I was surprised to learn that May 1st was a holiday for the Canton of Zurich. In fact, upon further reading, May 1st is International Workers' Day (May Day) and over 80 countries officially recognize this holiday. The United States equivalent is celebrated on the first Monday of September, Labor Day.
View of Bürkliplatz, which on May Day becomes a focal point for demonstrations by various socialist and communist groups. Because of these large demonstrations, many trams and buses originating from or going through Bürkliplatz were cancelled.
As we know, holidays are treated as Sundays, so the day before, we went out to Coop and loaded up on tons of beer and sausage for a barbecue at the park in Wollishofen, (a section of Zurich north of Thalwil).
We are ready for the picnic! Wait until you see all the sausage we bought! (pictured below)
Public, electric grills that are regularly cleaned and maintained! Just add meat!
We had initially bought some aluminum pans to keep our meat from directly touching the grill, but an immense amount of heat got lost on the corrugated pans (very poor heat transfer). Even after an hour of cooking, we had barely seared one side of our sausages. We were so fed up and hungry we threw food safety concerns to the wind, trashed the pans and placed our food directly on the grill. Everything was cooked within minutes! Lesson learned: don't mess with Swiss genius.
After an hour, still very under-cooked and cold...
Pork sausage in the shape of a snail from the canton of Vaud, Switzerland.
St. Galler OLMA Bratwust (very large veal sausage), similar to the sausage we had in our trip to St. Gallen.
Sausage on skewers filled with cheese, and wrapped in bacon. The crowd favorite!
As you can see, there was no shortage of food! (And yes, as you can see from the packages, it cost quite a bit. Meat is expensive in Switzerland).
The grill was certainly very busy that day too! People filled the park and kept the BBQ going all afternoon. Auffahrt (Ascension Day), 39 days after Easter: This holiday occurs thirty-nine days after Easter Sunday and always falls on a Thursday (also referred to as Holy Thursday). The canton of Zurich took the day off, and as such, we decided to relax with another barbecue. For Labor Day, we went to Coop the day before and were prepared with grilling goodness. Unfortunately, we were not so prepared for Ascension Day, and foolishly decided to hazard the grocery store at Zurich HB. On Sunday and holidays, all businesses, except those that serve food or are located within the train stations are closed. This means that the few businesses open, especially the grocery stores, are absolutely mobbed. Ascension day was no exception. It was packed. The Migros at Zurich HB is significantly smaller than most grocery stores and we felt like sardines in a can. Another lesson learned. Trekking our way back to Wollishofen, we met up at a fellow post-doc's patio and grilled some more sausage!
This would have cost us about 60 CHF. However, they were on AKTION (means that the food is DISCOUNT and on sale) and only cost us about 30 CHF.
So. Much. Bacon. Sausage.
Our host was Italian, so he broke out some delicious cibo Italiano (Italian food) to accompany our grilled meats.
Starting from the freshly baked bread on the top (courtesy of Migros), clockwise, we have olive verdi snocciolate (pitted green olives), filetti di alici all'olio di oliva (anchovy fillets in olive oil), hunks of provolone cheese from Italy, cheese filled bacon wrapped sausages, carciofini interi in olio di semi di girasole (whole artichokes in sunflower seed oil) and melanzane a filetti della Puglia (eggplant strips from Puglia, Italy).
Seriously good stuff. (Muttertag) Mother's Day, Second Sunday in May: Today, we decided to go out for a walk to Rüschlikon, the town next to Thalwil, and go to Park im Grüene for a light Sunday brunch! It also happens to be one of the few places that is open on Sunday around Thalwil (aside from the Starbucks downtown).
Sponsored by Migros!
Beautiful public park with the Migros Restaurant in the back.
Amazing spread at the restaurant.
Our Sunday afternoon treat!
Migros-made croissant and creme cornet (delicious buttery vanilla cream).
A colorful (and crowded!) play-pen inside the Migros Restaurant for families. The Swiss are very mindful of play spaces for children.
