3 June, Thursday

Last but not least: The Capital, Bern!


Staircase from the Einstein Museum. Brilliant!
Beside the Old town these bears are living. Subjected to criticism from animal protection organisations, by the way...

2 June, Wednesday

If you are visiting Switzerland, and love the Sherlock Holmes stories, than Meiringen is a must!
This is the famous place where Holmes almost died in the struggle with Moriarty Professor, the "Napoleon of crime". There is a nice museum, partly copying the Baker street Museum in London. You can see the interior of Holmes` dining room on this picture:
There was a nice old lady who helped me with the guiding tape :)
You also must visit the Reichenbachfalls, where the struggle took place (as it is marked by a white star...). The weather was rainy, rather cold, and climbing up on an interesting little trail beside the furnicular I got totally lost... Ended up on some hilltop actually surrounded by sheeps...
But the falls are brilliant!!!! And so enormous!
At the town I met with a nice Americal couple who took a picture of me in front of the museum, beside the statue of Sherlock Holmes. And they also took a picture of me, for some reason, well, why not, I said. Maybe they are collecting Sherlock Holmes fans, and I am the Hungarian one....
:)

31 May-1 June, Mond-Tues

Now it is time for Zurich!!
Ah, sorry, not yet, it's Shaffhausen first. Pretty town, lots of medieval-looking buildings and a castle-like building on a hill surrounded by grapes, which was built with the labour of slaves. Fascinating!
4 or so km of Shaffhausen is one of the biggest waterfalls in Europe, over the Rhein. You have to pay for practicly everything here, even the view...
Now we can go to Zurich!!
The first thing I've noticed about it is, that it's big. And full of people who go in and out and about... Not like the silent and friendly Lugano. Although, I have to tell you, Zurich is a pleasant surprise to all who expest a trading center or bank town. There is green too! And historical buildings and churches and water...


And the best secondhand bookshop ever!!!
So, after a little bit of phone number mixup and travelling (my bad!!) I could spend the night at Remo's, in one of these brand new beauties:
And took off early to... ST GALLEN!!!
Where GAllus, the travelling Irish monk stumbled upon a treeroot and established the abbey. And where one of civilisation's cornerstone is, the library!!!
Sadly, I could not take pictures inside...
:(:(:(:(:(
But it's gorgeous!!!!
:):):):):):):):):):)
There I met with a nice old American lady, who searched for her ancestors. (that's not her in the next pic....)
Well, after St Gallen I felt I'd like to visit a different country, and made a detour to Liechtenstein. By bus.
It's not that different after all... Both modern and old, and has a national library which looks like our district Szabó Ervin... :P
And finally, Vaduz, where the princ lives.
(sorry guys, no prince at the window... :( )

29-39 May, Sat-Sun

Let's go to Brig!! Through Italy non other!!!

The famous Matterhorn from Zermatt.
And the delicious fondu!!!!
Next day we went to French Switzerland. It was raining.
Sion


And this beautiful church, or rather a snippet of it, secretly photographed.
Lausanne




The underground is great!! There is noone driving it, it's totally elechtronic!!! You can even stand at the front, see?...

28 May, Friday

Now Bellinzona's got to see me after all :):)

It all began with terrible rain. And the conviction that I have to make it up to Bellinzona today. So I went to that fine city, the center of Ticino, where you must at least pass through every time you come to Lugano from the North. Famous for its 3 castles, UNESCO World Heritage sights or what. Well, then I went to search for some nice old churches a little bit out of town by a map I got from the Turist office. Circled around a bit, one of them was an interesting graveyard church,

And the rain began to fall even more strongly, so I took a train to Locrno, beside the Lago Maggiore, hoping to get a bit of sunshine. Nice place, very secretive with it's sights, not very good icecream, and a monastery on the hill, Mary...something... de Sacco. I climed up,
They were renovating the whole place, women painted frescoes all over, I could not even enter the church! But I saw the statue of Mary, and the view was really spectacular!!
Then I saw the castle, got lost a bit cursing the Eyewittness guides in several languages, and took a bus into the general direction of Ascona...
Tourist place, the lady from the Lucern train yesterday mentioned to have a summer home here. Many people have one. This little town got it all. Lake, sun, trees, nice library... Gorgeous! And a German second hand bookshop with spectacular armchairs!!
Well, after a while I decided to go back to Bellinzona (was on the way anyway), to have a bit of sun there too. The bus and the one-way street pretty much fooled me than, but I managed to arrive and climb a castle.
It's really hard to get all 3 of them to one picture, but here I managed. Forefront: the castle I'm at. Background: No 2 and 3.
Well, and the fun on that ay, it was day 3 of the annual Bellinzona Beatles Days!!! Free concert in the middle of the Sun Square. Beer, people, black T-shirts!!! Yeah!!!!!!!!!!