night we ate at a smaller more local place whose name I cannot remember. I had this wonderful raclette meal with potatoes and melted cheese that just hit the spot (and we needed that since we had just come in from the pouring rain from walking to the Zürcher See) And of course the Weißbier - lots of Weißbier!

Before we left I wanted to pick up some paints. I had put mine in my suitcase and surprise, surprise, they didn't get confiscated but after Jamie recommended a 3 color Rembrandt palette I was very eager to try it. So we headed to Zumstein which is a conucopia of artist materials and supplies. The Swiss are really good at nifty little devices - it is after all the home of the Swiss Army knife. I got a mini sketchbook and a small device to hold pencils to your sketchbook. It looked like a big steel clip with 3 Slinky rings attached through which you could pass pencils, pens, erasers, etc. The store even sold rubber protectors for pencil points which are hard to find in American art stores. Mia picked up a sketchbook and some supplies too and before we left, I found a folding lightweight chair that I could take on painting trips.

So thus armed we were ready to head towards Konstanz and our biking adventure.

New York - home again!

Well a slight wrinkle came up in my plans. The trip was wonderful but I tore a cartilage in my left knee which had to be operated on and so I haven't felt like doing much lately except healing the left knee. More information about how that happened will come up in my report about Friedrichshafen.

The trip to the Bodensee was wonderful though. I would love to go back with a few changes to the itinerary. If I had to do it all over again, I would stay an extra night in some of the towns on the way especially Stein am Rhein and Ueberlingen.

I also wouldn't promise to update this blog on the trail. The hotels we stayed at were wonderfully comfortable but didn't have reliable Internet conditions.

So for my next entry, I'll focus on our city of arrival - Zürich!

New York - day before takeoff

It's been a wild couple of months getting ready for this trip. If you would have said this past New Year's Day that my big vacation this year would be taking a weeklong biking tour that goes through Germany, Austria, and Switzerland, I would have said you were crazy. Yet here I am the day before we fly to Zurich with my biking gear and German language podcasts in hand. I'm waiting for a UPS delivery of my pochade box to take with me for some small plein air paintings and maddeningly UPS does not give delivery times. Arrrrgggghhh! Oh well, it gives me time to set up this blog.


So how did I arrive at this unlikely crossroads between a couch potato existence in New York and biking my buns off for a week around the Bodensee? Well, my friend Mia had been on biking trips in France before and I remember her stories of biking up tremendous hills to see a castle in the Loire to get to her hotel at 10 o'clock at night, totally exhausted but with a gourmet meal waiting. Hmm, I could do without the hills and the late night arrival but the idea of working up a sweat to be rewarded by a warm bath, ready cooked meal and beautiful surroundings did sound a bit appealing. Also the idea of traveling a little like vagabonds biking from one town to the next each day - starting in one place in the morning and ending up somewhere completely different that night ... and then doing it all again the next and the next ... well it appealed to my sense of adventure. I felt like an explorer on the Discovery Channel...albeit one with a biking tour company riding along to take our luggage from one hotel to the next so we don't have to. Adventure doesn't have to mean totally roughing it!


Yet Mia hadn't mentioned her bike tours in awhile when she sent me an email out of the blue this past spring telling me about some Supersaver fares to Zurich. I don't know what possessed me to suddenly think of a biking tour. The Supersaver fares got me thinking what types of trips we could plan from Zurich and the idea of going back to Germany or Austria appealed to me since I had lived in Germany before and had spoken German but by now I was totally rusty. I wanted to do something different but not impossible. A colleague at work who had lived in Vienna knew about some biking between Vienna and Prague and her family had a house on the Bodensee (Lake Constance) So I started looking for biking tours on the Internet and Lake Constance sounded really good.


The Bodensee or Lake Constance is the second largest lake in Switzerland behind Lake Geneva and the third largest lake in Europe. The English name for the lake takes its name from the largest city in the area, Konstanz, Germany, the medieval city where the Council of Constance was called to repair a schism in the Catholic Church-the side effect being that the reformer Jan Hus was burned at the stake. You've got to love those medieval Catholics. Mia and I will be starting our tour in Konstanz and hopefully I'll get a picture of its most controversial work of art, a statue devoted to the prostitutes who offered their services to the bishops and clergy during the Council of Constance. I think its a modern statue. Other cities on the lake included the beautiful island city Lindau, Friedrichshafen, the home of the Graf Zeppelin museum, Bregenz, Austria, and the small but very quaint Swiss town, Stein am Rhein.