The traditional Swiss holiday to celebrate the coming of Spring in Zurich is called Sechseläuten and occurs on the third Monday of every April. On that day, everyone who works in the Canton of Zurich has a half day (if you work in a different canton you're out of luck). Crowds assemble near Bellevueplatz down by Lake Zurich, with tall cans of beer and grilled bratwurst (and loads of other street food!). The weather was a fantastic 26 degrees Celsius (79 Fahrenheit), the sun was out and everybody was ready for Spring to start.
It was crowded, to say the least.
During the day, there is the parade of the 26 Zunfte (guilds - powerful trade groups that have now become private clubs) with over 3000 members! The guilds limit participation in the parade to its members, all men. Women are only there as honorary guests, and it reflects Switzerland's still male-dominated society. Despite Switzerland's fairly liberal stance on politics, women's rights have come slowly. Women couldn't vote in federal elections until 1971 (and even as late as 1990 at the cantonal level) and only won statutory paid maternity leave in 2005.
Ladies represent...clearly this is not a guild.
This is a guild...Not a single woman.
The parade goes through Zurich's Old Town, past the Rathaus (townhall) and finally to the main attraction - the Böögg, a towering wooden snowman, filled with firecrackers, an effigy of Winter. The burning of this Böögg is supposed to symbolize the changing of the seasons. The time it takes for the firecrackers inside the Böögg to go off determines how nice summer will be. Historically, the burning time ranges between 5 minutes (great summer) to as long 40 minutes (terrible summer).
Since I'm a postdoc, we don't really get half-days, so I missed the parades (actually, I found out about them afterwards), but we did go down a little before 6PM to see the burning of the Böögg. As I said, the area around Bellevueplatz was packed! Luckily, we still managed to get a great view of the burning!
The Böögg! We thought he'd look like a traditional 3 stacked sphere snowman. Instead he resembled the Michelin Man.
The Böögg was putting up quite the fight (and smoke!). Swiss Ms: This feels like something that I shouldn't watch.
Finally! The Böögg catches on fire.
We even managed to get video footage of this burning!
Children start crying. It's too much. Swiss Ms: I don't blame them, this is a little graphic.
Boom! Kapow!
It took the fated snowman 35 minutes to explode (on the Böögg-scale I think that means the summer will be fairly horrible in Zurich).
This was followed by some delicious sausage down by Lake Zurich.
My Kalbswurst (veal) bratwurst. Comes with mustard and bread! Very delicious! Surprisingly mild flavor and soft texture.
The Schweinefleisch (pork) bratwurst. The Swiss Ms was not impressed. Saltier and tougher than the Kalbswurst (similar to the Cervelat we had previously).
In Switzerland, Sunday is seen as a dedicated "Family Day", and it's illegal to have most business open on Sunday. The only businesses allowed to be open are any places that sell foods, public transportation or any business underneath the public transportation railway stations. In Thalwil, that means the only place to go out on Sunday is Starbucks. Thalwil doesn't have a large enough railway station to house any businesses underneath it, but Zurich HB is a massive station and has a "RailCity" of businesses underneath (like Migros! The Swiss Ms' favorite!)
Although we knew that Switzerland was known for its gorgeous mountains and scenery, we had no idea that Easter was such a big deal here. Not only are chocolate bunnies and beautifully colored Easter eggs everywhere, but both the Friday and Monday of Easter weekend are taken off as well. As one local told me, it's basically four Sundays in a row. As such, we thought it would be fun for us to get out of the city and celebrate, so we decided to go to Luzern (Lucerne in English) for the weekend (just a 40 minute train ride away).
Luzern also boasts a huge train station (HB), like Zurich HB, and hosts its own RailCity underneath!
Upon arriving at the Luzern Hauptbahnhof (HB), we walked along the Kapellbrüke (The Chapel Bridge), which spans the Reuss River of Luzern and is the oldest wooden covered bridge in Europe. Unfortunately, a fire in 1993 destroyed most of the old bridge, but it was reconstructed and reopened to the public by 1994. Inside the bridge, we admired the religious/ historical paintings lining the ceiling of the bridge. Some of the triangular paintings were completely blackened, but it seems that they were able to save/reconstruct some of the surviving paintings.
