Wow, what a day! Zurich is an absolutely amazing city and I had perfect weather to walk around and explore. We woke up early this morning and headed into town. Anna had to go into work for awhile so she dropped me off where we were going to meet later in the day armed with a map and a list of things to do. It was so funny, she told me to message her on facebook (since my phone doesn't work here) every once in awhile so she knew I wasn't lost!
I started off by taking a 20 minute walk down Bahnhofstrasse. This is the Swiss version of the Champs Elysees - lots of designer shops that charge way too much money for everything in the store. On the way I passed by the national bank of Switzerland. That street dumped me right in front of the huge train station I was at yesterday. On the other side of the train station was the Swiss National Museum. I went into the museum and learned all about Swiss history and saw lots of different artifacts. The coolest part was the war history stuff. They had many of the weapons used and lots of suits of armor to look at. After exploring the museum for a little while I left and headed towards Old Town. Old town is an area of the city that has all of these little hilly cobblestone streets that are completely closed off to vehicle traffic. There are a ton of cafes, shops and galleries. I walked all around and choose a random cafe with outdoor seating for lunch that turned out to be really good! I had a sandwich and salad lunch combo and it cost me what amounts to almost $30 US dollars! Anna had warned me Zurich was expensive and clearly she wasn't kidding. After I ate some lunch I headed towards Lindenhof. This is a little park in the city that Anna's mom had recommended for great views of the city. I forgot to mention yesterday, Anna's mom joined us for dinner last night. She was very curious to meet one Anna's "hockey friends" since she doesn't know any other girls who prefer to watch hockey on tv, drink beer and play sports over most other things. She was a wonderful woman and it was very fun to talk to her. Anyway, Anna's mom was correct and the views of the city were awesome! After taking a ton of pictures, I headed towards the 3 famous churches of Zurich - St. Peters, Fraumunster and Grossmunster. St. Peter's is famous for its clock tower - apparently the clock is the largest in all of Europe. Fraumunster and Grossmunster were homes for the nuns and monks respectively. The story is the river that runs between the two was put there to help them avoid any temptations. Both were absolutely gorgeous. The cool thing about Grossmunster is you could go to the top of the clock tower for amazing views of the city. It was definitely worth the hike up! After leaving the churches, I headed towards the Zurich Opera House, which sits right on Lake Zurich. After exploring the Opera House a bit I walked all along the lake through a bunch of small parks. I looked into renting a small motorboat or pedal boat but unfortunately I didn't have enough time. I then headed back to the train station where Anna and I were met up at Starbucks (thank you Starbucks for your free wifi so I can use my phone).
After Anna and I met up we went to the store where we picked up some stuff to make for dinner and she helped me pick out some Swiss chocolate to bring home to everyone! For those of you that get a sample, you can blame her if you don't like it, haha! We then headed to the International Ice Hockey Federation (IIHF) offices to meet her boyfriend who had the car. Adrian (her boyfriend) works for the IIHF and helps out with some of the officiating stuff. I get emails from him before every one of these trips so now I can put a face with a name! He gave me a tour of the offices (which are in this beautiful old mansion) and I got to say hello to KK. KK is in charge of all officiating matters in the IIHF. I had met him last year in Ottawa so it was nice to see him again. After our visit to the IIHF offices, Anna and I headed back to her house. On Tuesday nights she goes to this fitness class with a few friends so I said I'd go along with her. I wasn't exactly sure what to expect but I figured at least I'd get a workout in! The class was 1:15 minutes long. The first half was an aerobics type workout - I called it Zumba on steroids. That was entertaining to say the least. First, as many of you know, I don't have the best rhythm in the world. Couple that with the fact that all of the instructions were in German and I was an absolute disaster! All I could do is laugh, the people in this class will probably say to her next week - who is that crazy girl you brought that had NO IDEA what she was doing? After the aerobics portion there was a strength portion where we used bands to do all sorts of things - this was much more in my wheelhouse. After the class we headed back to her house to make dinner, drink Swiss beer and watch the Swiss Pro Hockey League playoffs. It was interesting to watch, they play by IIHF rules on Olympic size ice so it is a bit of a different game than NHL hockey. By far the coolest thing though - the leading scorer on each team wears a special jersey that says "top scorer" and has a yellow helmet with flames on it. Yes, I'm serious, a yellow helmet with flames. It was amazing, I want one for mens league at home!
It really was an awesome day. I cannot thank Anna enough for her hospitality, it has been great staying with her and hanging out. I owe her big time when she come and visits the USA (and Anna - since I know you are reading this you better come!). Tomorrow I am going to do a little more sightseeing before I have to head to the airport to catch my flight home. I can't believe I get home tomorrow night and settle on my house on Thursday morning! Goodnight!
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