Luzern aka: Lucerne

With Rick Steves to guide me I ventured out to Luzern (or Lucerne in English) next. Adrian watched the weather the night before so warned me to bring my umbrella. I started out in Luzern with the Rick's self-guided walking tour. As I got my bearings outside of the train station, book in hand, holding it out in odd directions trying to match my surroundings with his map, it began to rain. Never fear, I pulled out the old umbrella--living in Chicago, I've become quite dextrous maneuvering with an umbrella in one hand and something else in the other. In this case Rick and his maps.

Most of the time I don't enjoy rain when I have to be outside getting wet, but occasionally the heavy gray weather is an unexpected relief. I resign myself to getting damp (or dripping) and start to feel my muscles relax under the weight of the laden sky.

I sat in the Jesuit church for a while, listening to the organist practice and then strolled over to Luzern's most famous landmark--the chapel bridge. The bridge stretches diagonally across the wide river and is original from the early 1300s! All along the inside of the bridge are panels depicting various scenes from the city's history in the 1500s. In 1993, however, a portion of the bridge caught on fire. They rebuilt it, but did not replace the paintings in that section as a reminder for what happened.

It was crowded on the bridge because it was covered and more than one tourist was taking refuge from the pouring rain underneath. The paintings were interesting. Each one depicted a normal village scene, but a skeleton was present somewhere in each one. Sometimes it was dancing with a person, sometimes standing behind them, sometimes sitting watching from afar. It was a reminder that death is always present for every person--young, old, weak, strong, rich, poor--no one is exempt.

I stopped at a cafe for lunch and to dry off a bit. Though I was getting more used to being by myself, it still felt slightly uncomfortable to get a table for 1, especially in Europe where everyone shares the tables anyway. There was a group of people sitting right next to me, but the seat across from me was free. Having people so close to you when you're alone somehow makes the aloneness active--exclusion--rather than passive--just minding your own business, being alone. Everyone told me I would meet all kinds of other young people traveling alone in Europe because people do it all the time, but that was just not the case. Everywhere I looked my fellow travelers were retirees. Perhaps the economy, perhaps the time of year, who knows.

I ate and flipped through my book to see where I'd go next. Just as I was finishing a young, handsome guy walked in to the cafe, clutching none other than the Rick Steves Switzerland book! He found a table and sat down and I started gathering up my courage and figuring out what I would say--I have the same book! Ha ha! Let's see the rest of the city together! And I thought how proud Mom would be if my great love story were: we met because of Rick Steves! And just as these thoughts were beginning to settle in my head in an organized fashion, a female travel companion walked over and sat down across the table from him. DARN! Should have known he wouldn't be traveling alone. Probably on their honeymoon. How sweet.

I spent the rest of the afternoon wandering alone through the Old Town in the rain, admiring the many murals on the building facades. I actually had to stop and buy a scarf because it was in the 50s. The only store I could afford was H&M--I know, not authentic. The $ to the Swiss Franc is about 1:1, but the Swiss make up for that by having everything twice as expensive as it would be in the states. My last goal was to find the famous lion statue. It really was a compelling sight--a great stone lion carved into a stone cliff with a reflecting pool underneath. The lion lay dying with a broken spear in its side, tears streaming down its face. It represents the valor of Swiss soldiers killed in combat, and was really quite moving.

While waiting for Adrian, Etel, and Adrian's 8 yr old son, Janosh, to come meet me for dinner, I sat down at a cafe to have apple strudel. It was delish. