Let me start from the interesting point here.. 😀
Hope you are finished reading Paris the previous article, ‘coz this continues from there. Having done with the nasty kiddish work of Air-France with our Luggage, we wanted rest of the trip to be smooth and so good. Infact It was. Little uneasy start but rest were awesome. Great infact.
We reached Zurich around 8:30 PM on 19th of July 2009. I got my Swiss first class saver Swiss rail pass activated for the next 8 days. Buy Swiss pass from the country you start or buy online which is upto 40% lower than there. Interesting fact is Europe (EU) citizens cant use these Swiss passes, just we could. ;-). As it was a new place, I was hoping for newer things eventhough I was well equipped personal timetables, train numbers etc. But Swiss railyways are the easiest and simplest ones in terms of understanding. Note Gate (gleis), Time thats all you need at stations. Then if you have first class (like us), stand near the right wagon to hop on easily.
We had our reservations at Hotel Atlantis Guest house. Note Atlantis Hotel was there 5 years ago which was Sheroton’s chain. Now its being run by others. Guesthouse acts as hotel now and the old hotel for the past 5 years as asylum. I had google maps, navigator apps, printouts of hotel, hotel path and what not. This sweet hotel is 3 mins walk from Triemli station. We reached Triemli station around 10:30pm and it was pitch dark. (I wish I made it by 9:30 or bit later before the sunset). We walked little further and crossed the tracks and as it was so dark, couldnt identify the right route (yes, for 3 mins walk).
Luckily 2 youngsters came and we just told them we are going to Hotel Atlantis guesthouse. They didnt speak english but managed to understand that we were looking for the hotel. But what they told us back was… “They dont open for tourists.. Its asylum now. Only for refugees” with their slaughtered english. I was still little confident that they misunderstood and trusted my google map images and addresses. We walked uphill for 2 mins at pitch dark. Nearby was a stream and I was not sure what it adds to my ears. :D. Then we deviated to the rough path towards a very big building and all the way those lovely youngsters were talking with us and offered to take Thenmozhi’s suitcase. Poor girl having almost lost to Air-france told she is okay to drag at that mud road which was quite steep. I understood that big building (old Sheraton chain hotel) is now a asylum and swiss govt uses it as refugee camp for those who cross the borders wihtout valid papers. They allow few of them to get proper papers to work there. One of the guys who told us that we are lucky to get those guys because those others in the asylums are drug sellers and the list went on. I was comfortable even after and learned that they were from Cerbia. Interesting. We passed that big building and saw signs to our hotel. These poor guys walked again almost a KM for us to safely leave us in the hotel. It was very funny to recollect that we took 15 mins of walk uphills and mudroad route for a clean 3 min walk from station. Those lovely guys, were caring and walked long at that time for us and made sure to drop us at the hotel. No matter what, few are very good by heart despite their outfit!!
Next thing.. Swiss is expensive. Expensive enough that even a European or American will say Swiss is expensive. :-p. Who bothers. Swiss lives to all that beauty. Ask yourself what are you for here. And you wont even bother about the cost. ;-). And the hotel was I was looking at lower ends (around 3 stars) and sounded so much to me when I booked. Note, star hotels costs upto 1000 USD per night here. 😀 dont get bothered. Do your home work to get a good hotel. And Atlantis Guesthouse was soooooo good. Quite compact and it looked so fresh and new. Thats all I require. We called it a day with the dreams’ of following days.
Morning we laughed at each other to see how close it was to station. 😛 We checked out and dumped our luggages at Zurich lockers (Station). Its so helpful to have coinbased lockers to dump our luggages (almost all your luggages). They cost 7 Swiss franc for larger luggages which can hold a lappy, a big suitcase and a small one. We dumped them and caught the next train to Schaffhausen where river Rhine has a little pit to turn that into europe’s largest waterfalls. 😉
In 48 mins, we were at the Schaffhausen station. We avoided 2 hours of walk along the river by catching a bus (1,6 goes there) (with swiss pass everything is free.. ;). We got down at Neuhausen and then we gotto walk for 5 mins. You know what, Swiss people are proud and happy. Their words might sound rugged but its totally of their proud nature.Yet very kind to tourists. At the station, a granny came to us and told us that the bus will stop little away from us where the “door” of the bus could stop. We were just 10 foot away,still she wanted to tell us about the bus, in German. I was touched. And at the bus stop at Neuhausen, another aged couple got down, waited till we were got down from the bus and told us the direction to the falls. We didnt even ask a question. How lovely & caring people they are.
It was a quite simple walk from there (Follow the yellow foot marks), to reach the falls.It looks small (obviously because of its “height”). But trust me guys, I have never seen any falls at that height with such a force. Gosh! Its a real thril. Its massive. Thats the right word.
Falls is soo beautiful and I swear if you are there when the night falls on evening it would be the best sight of all your wild imaginations. We walked along the water and reached boat-house to go to the roch which is right at the centre of the falls. It was a simple ride of 5 mins to reach there. At top of the rock, it looks scary, unbalanced and “we are nothing” feeling. Great nature. Wont forgive as well if you take it granted. 😀
With some pics and OMG moments, we got down and waited to take the boat to the bank. We felt as if we were on a leaf in front of that massive falls. With something in the name of lunch, (you will get french fries and chicken nuggets everywhere. And great pizzas from the neighbor who introduced it, what else you need??) we headed back to Zurich.
Catch the Interlaken entries next!!
Better version of images. Download at Rhine Falls
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