Zurich, Switzerland

Arriving in Zurich, I met up with my couch surfers Christine and Jens, they were very friendly people and we got along great! They even let me use their washer and dryer. I was surprised to find that they had a dryer, it was the first I had seen in Europe. But upon opening it, I noticed that they used it for storage of extra toiled paper. People just air dry their clothes, which I have become more of a fan of. For dinner we had a wonderful Swiss dish where by cheese is melted in small personal “frying pans” and then drizzled over potatoes, tomatoes and other mouth watering foods. It was ridiculously delicious. Real Swiss cheese is the BEST!

These are the spatula/frying pans used to melt the cheese on the potatoes

Which created this delicious meal

We decided that I would see the majority of Zurich in the morning, then see Lucern and then accompany them to Sedrun, a small town in the Alps for National Day festivities. Christine and Jens were biking towards Sedrun while I explored.

First stop was Zurich.

Zurich is a beautiful city, which I had the pleasure of visiting on August 1^st, National Day, very similar to the 4^th of July, in the USA. Situated on a lake, it has a river flowing through the heart of the city. Along the banks you find magnificent buildings, clock towers, and bridges. Walking through the old streets made of cobble stone, I couldn’t help but smile. Everyone seemed very happy, everything was clean, organized, just how I like. I got to see a church with the largest clock face in Europe!

I took a boat tour of the city. The bus ticket is good for use on the boat as well, which takes you up the river and into the lake a ways. I was able to get a nice vantage point of the city. It was so relaxing that I may have even fallen asleep when we were out on the middle of the lake. J However, as we got closer to town I certainly couldn’t rest anymore due to the chiming of the bells on all of the clock towers. The amount of bell noise was astounding, and being in the middle of it all was even more intense!

After hopping out of the boat I raced to the train station to catch the next train to Lucern. Since it was National Day I bought a special bread that is sold only on August 1st. It comes with a little Swiss flag sticking out of the top, it is a delicious bread!

Happy to have my bread!

Vaduz, Liechtenstein

Taking a bus into the capital of one of the smallest countries in the world is an experience, it only takes a few minutes to drive across the country. The land was very green and mountainous. It looked as if I would enjoy it in the winter time, skiing along the ridges and slopes of the gorgeous range that plows through this small country. One of the interesting things to notice about this country is that it is ruled by a monarch who still lives in an old castle up on a hill.

(just a really colorful truck)

The country is known very well for skiing and banking, the areas that I saw certainly looked very affluent. In the heart of the capitol you can’t help but notice the strange statues and fountains that ornament the main drive.

(this was a fountain)

But the water was inside!

(I liked this one, it looks like a sink the water from it runs through the intersection into another part of the fountain.)

There was a beautiful church that I saw. Nice doors.

Another thing that they are known for is people sending post cards home with a stamp from Liechtenstein. I of course had to have this little novelty, so I sent one home.

After I ate my tuna out of a can on a park bench I headed out of that country towards Switzerland.

Sofia, Bulgaria

Arriving late put a bad taste in my mouth for the city because unfortunately the night highlights the negative aspects of a city just right and as you all know, first impressions mean everything, even for a city. On my first real day here in the city, I wandered around trying to find cool things to look at. I of course tried really hard to avoid any museums or churches that required money.  Which by now most of you know that I am fairly good at it. I wandered to one of the grandest churches in the city, Alexander Nevsky Cathedral, and I saw St. Sofia Church, the Russian Church “St. Nikol” and I saw a government area which is the administrative headquarters for Bulgarias presidency, every hour on the hour the guards changed. I was very hungry walking around and wanted to find some food, unfortunately the alphabet here is Cyrillic which I of course do not understand, at first I was a bit worried that I was going to have to point to something in the middle of a menu and hope that it was good. But at a stand selling kebaps and burgers I met a man who spoke English, he gave me a hambuger type thing. There was a lot of stuff on it, and it was amazing! It was like a cross between a Burger, a Gyro and a Turkish Doner Kebap, there were french fries on it, taziki sauce, mayonnaise, meat, ketchup, more mayonnaise cucumber, chili powder/sauce not sure which, and some other stuff, it was amazing.

