Wikimecum:Zurich, Switzerland

Despite the fact that Zurich is the largest city in Switzerland, it is not the political capital. Zurich is however, the main cultural and commercial center of Switzerland (it is sometimes called the Cultural Capital of Switzerland). Over the past few years Zurich has been named the city with the best quality of life, as well as the wealthiest city in Europe.

The official language of Zurich is German and is used by the government and most publications. I did find that many people did speak English, so don't make it that much of a concern. The Swiss Franc is the current currency of Switzerland, so don't get confused and use Euro's. The Swiss Franc is abbreviated with either CHF, Fr., or Sfr. When I traveled to Zurich the exchange rate was that for ever dollar you got about 1.2 Swiss Francs.

I traveled to Switzerland with 5 other people. We traveled to Switzerland the 4th weekend we were in Venice (November 14, 15, and 16, 2008). The weather was beautiful, but it was quite cold. If you travel to Zurich around the same time we did I suggest packing plenty of warm clothes. Zurich was an amazing city to visit with a lot of history and beauty and I highly recommend traveling there.

Getting There

The easiest way to get to get to Zurich is by train. Like many of my other trips, I took a midnight train to get to Zurich. I found that traveling on midnight trains works best because you don't have to worry about getting there late in the day on Saturday and then not have a lot of time to tour around the city.

I left on a 7:57 p.m. train out of Venice with 3 other people (the 2 other people that I traveled with left on an earlier train) and arrived in Zurich at 8:42 a.m. Saturday morning. Despite the fact that this was a 12 hour train ride it did not feel like it. We had a change over in Bologna around 10 p.m. which lasted for an hour or so. Then we got on the train that was going to take us to Zurich. This train had sleeper car's so we decided that would be our best bet since we wanted to be able to sleep. Despite the fact that it was a little crammed and the bunks were quite small, it wasn't a bad sleep at all. The attendant on the train woke us up in the morning so that we would have enough time to get up and leave. We also got breakfast and coffee, which was a nice little addition. I found the train ride to be really nice and would definitely do it again.

The price of the train ticket was about 140 Euros round trip. I had my Euro Rail pass so I only had to pay for the price of a seat reservation which was about 40 Euros round trip. This was the most expensive seat reservation that I had to pay for only because it was an overnight train and I had to pay for a sleeper car.

Where to Stay

I found that it was very difficult to find an affordable place to stay in Zurich. I looked online to find a hostel to stay at because those are usually the cheapest and there weren't very many options. The ones that I did find didn't look very welcoming and decided that maybe it would be better to look for a hotel to stay at. I ended up finding a hotel that looked nice and was pretty affordable. It was called Easy Hotel and is run by the same company that runs Easy Jet. It cost about 80 CHF (about 60 Euros) per room per night. Each room was able to fit 2 people which made the room cost about 30 Euros per person per night.

The hotel was located less than a 10 minute walk from the train station and less than a 15 minute walk from the Old CIty. The hotel was very clean and the staff was friendly. Ther were maps and information packets in the lobby with suggestions of things to visit and we found them very useful when deciding what to do for the day.

Moving Around the City

The main mode of transportation in Zurich is a extensive Tram system. While walking around the city you will notice that there are tons of cables running above your head and tracks in the street which are used to guide the trams. The tram system is very similar to the bus system and is designated to stop at certain spots. It cost about 1.5 Euros per ride, so about 3 Euros round trip.

While in Zurich we did not use the trams that much. We only used them to go to dinner and then go back home. I found them very confusing and the map that we had did not have the tram lines on it, which made things very complicated. I would suggest finding a map that had both the tram lines and the streets on it. That probably would of made things a lot easier for us.

My Weekend Itinerary

Upon arriving in Zurich we went directly to our hotel to meet up with our friends. Since it was only about 9 a.m. we were not able to check in, but we were able to leave our bags there. From the hotel we decided it would be best to walk around and see what there was near by. We ended up walking back towards the train station and down the main shopping street, Bahnhofstrasse. This street is lined with all kinds of high end stores and famous Swiss banks, but also regular stores like H & M and Zara (a store similar to Forever 21).

We decided that it would be fun to go on some kind of tour so we found the information and touring are and walked over to see what it was all about. It is located on one of the streets behind the train station, but I suggest looking at a map to find it. Basically it is a big parking lot with a few little booth in it that have information about all of the different tours. The tour company that we decided to look into was the Best of Switzerland Tours. They had a brochure with all of their tours and we decided to go on the Gold and Silver Coast tour. It was a 2.5 hour tour that cost 28 CHF, which is only about 18 Euros.

The tour was a walking tour and a bus tour, but we also got to do other things. We spent time walking around Bahnhofstrasse and learning the history of the city. We saw a few different churches and various famous buildings were pointed out before we got onto the bus. The bus took us into a town just outside of Zurich where we got on a cable car. The cable car took us up into the mountains and gave us a nice view of the Alps. After the cable car ride we took the bus on the only ferry that crosses Zurich lake from the Silver to Gold Coast. The lake was really pretty, but it was freezing out, so we couldn't stand outside too long. After the ferry ride, the bus just took us back to where we started. The tour guide was really good and made everything very interesting.

After the tour we decided to go out and get dinner. There was a wide variety of places to have dinner at, all ranging in prices. I noticed that there were a lot of Italian restaurants, especially in the area we were staying. We decided to take a tram to the Old Town and see what there was down there. There were a few German restaurants which looked good, but we ended up eating at a traditional Swiss restaurant. Not everyone wanted Swiss food, so only 3 of us ate there. The food was amazing. It was a bit expensive (around 20 Euros), but well worth the money. I suggest trying to find fondue someplace because the Swiss are famous for it.

We found a bar near the restaurant and decided to stop in and see what it was like. It was called Oliver Twist and had a really good atmosphere with a lot of people. We didn't stay long because it was packed and there was like no place to sit. From here we just took the tram home and went back to our hotel.

Sunday morning we just walked around some more. A lot of things are closed so beware that you won't be able to do a lot of shopping on Sunday. A majority of the stores that were open were in the train station, but they had a good variety of shops in case you wanted to pick anything else up. There was even a food store and a bakery which is were we bought food for the train ride home. Our train left around 1 p.m. and it was a beautiful ride home. We got a really nice view of the Alps, so be sure you have your camera out.

Other Things to Do

Take a trip into the Alps - Since we were only in Zurich for a weekend we did not have enough time to take a trip into the Alps. Although we did get to see them from afar, it would have been great to actually go into them.

Stroll Through the Old Town - Zurich is broken up into an Old Town and a New Town. The Old Town is the oldest part of the city and has a lot of history. If you are interested in history I would suggest taking a walking tour and finding more out about that part of the city.

Switzerland Mountains and Chocolates Tour from Zurich - This is a day tour offered by Viator. It is an online tour company where you book the tickets and then just meet the bus. It looked like a really fun tour, but we didn't have enough time to do this and everything else we wanted to do.

Visit the Lindt Chocolate Factory - The factory is not located in Zurich, but in a town nearby. We were not able to visit the factory, however if you are interested in seeing it I suggest looking it up online and doing some research before you go.

Cruise Lake Zurich - There are different lake tours that are available which you can take. There are one or two different landing docks that you can go to and find out information from. I suggest doing this as soon as you get to Zurich because they usually only have one or two tours per day.