Kapellbrüke spanning the Reuss River in Luzern.
Some of the paintings that survived the 1993 fire.
The farmer's market was also open on Saturday, which came as a pleasant surprise to us, since we expected nothing to be open. We weren't planning buying anything since we were on foot all day and staying overnight, but the freshly baked bread smelled so good we couldn't resist buying some.
The farmer's market! So much cheese! So little time!
Did I mention that Easter was a big deal here?
We broke down and bought a bread bunny. They even gave us a second one for free! (Swiss Ms: "How can you say no to those faces!")
We strolled the streets of Luzern, eating pieces of bunny bread and admiring all the local produce. We strolled around town until we could find a restaurant that wasn't too busy, and ended up at Bäckerei Hug, a nice bakery and cafe.
Spinach Swiss Tart with mixed salad.
Älplermagronen (traditional pasta and potato dish in lot of cheese) with roasted onions, and apple sauce
Café au lait and espresso, with complementary chocolate!!! We could get used to that.
Bäckerei Hug sat right on the Reuss River, across from the Spreuerbrucke (think Kapellbrüke with death story-boards). We then took a bus to the Verkehrshaus der Schweiz (Swiss Museum of Transport), which is apparently the most visited museum in all of Switzerland. After going, we can definitely see why. It's a phenomenal museum that showcased all forms of transportation, with the actual vehicles there to tour and explore.
Swiss Mountains make helicopters essential for rescues. Look at that victim wrapped in foil!
All the traffic signs in Switzerland! Since we don't have to drive, we barely see them!
Cog railway to take you up and down the mountains!
After the museum, instead of taking a bus, we decided to take a boat back to Luzern HB. The great thing about Swiss transportation is that a ticket will cover ALL modes of transportation, so there is no need to buy separate passes. Once again, like everything Swiss, the boat was on time, immaculate, and housed a restaurant for you to rest and relax. On the way back, we had the pleasure of talking with a family from Germany who were visiting Luzern for Easter break, and they spoke fluent English! Although we've been in Switzerland less than a month, it was refreshing to hold conversation in English without feeling like "dumb Americans" who can't speak German.
I'm. On. A. Boat.
After a long day of trekking around, we headed to our hotel (c/o Lonely Planet Guide- thanks TFT!), to drop off our things and go out for dinner. We ended up at the Ristorante Rossini, a very warm, and affordable (relatively speaking) Italian restaurant. Since asparagus is in season, we ended up ordering a delicious roasted eggplant/asparagus pizza and garlic infused/asparagus filled ravioli.
Too bad Swiss Ms had to share with me.
Too bad I had to share with Swiss Ms.
The hotel (which Swiss Ms, the dealseeker found), also offered a continental breakfast. We had a delicious Easter brunch to look forward to.
Look at that spread! Holiday Inn has nothing on this!
No Swiss breakfast is complete without cheese, dried meat and jogurt!
And for the extra touch, festively colored Easter eggs!
Filled with a hearty Easter brunch, we then made our way to Löwendenkmal (the Lion of Lucerne), which commemorated the Swiss guards who were killed in the French Revolution defending the bourgeoise. It is simply a stunning work of art.
The monument measures about ten meters in length. (Swiss Ms: "I never would have thought when I visited this monument 12 years ago that I'd be a resident of Switzerland".)
Helvetiorum fidei ac virtuti. "To the loyalty and bravery of the Swiss."
Finally, we get to the title of the post, Mount Pilatus! During the summer you can take the world's steepest cog railway up the mountain, during the wintertime, it's closed! However, there are still gondolas to take you up the mountain-top. Unfortunately, due to the weather being cloudy/rainy, we could not enjoy the panoramic views. We will have to come back on a sunny day (and perhaps, with one of our readers!).
The cable car up Mount Pilatus!
Very excited! (Swiss Ms: "This blog is going to turn into pictures of me revealing my inner 5 year old glee while riding various forms of transport.")
Going up the mountain!
At the top, but it's so foggy, you can hardly see out very far! We will be back!
Sorry for the long post. Hope it was worth the read.
Happy Easter!
-Sir Cervelat