I walked back to my couch surfers apartment, which I found after wandering through some neighborhoods that looked a bit sketchy. I finally found the National Military Museum, which is next to his house. Its great, you can wake up and look out the window and see a Mig, or a tank looking at you, or trucks with rocket launchers on them.

After Simon returned home we went out for a bite at a local ale house, it was very clever in that they had poor spouts for the beer at each table with a meter that measures the amount you drink in liters, at first we thought it was measuring in money, so we were mislead and unfortunately did not enjoy the end result of that. The food was great! Fairly inexpensive but delicious. Later we took a crazy cab (the driver must have been from India, because he had a total disregard for the lanes) to a student area of the city where after a while we went “cosmo” bowling, it was a lot of fun, bowling in Bulgaria. After bowling we walked by another stand that sold the crazy burgers, I of course needed to get one of them and man was it good!

Thessaloniki, Greece

I arrived in Thessaloniki late in the afternoon met my couch surfer and went back to his house, while he was studying his cousin and her two friends invited me to go with them to see a Greek play. I thought that was pretty cool because I think the Greeks invented Drama. The play I saw was called “The Lady” apparently it was about a band of robbers trying to steal a painting I think, but I am not 100% sure. I could not understand any of it, but it was fun to see a play in a different language. When we got out of the play it was raining really hard, it was crazy, the streets were overflowing in places and there were bits of loose trash flowing in the current down the streets. I was with  one of the girls who couldn’t get her arm brace wet due to an injury, so it was pretty difficult for us to keep it dry while everyone got soaked to the bone. The girls made spaghetti it was really good. While we were eating two girls from Iceland came to the house too. My couch surfer was hosting me and two girls from Iceland at the same time. It was really cool staying in a house full of people to talk with and learn about one anothers cultures. The next day we took a walk to the castle on the top of the hill and saw a beautiful view of the city and of the Gulf of Thessaloniki further down the road was an old city wall tha protected the city a long time ago, at one end there was a castle, in the middle was a rotunda with frescos depicting Jesus Christ and other religious symbols and at the very end near the sea was the beautiful White Tower which is not white. After relaxing at the waterfront for a while we walked to a great Greek resturant where we got a smorgasboard of food it was of course, amazing.

The next day I hoped on a train to Sofia, Bulgaria. I was really excited that I had an entire room to myself and that it was a non-smoking train. Then I realized that no one pays attention to the signs and it makes me very upset. Those of you who know me know that I cannot stand smoke/ing and it was coming right into my area so I had to put on a mask to try to give myself some decent air to breathe, which of course didn’t work as well as I wanted it to. I really wanted to go to the cabin next to mine and throw them off the train, but of course I refrained.

(not happy)

I arrived in Sofia at 11:30PM and I wasnt sure if it was Sofia or not, so I went out to ask someone, and there was no one on the train. It was dark in this seedy looking train station at midnight and I didn’t hear anyone get off the train, yet there was no sign of anyone and only a few people outside the train, not a trainload thou. I gathered my belongings and steped off the train into what felt like dozens of peering eyes, a big disgruntled man saw me and started to follow me into the train station I was walking toward what looked like a security guard just in case, but as I figured he was a cab driver following people around. I tried to call my couch surfer but for some reason I didn’t have the exit code right and couldn’t get ahold of him. Great, stuck in a train station at midnight and I can’t get ahold of my host while a bunch of seedy people lingerd about. Then I saw a man who looked clean cut and like he spoke English, he let me use his phone and my host said he would meet me at the station in 20 min. I told my new friend that my ride would be here in 20 min. We started talking a bit more as creepy guys came up to us asking if we needed a cab. He turned to me and said you really shouldn’t wait here. So we moved inside just as a lady was locking the doors. While inside we got kicked out because the train station was closing. So, outside on the freshly rained pavement my new friend told me that this area was really not safe for either of us, so we walked across the street to get away from who knows what. He was kind enough to wait with me until my ride arrived, relieved I got into a cab with him and headed home.

I hadn’t eaten in quite some time, so we walked to a 24 hour restaurant where I ordered a Bulgarian style pizza and my couch surfer ordered a salad, which was just a bowl of cut up tomatoes. It was pretty funny.

Bulgarian Pizza