But besides the area's predisposition for burning medieval heretics, it had a lot to offer us. First, its the vacation spot for the locals and it seemed more low-key and less touristy. Secondly, we could probably practice our German there because its a local rather than international destination. Thirdly it was a family-friendly location with basically flat trails close to the lake and lots of swimming opportunities (a VERY important consideration) Finally it looked beautiful and it was a place that neither of us had been to.


One bike touring company seemed well organized and well recommended by most websites - the Konstanz based Bodensee-Radweg company. The layout of the website looked very professional and contained a lot of resources for travellers needing information to bike in the area. The company offers a lot of different tours from the Bodensee Klassische Tour (the classic tour and the shortest one with a roundtrip from Konstanz but cutting out the hilliest part of the lake - just our speed!), the Bodensee Radweg für Sportliche (for active cyclists - definitely not us!) and the Bodensee Radweg für Sparsame (for cheap tourists but I saw the route for the cheap tourists and it looks harder than the one for active riders-no thanks) The Bodensee Klassischer tour was just our speed. And did I say that this wonderful company will carry our luggage for us from town to town? Mia and I are in packing heaven right now. They're renting us the bikes, arranging the hotels, and would have provided for meals in the city but we prefer to sample some cuisine on our own.


So Mia and I planned to take a beautiful Klassische Tour at the end of May right before the heavy tourist season when we got a monkey wrench into those plans. Mia got a new job! It was a pleasant monkey wrench for her, she was looking forward to the move to a new job. However, employers doesn't look kindly to new employees just taking off a week or more in the first months after they get a new job so Mia had to work her magic and get some time off in early September. Ah bummer but it turned out for the best because the preparations for this trip have taken us this long. If you're interested in biking the Bodensee, don't be put off by our slow start - we are preparation junkies and getting ready for a trip is almost as much fun as going on the trip.


We haven't been on the trip yet but so far, I can only say the nicest things about the people we have dealt with at the Bodensee-Radweg company. They have been extremely nice and patient answering a multitude of questions both by email and phone. I must admit I don't know what the service is if you don't speak German. Their website has an English version but it unexpectedly links to German pages for some links. Mia and I did get our tour materials in English though.


A couple of things did catch me by surprise. the first was the long wait after we had turned in our reservation (about a week) It actually was a bit longer than that but I had made a mistake and made my reservation in an email to a single individual after she had answered my enquiries. I should have filled out the form on the website. Then she got sick and was away from a couple of days and since my reservation wasn't in the system, no one else had the information to process the order. When I followed up, I got an immediate response but then it took about a week to process the order. I finally figured out to fill out the form because my email didn't have some vital information (especially about the bikes we were renting) and in a week the confirmation came through.


But once we got the confirmation, we got everything that we would have wanted. They mailed us some great materials including a waterproof bike map of the region, a customized booklet listing our intinerary with hotels and directions, tags for our luggage, and a color booklet outlining our tour. A couple of times I had to phone the offices in Konstanz and each time I was met by a friendly female voice on the other end who was very patient with my attempts to practice German and answer my questions.


The second time I got to practice my German was when we had a little snafu with the payment. I noticed about a month after the reservation that although I had provided my account and bank information (as we would do here in the States for a direct debit payment - Bodensee Radweg does not take credit cards), the company had not yet taken the money out of my account. I called the office and another friendly voice told me that the usual payment method was a wire transfer. Their account and bank information had been on the receipt they mailed us. If I had looked at it carefully I would have seen that the total due was the amount of the trip and not (as when you pay upfront with a credit card with an American company) with a total due of zero. I'm glad I called then because in a few days would be one month before the trip when the tour had to be paid in full. They later sent me an email apologizing that the payment was so difficult for non Europeans so I think that they are strictly used to Europeans travelling with them. But they were professional throughout and I am glad I got some practice working out problems in German; I think it will be helpful to us be able to take care of emergencies if they happen on our trip.


Well UPS is still not here and they still haven't called. I'm going to get something to eat and then in the next installment, I'll write about our adventures of practicing German.