2 posts tagged “stuttgart”
When we last left me, I was counting bars of sheep's milk chocolate in a dark room in Schaffhausen. Read it a few more times, it's funny. Maybe not funny ha ha, though.
Day 3
I had discovered a little tidbit in my Swiss guidebook (aka the cheapest Swiss guidebook at the travel store on the corner) about a science museum in Winterthur (about 2/3 of the way from Schaffhausen to Zurich) that "explained technologial marvels/housed a collection of great Swiss innovations". Unfortunately, it was neither. I left the hostel around 8:30 to catch one of the every-half-hour trains from Schaffhausen to Winterthur, and reached the museum at around opening time. The museum was NOT 5 minutes by bus from the train station, it was 20 minutes by bus, and maybe it was the weather (cold, pouring rain), but Winterthur seemed like kind of a dump. The museum itself was, unfortunately, just like every other science museum I'd ever been to, with the exception of a pretty cool model train exhibit in the basement. If I did this trip again, cutting out this museum would be the only thing I'd change. I'd only allotted 2 hours to spent there, however, so I played with some bubbles and shot some electrons through some gold foil (okay, so that was cool too).
So I hightailed it outta there and was in Zurich with plenty of time to visit the Uni Zurich Zoological and medical history museums. The medical history museum closed earlier, so I went there first. It's a free museum, which is a tip for all of you. I have to admit, it was pretty neat. They're not all hung up on squicky things in Switzerland, and they had items on display that I had never seen before, despite having been to several medical history museums and having written more than one paper on the topic. They had a mummified body spinning slowly in a case, and pickled hands, and forceps and yanking devices the purposes of which you DON'T want to know. It was pretty great. They also had a few wax molds of really unpleasand skin diseases, which elicited a response along the lines of "Oh wow, that is so interesting...that I'm going to throw up all over this nice museum". Unforunately, I didn't learn until later that the molds were made by a woman somehow affiliated with the Uni, and that they have a whole separate museum (in German only) of such moldings. They also had an iron lung, with an Erich Kästner book in the little book rest. The museum as a whole was so much different than I'd expected - I was afraid it'd be same ol' same ol', but it had more devices I'd never seen before than I could've guessed.
The above exhibit was a LOT creepier without the camera flash, let me tell you. The "beak" of the mask the doctor is wearing was filled with aromatic herbs to cover the stench of death. The coffin opens at the bottom so that victims could be dispatched into graves with minimal contact with the burying party, and was (obviously) not single-use. If this appeals to your morbid sensibilities, I recommend you watch Herzog's Nosferatu immediately.
On my way to the Zoological museum I saw this photo opportunity:
The Zoological museum was also quite interesting, though not as novel, I must admit. It had the same animals-I'd-never-seen-before as at the Zoo. Just dead. That took a little wind out of my sails, but I knew there was at least one more zoo in my near future, so I survived. As you may be able to tell from that photo, they had a special exhibit about the Steinbock aka mountain goat. They only had one or two mounted ones, but they had lots of photos and information about current research, and VIDEOS OF GOATS CLIMBING! YESSSS! This is the second of the bock tie-ins, the first being that it's the town seal of Schaffhausen. They also had a stuffed bird called (literal translation) a Parrot Owl. It looked kinda like an owl, but it had these beautiful green/mottled feathers. I'd never even heard of such a thing. Crazy.
Because it was windy and cold and I'd only brought my sweatshirt, I figured it might be time to head to the hostel and check in and take a break. 5pm is too late to "take a break". I got a crepe in the train station on my way to the baggage lockers, and it was SO good. Drool. They were having a big market inside the terminal (which randomly has a HUGE open space?) with lots of stands set up. I wish I'd spent more time in it. The tram to the hostel was fairly long, and then it was another 5 minute walk, so I realized I didn't quite have it in me to go back into Zurich and then back out for dinner. There was a grocery store-slash-cafeteria by the tram stop, so I bought some goodies for the train (apricots and mini stroopwaffeln) and had bizzare, European jalapeno poppers and a piece of quiche for dinner. When I got back I had roommates, two American girls from Maine and Pennsylvania who were traveling together on a Eurail pass during THEIR study abroad (England) spring break. They were quite nice and we talked for a while. We'd had very different days in Zurich, as I'd just gone to museums and they'd just walked and walked. They were doing two nights in each city, so they'd spend half a day on the train, then half the day in the city, the next FULL day in the city, and then get up at the crack of dawn to get their next train. They were coming from Paris, and heading to Munich, and will be in Berlin tomorrow, just like me! I wrote them a note about things to do in Munich, and they wrote me a note with their cell phone number if I wanted to meet up in Berlin. I'm not so sure that'll happen, but I'll definitely message them on Facebook to inquire about their trip!
