Day 19: September 11, 1999
Arosa to Zurich, Switzerland

Today was our last full day of the trip. We needed to get to Zurich, where we'd be heading out early the next day. We decided to just head out in the morning rather than hang out in Arosa. We headed back on the windy road to Cchhhoor and then continued on to Zurich. The whole drove took about 2 hours.

With our magic navigation abilities, we picked up signs to the Flughapen, which we knew was the airport cuz of the little airplane next to it. Walendo noticed the hotel said it was in some other town (can't remember name) which was one exit before the airport, so I took a chance and took the exit. Walendo quickly found a hotel sign to The Airport Hotel so we followed signs and found it. Not bad. This one was a 4 star hotel, but it didn't seem much different than the others. The furnishings were nicer, but the room was much smaller.

Anyway, the first thing we did was schlep all our crap up to the room along with the boxes we'd picked up in San Gimignano. I packed both of our bags and put all our fagile stone stuff in one of the boxes. It all fit, and we even a few gifts in our suitcases as well. We wanted to get some tape for the box plus we were hungry for lunch, so we decided to head out. The woman at the desk said nothing would be open on Sunday downtown at the Old Town (a good place to visit, according to the books) but the airport had open shops, so we decided to go there, figuring we'd also scope out the process for returning the car that early in the morning.

At the airport, we found the Hertz place would be opening around the time we got there, but we could drop off the keys if they weren't open. We couldn't find tape so Walendo bought twine, which was probably more helpful for carrying in the end. He also bought a backup book incase he finishes the Winds of War on the plane. The airport had all kinds of little shops with fresh food, including a bakery and a cheese shop and a grocery store. That was nice, better than US airports. We wound up buying at the grocery store, which had a little deli and took credit cards. I had a bit of a time trying to order a sandwich since they didn't want to give me what I'd asked for and they didn't know the names of tomatoes or lettuce, but I managed. The checkout woman got annoyed that we had veggies from the veggie area just outside (I'd asked and they said we could buy them in the store, but I guess we were supposed to weigh them, once again.) She went off to weight them, grumbling all the way. And then we tried to buy some sandwiches. At the airport, we bought many foods from a pissed off supermarket worker.

We came back to the hotel and ate our lunch, after which W napped for a (after scanning some lousy TV). It was still 5 hours till we needed to go to sleep, I suggested we go into Old Town, even though stores would be closed. W thought we'd be walking through deserted streets, but after groaning a bit he agreed (having no better plan to suggest). We drove down and parked in a suspended garage structure that interested W, near a McD billboard, a good sign. We got some Swiss francs, and then walked along Bahnhofstrasse, a fancy street with expensive stores that were all closed but of course open for window shopping. At the end of the street, we came to the Zurichsee (Lake Zurich) where the whole town was out and about, strolling along with dogs and such, women wearing tight clothes, rollerbladers cruising along, it was a busy scene. W made fun of himself for thinking that it would be deserted downtown. "Yep, a ghost town, not a soul around," he kept saying. It was a lovely summer day, very warm and sunny. We walked a long way down the lakeside road and then back again. On the way back, we walked by church that rang its bells for about 10 minutes straight. We wondered if they just rang it a while just to make sure they hit 7pm.

Walendo was hungry, so we circled back to one of the McDonalds we'd seen (there had been a few), but W decided he'd prefer some fast food Chinese he'd seen. (Plus there was a line at McD, and W doesn't do lines.) It turned out the Mr. Wong's fast food Chinese was pretty awful. W's food was bland, and I had what was billed as "the city's best frozen yogurt" or somesuch that turned out to be the opposite. For one, I asked for chocolate, and the woman said "of course" they had it, but she gave me vanilla with chocolate sauce on it. Then when I tried it, it turned out to be just regular, plain yogurt, nothing "frozen yogurt" about it. Yucko. The meal, with two sodas, cost $20, again the Standard Swiss Monetary Unit. While we were there, a woman asked if we could watch her infant baby while she went with her other child to the bathroom (presumably). We were happy to do it, though we wondered if someone in the States would do that. It was actually nice to be able to help.

Before going back to the car, we walked around underground mall that had plenty of stores open. (As it turned out, it would have been fine to go downtown instead of to the airport. Oh well.) W bought two Swiss Army knives for his nephews. We drove back to hotel around 8pm, finding the one cheap thing in Switzerland. It was about $2 to park for several hours. At the hotel, we tried to fill up the tank again using automatic pay thingee, but it only took cash and didn't give change. It turned out we didn't need very much but W had only a 10 Franc note, so we wasted 6 francs, oh well.

Around 10pm we went to sleep, or at least tried. It took us a while to drop off. We were glad, though, that the planes had stopped flying right through our room by that time.

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