I have begun a fond appreciation for Viator.com after my trip to Geneva. I booked 2 tours via viator and one of them was this day excursion to the surrrounding towns: Lausanne, Montreux and Chillon. I took so many pictures of Lausanne that in this post all you'll see is pictures of Lausanne first.... The swiss countryside is very beautiful and I just start snapping away.
Interesting facts about Lausanne:
- Birthplace of the Olympic games. The Olympic headquarters is located here.
- Lausanne is located on the shores of Lake Geneva which is approximately the size of Singapore. My guide had previously spent 8 years in Singapore and she recognized my accent immediately. Incidentally too there was another Singaporean on the bus. He was a PSC scholar on internship with MFA for 3 weeks in Geneva. I kinda guessed immediately that he was a scholar coz he told me that he was in Yale (like hello... private school in the States) and he had a very cool internship working with WTO in geneva.... I asked him if such an internships were common and he quietly admitted to me that it wasn't.... scholars are soooooooooooooooo lucky.....
Pictures of Lausanne: town area. Lausanne is built on a mountain, so it is very steep for the pedestrains...
Old town area...one thing about Swiss water is that it is mostly drinkable and very safe. And it tastes very nice too.... for example... Hungarian tap water while safe had a different taste to it when I first tried it and it took some getting used to.
Headquarters of the International Olympic committee...
Believe it or not, Switzerland actually has some Roman ruins... though it's nothing in comparison to the ones in Turkey... but still you gotta be proud of what you have right.... basically what you see are the walls/foundations of the old towns
Olympic museum. We didn't have time to go inside, but from the outside, you can see that the grounds is nicely decorated with sculptures and statues which are gifts from participating olympic countries. The thai structure below is a gift from the Thai king who actually studied French here in Lausanne.
Cathedral Notre Dame de Lausanne... known as the most beautiful gothic cathedral in Switzerland and famous for its square tower where watchmen used to announce the time at the 4 corners at 15 min intervals.
Interior of the cathedral... with the famous rose window and blue stain glass windows (bottom left hand corner -> like those in the Notre Dame Paris).
The cathedral grounds overlooking the city and the lake.
Walking tour around old town... we managed to see this scheduled performance in front of this old fountain which features soldiers marching and swiss girls dancing in the swiss dress... a bit like the astronomical clock in prague... but this one had a bit more action :P
Lake Geneva and its surroundings... Opposite of Lausanne is French territory and also the famous village of Evian, where the famous bottled water is produced
On our way to Veves to catch the boat to Chillon, we drove past this UNESCO site of terrace vineyards. This region is the 3rd highest producing region of wine in Switzerland. I managed to try some during my stay in Switzerland and its very nice. The unfortunate thing is that Switzerland does not export its wine as it does not even produce enough wine for its own consumption and has to import wine from France and Italy to support the demand...
Vineyards overlooking the lake..... gorgeous scenery..
Interesting facts about Lausanne:
- Birthplace of the Olympic games. The Olympic headquarters is located here.
- Lausanne is located on the shores of Lake Geneva which is approximately the size of Singapore. My guide had previously spent 8 years in Singapore and she recognized my accent immediately. Incidentally too there was another Singaporean on the bus. He was a PSC scholar on internship with MFA for 3 weeks in Geneva. I kinda guessed immediately that he was a scholar coz he told me that he was in Yale (like hello... private school in the States) and he had a very cool internship working with WTO in geneva.... I asked him if such an internships were common and he quietly admitted to me that it wasn't.... scholars are soooooooooooooooo lucky.....
Pictures of Lausanne: town area. Lausanne is built on a mountain, so it is very steep for the pedestrains...
Old town area...one thing about Swiss water is that it is mostly drinkable and very safe. And it tastes very nice too.... for example... Hungarian tap water while safe had a different taste to it when I first tried it and it took some getting used to.
Headquarters of the International Olympic committee...
Believe it or not, Switzerland actually has some Roman ruins... though it's nothing in comparison to the ones in Turkey... but still you gotta be proud of what you have right.... basically what you see are the walls/foundations of the old towns
Olympic museum. We didn't have time to go inside, but from the outside, you can see that the grounds is nicely decorated with sculptures and statues which are gifts from participating olympic countries. The thai structure below is a gift from the Thai king who actually studied French here in Lausanne.
Cathedral Notre Dame de Lausanne... known as the most beautiful gothic cathedral in Switzerland and famous for its square tower where watchmen used to announce the time at the 4 corners at 15 min intervals.
Interior of the cathedral... with the famous rose window and blue stain glass windows (bottom left hand corner -> like those in the Notre Dame Paris).
The cathedral grounds overlooking the city and the lake.
Walking tour around old town... we managed to see this scheduled performance in front of this old fountain which features soldiers marching and swiss girls dancing in the swiss dress... a bit like the astronomical clock in prague... but this one had a bit more action :P
Lake Geneva and its surroundings... Opposite of Lausanne is French territory and also the famous village of Evian, where the famous bottled water is produced
On our way to Veves to catch the boat to Chillon, we drove past this UNESCO site of terrace vineyards. This region is the 3rd highest producing region of wine in Switzerland. I managed to try some during my stay in Switzerland and its very nice. The unfortunate thing is that Switzerland does not export its wine as it does not even produce enough wine for its own consumption and has to import wine from France and Italy to support the demand...
Vineyards overlooking the lake..... gorgeous scenery..