Day 4
The next day I caught a not-so-crack-of-dawn 9:14 train to Stuttgart. I was VERY ready to go home by Thursday, but I had unlimited rail travel for the day, and more animals to see! From Zurich to Schaffhausen, I sat across from a young man on the train who was reading a book about organic chemistry, which seemed like it might've been in English. As I guessed, he got off at Schaffhausen, which I thought was a hoot, because my Dad is an organic chemist, and that's why HE was in Schaffhausen a few years ago. I guess you had to be there.
Though I saw almost nothing of Stuttgart, the city impressed me. The train station was nice, and in a nice area, and the U-bahn that I took to Wilhelma (which was entirely painless to get to) passed a stop called Mineral-Bäder, which means "mineral baths". Beyond the platform I saw a large, open, green space spotted with pools of water, as well as a spa-type mineral bath facility. At the Wilhelma stop, I was greeted with this:
There was some jaw-dragging involved in this particular venture. I was really excited that this place had a walking tour so that I didn't have to wander aimlessly and miss the elephants, but was then crushed to hear that the maps were not free! If nothing else, speaking German is good for being a tourist. I assumed (foolishly) that the trail might be marked, and set off through the greenhouses. The path was not marked, but I was beyond the point of no return (stubbornnesswise). Luckily there were maps every here and there and arrows to certain animals, and I don't think I missed anything.
After a few hours in Wilhelma, feeling like I'd seen everything, I headed back to the train station, grabbed my bags, called my folks, and dragged myself onto one last train. It was a great trip.
Thoughts on Switzerland
I liked it a lot, and didn't find it to be particularly expensive, except for the food. I was bowled over by how different Swiss German was. I'd only hear a few words out of a sentence, and the rest sounded like Hebrew to me - Swiss German has more of the gutteral sounds that people joke about German having. Especially quirky about Swiss German, is that they all (seem to) speak regular High German, too. I was locking my bags up in Zurich when a guy came up to me and said something I didn't understand at all, so I said "I'm sorry, I don't understand Swiss German" (in German), and he said "Oh, do you know how much a locker costs?", clear as day. There was a lot of that.
Another thing that I liked about Switzerland, was that it made me feel German! In Switzerland, or at least this part, you deal in either Swiss German, German, French or Italian. So when I walked into a particular place and spoke in German, to them, I was German. When I thought about "going home", I meant Regensburg. (College is a confusing time in that way, how many "homes" do I have now? Three?). It was also nice that when I addressed someone in German, they answered in German. In Regensburg it happens fairly frequently that they hear your accent, and either ask if you're British, start speaking English, or even ask IF you speak German. That was not a problem at all in Switzerland. It would seem that as far as the rest of Europe is concerned I'm German. Cool!
The 5 franc piece in Switzerland is a coin. It is an enormous, heavy coin. That was weird.
Thoughs on Traveling Alone
I didn't get murdered! My first thought when deciding to embark on this trip alone, was that I'd be constantly feeling threatened and looking over my shoulder. That was not the case at all, even wearing a sweatshirt with English on it, and even in Zurich. As a safety precaution, however, I didn't go out after dark, which I realize impacted my experience, but to a degree that I felt was acceptable.
I did get lonely, starting on the evening of the second day, I would say. It was hard to see and experience all these, wild, new things and have nobody to talk to about them! It was boring to eat alone. People on trains and in hostels did not try to befriend me because I was alone, as was predicted by Jason's mom. That was okay with me, I tend to freak out in situations like that anyway.
A clear benefit of being alone was that I could do what I wanted with my time, and there were no debates. It was great, and arguably made the loneliness worth it. I changed my itinerary twenty times a day. I spent half an hour on the floor of a used book store. I don't think I would've had near the same experience with a travel buddy. And yeah, it worried my parents a little, but I made it, and nothing even got stolen. I am the king of the world.
The fourth occurrence of the bock, is, of course, in Regensburg, at the Kneitinger Brewery. The perfect conclusion, don't you think? That's why I bought one:
(and if you're wondering, the new title banner is the view of the Rhine from where I ate my pizza in Schaffhausen)
2 hostels, 4 days, 3 nights, 2 zoos, 6 cities, and 1.63 Swiss Francs to the Euro.
