While the Grossmunster wins the size and historic significance award in Zurich, the Fraumunster is not to be missed because of the beautiful Marc Chagall stained glass windows.  But just a few more shots of the Grossmunster from the outside are in order, starting with the bronze doors that are like the ones at the baptistry of the great cathedral in Florence. The Fraumunster is a decidedly smaller cathedral but also well worth the visit. For those of you unfamiliar,... Read more

Ulrich Zwingli was in many ways the unsung and under appreciated hero of the Protestant Reformation.  Here is his statue in Zurich, which as I mentioned before, like Geneva, became a Protestant town, dominated by two Protestant cathedrals downtown. The big one, as the name grossmunster implies was the church of Zwingli. Zwingli was a brilliant scholar.  His rhetorical commentary on 1 Corinthians is still helpful today.  Unlike Luther he did not have as colorful or mercurial an emotional range,... Read more

But I’m not giving it back :). A tour of the Lindt chocolate factory was like watching the movie Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. It’s a child’s dream.  I was in line for the free chocolate balls, and there was a little girl behind me who reached into the glass bowl and pulled out like 6 chocolate balls at once. You were supposed to try one of each kind.  I told her ONE, so I got to be the mean... Read more

There are in fact many things Switzerland is famous for, which includes the Swiss Alps, and we went to see the Jungfrau Glacier which is at the Eiger Pass, where the 1975 Clint Eastwood Movie The Eiger Sanction was filmed.  There is a weather station on top of the 9,000 ft. high mountain which we saw as well. Not to mention the cog railway train we got to ride to get there. There were breathtaking views along the way up... Read more

Switzerland is famous for several things, notably chocolate (Lindt in particular, also Toblerone), snow-capped mountains, cuckoo clocks, and ultra neat and clean towns and cities.  You can actually walk into a chocolate shop and see a wall oozing with chocolate (more on this in a later post). No, you are not allowed to lick the wall. They are also famous for their flowers, although Edelweiss is more associated with Austria. The picture below is edelweiss (you can start humming the... Read more

Going back to before the middle ages, the Catholic tradition was that you had to be baptized to enter the sanctuary or at least to really participate in the service, and in particular to take communion.  Naturally, this excluded non-Christians.  You can see how the church became increasingly less open to strangers or even visitors and less focused on evangelism.  The way the church continued to have social clout was by involving itself in local politics, and even threatening officials... Read more

One of the main reasons to go to Lucerne is to enjoy the beautiful clear water lake, which has four fingers and the mountain surroundings.  My father took a cruise on this lake in the 40s, and so did we about 80 years later.  Here are some shots. That tall white building in the distance is an ultra expensive hotel— about nine stars.  And while we are talking about expensive, this town is too expensive to live in the for... Read more

Like many ancient cities, Lucerne was a walled city, with watchtowers, and also covered bridges which protected merchants and citizens during a time of hostilities.  Here are some shots of these beautiful decorated bridges. The paintings in that part of the covered bridge are original, but unfortunately there was a fire in the recent past that burned up half the bridge, which is now restored as our local guide explained.    What you see above is however original. Read more

This is the famous Mardis Gras building. And yes, Mardis Gras happens in Europe too.  Again this is the celebration just before Ash Wednesday.  Lucerne is  a (nominally) Catholic town with Catholic cathedrals downtown, where as Zurich has only Protestant churches downtown, including Zwingli’s Grossmunster. Today this is the Hotel of the Scales— i.e. the building was once a judicial building, a court.     Even the door frames are ornate. Read more

One of the must see items in Lucerne (which is a small town of about 80,000 compared to nearby Zurich or Munich) is the lion of Lucerne. And as one famous tourist once quipped, there is no sadder lion on earth.  The carving in stone is a memorial to the Swiss Guards who lost their lives fighting the French. Wait, you may say, I thought the Swiss were a neutral nation? Yes, famously they have been and are. BUT, the... Read more