Switzerland is a mountainous Central European country, home to numerous villages and hiking peaks of Alps. It is famous for its Ski resorts and chocolate that is world owned.
For a very long time Switzerland even though situated in Europe it has not been a part of the E.U (European Union) meaning they still are in relation in terms of trade, as Switzerland remains one of Europe’s largest trading partner alongside the United States and China. It accounts for 52 percentage of E.U imports from Chemicals, Medical products, Machinery, Instruments and timepieces.
Switzerland is one of the wealthiest economies in the world, there is certainly an element of wealth written all over the country. I never imagined that one day I would travel to Switzerland. On this European tour, it happened to be my stopover the country as I headed to London travelling from Italy. Not an inch of excitement, it has been two weeks on the road. I Imagined Switzerland to be a cold and wet deserted village, literally a stopover was all I had in mind so two days was sufficient. On my arrival, it was a freezing Thursday afternoon and all I could think off was a hot shower, coffee and straight to bed. I have never been exposed to such low weather Celsius ever. It was beyond cold, it made me regret ever taking our South African beautiful weather for granted. See, our seasons are intentional and crystal clear. Each season is always better than the one before, it’s also easy to differentiate which season we are in, meanwhile, Europe is a totally different story.
spreuer brucke Bridge
Switzerland was far from what I had imagined while driving I came across those beautiful vintage Swedish stockli cottages made out of dark wood. The Mountainous landscapes and acre on acres of green fields with herds of cows in their 101 dalmatians uniform like we see them on tv made my heart melt. Truly this is are one of the reasons I enjoy road trips so much. As I proceeded to my hotel, I had to cross the famous Spreuerbrucke Bridge mounted on top of the quite Reuss river which flowed so peacefully and brought this weird calm onto the city. But was it really about the river? As I looked around, I realized perhaps it had to be about the location too. I stopped for a second. Took out my camera and snapped a beautiful picture right there, in the middle of it all. There is where it dawned on me that I might just be falling in love with Switzerland. The view of Stockli, wooden beam styles and the Swiss chalet architecture style of buildings, which were popular in the 19th century and major styles like Roman Romanesque, Gothic, Art Nouveau made my heart do summersaults. I could feel it, the trickling shiver of excitement that I didn’t expect in this leg of my journey. Whether the shivering could have been from the freezing cold or feeling of love, I knew one thing, I was in Switzerland and I was beginning to love it. The next morning as I opened my eyes, something seemed out of context. The room was still very grey and gloomy yet warm. The most splendid thing about the buildings in these freezing cold countries is the way they are built, their heating systems indoors is exceptional.
spreuer brucke Bridge
The minute your indoors it is back to normal temperature. You can be dressed in anything you desire, as long as your indoors. I got out of bed in my summer silky pyjamas’ still wondering what time it was and hoping I hadn’t slept till afternoon the next day because I could feel I was still tired but this time from being in bed a little longer than I should have. I stretched and walked to the window. Thinking that should do it. I opened the curtain filled with hope peeping out to make reason of my day and to my bewildered surprise, I couldn’t believe it.
Pilatus Mountain
Were my eyes seeing correctly? My heart began to race, my mind stopped, my eyes began to well up with tears. Was I still asleep? I could not believe it. It was snow! SNOW! It was snowing heavily. It was clear that it had been snowing since last night because the entire outdoors was covered in thick snow. I could feel the tears rolling down my face, tears of joy, I have never seen or touched snow before ever in my 30 years on earth and which better place to experience it for the first time? Switzerland. It was perfect. As tears rolled down my cheeks mesmerized by the view before me, cars, trees, houses call covered in snow I felt exceedingly blessed, I couldn’t wait to step out.
Written by: Phumie Sims
Instagram : Phumie_Sims