The Most Lovely Layover in Zurich, Switzerland

When booking our flights home, I realized the most amazing thing: long layovers aren't necessarily bad. A long layover in the right city could actually mean an added mini-trip!! We looked at dozens of flights, paying close attention to what time we would arrive and depart and how far the city was from the airport. We came across the flight we ended up taking and  decided it was perfect because it got in at 6:30am and gave us the whole morning to explore Zurich. Plus, the airport is practically inside the city and there is super efficient public transportation. Done and done.

Zurich is incredibly picturesque, so I'm sorry and you're welcome for all the photos in this post. There are so many beautiful details in Zurich. I loved all the old buildings and the graphic design on the posters in the streets.

We were extremely lucky to have our own native tour guide, Jeremias, who Katie met while traveling in Cambodia. He woke up early to take the first train of the morning to come get us at the airport. Then he took us to every cool part of the town in a span of about four hours. (Thank you, Jerry!!) Zurich is pretty small and we could walk everywhere easily. We walked through some small, charming shopping streets which were serenely empty due to our early arrival time.

We walked along the lake, where we saw some ducks and swans. Most of the boats were all covered with their winter coats and it was a bit windy but still pretty. Our warmest clothes for SE Asia were not doing us much good in the Swiss spring. We took a break at a coffee shop/bakery and enjoyed the hot coffee inside in the warm air.

After thoroughly warming up, we took a tram up to the university for a panoramic view of the city and a little glimpse of the lake. The tram was filled with students coming in for their morning classes. Everything was so clean and orderly. What a change from the day before in Mumbai!

We walked back into town and happened upon a little farmers market. It was so cute I wanted to just rent an apartment and never leave.

Next up: chocolate! Jeremias knew we wanted to buy some good Swiss chocolate but he also knew we were on a budget so he showed us the best of both worlds. First we went to a very famous, very expensive chocolate shop in the heart of the fancy shopping street. As we walked in he told us, "Don't buy anything. We're just going to look." It was beautiful and smelled divine. Everything was perfectly prepared and packaged.

 Then we went to a local market where we bought the chocolate that local people buy. There was an entire aisle of chocolate!! He showed us his favorite kinds (all about $2 a bar) and we bought a bunch. It was the best chocolate I've ever tasted. Epic score.

 It was the best layover I've ever had.

Last Stop: Mumbai

On our last stop in India, we were more than ready to be on our way home. After a year and a half teaching in South Korea and then another four and a half months traveling through Southeast Asia and India, I was ready to see my family and enjoy the comforts of home. But we still had a couple more nights in India and so off we went, into the streets of Mumbai.

The Gateway to India

bell tower at the university

Indian traffic sign

DON'T DRINK AND DIE

We walked. We ate. We walked. We went shopping. We walked. We drank coffee. We slept. We left.

Hampi Then and Now

There was one place in all of India that I knew I absolutely had to go to on this trip: Hampi. I had gone there with my dearest friend Amanda while on Semester At Sea in the spring of 2006 and it was one of my favorite places of the whole semester. The setting was beautiful, the ruins were ancient, and we saw only a few other tourists. It was exploring heaven.

Hampi back in 2006

My, how things have changed!! The place is crawling with tourists, both Indian and foreigners. The town has changed dramatically. Somewhere along the line from then to now, the secret of Hampi had been unleashed. Every traveler in southern India goes to Hampi now.

Somehow Hampi has managed to retain much of its charm. The town is a quiet respite from the noise of the rest of India. In Hampi you could spend an entire morning just gazing at the green rice fields, the palm trees swaying, and the rock strewn mountains in the not too far distance. There is peace in Hampi.  

We rented some very crappy motorbikes and visited some ruins. The first bikes we got broke down and we had to wait another day and rent from someone else. Make sure you check the tires and look at the bikes to make sure they at least look acceptable to be riding around on dirt roads.

We dealt with the broken bikes all afternoon (bummer) and then went to climb some rocks to watch the sunset. It was beautiful. The view from the top of the rocks was phenomenal. The sunset was gorgeous. It made the whole day better.

We finally got some half way decent motorbikes and saw the ruins the next day. We didn't pay the exuberant tourist price to get in to see some of the best ones but we were still happy with what we saw.

We also went to see the sunset at the Monkey Temple. It was a popular place to go and there were lots of people, tourists and locals alike. And of course, monkeys were everywhere.

 
On our last morning in Hampi, we ate our breakfast while watching the local elephant take its bath in the river. It was very cool.

And then we went to Mumbai.

The Beauty in a Misadventure in Kerala

We read that the best place to see elephants in the wild was at a nature reserve in Kerala. It's the best place because the guidebook said it was "almost guaranteed" to see them. As soon as we had that information, we were making plans to go there.

So the day after our day at Fort Kochi and just one night after our 42 hour train experience, we got on a bus and rode for six hours. We then figured out we were still another couple of bus rides away from the nature reserve so we spent the night in some random city and left on a bus again the next day for another five hours on two different buses. It was a long couple of days and we were exhausted.

We finally got to the town next to the nature reserve. As we were checking into the hotel we saw posters with elephants on them and a map of the nature reserve. We told the lady behind the counter that we wanted to see the elephants, to which she promptly replies, "Oh, the reserve is closed for fire season. You can't go now."

What??! I felt so defeated. I had pushed us into taking bus after bus, day after day. I was doing the research at the time and it was my fault that we had to stay in that random city the day before because I had made a mistake. It was Jeremy's birthday the next day and now we couldn't see any elephants. Ugh.

We were all disappointed, but we did what every traveler learns eventually and we just let it go and tried to make the best of it. We spent the next day in a private car (with air-con!) seeing the sights we were still able to see in fire season.

The first thing we saw was a cave-like place with some very old carvings in the rock. It was there that we met a group of about 30 public school teachers who were on a trip during their summer holidays. At first, the men talked to Jeremy and Spencer and the women talked to me and Katie. Then later we all joined in on one big conversation. We asked what subjects they taught and when one guy said he was the music teacher, Jeremy jokingly asked him to sing for us. At first he refused, but then he complied and started singing. His voice was clear and strong and everyone was quiet letting his voice bounce off the rocks and fill the area his music. Another teacher joined him and they sang together. Some more joined in and it was beautiful. The four of us couldn't understand the words but we were all smiling, our hearts full.

As we walked down the hill away from the cave and towards the car, we saw a bunch of monkeys around the trail. It was obvious that people feed them there because there were a lot of monkeys and a lot of babies. It was fun to watch them and see all the tiny babies scurry about and ride on their mama's backs and tummies.

Next we went to a waterfall where we almost got heat stroke from walking in the afternoon sun. It was still nice though.

Lastly, we went to a small lake that we walked around. There was a nice shaded path all around it with seating areas, a playground, places to get snacks, and monkeys everywhere.

While driving around, we went through a lot of tea fields. It was cool to see them and think about how different and the same they were from the tea fields in Korea.

It was still a good day even though we didn't get to see wild elephants. We made the best of it and were happy regardless. That's one of the best things I learned while traveling: how to be happy when everything is hard and not going your way.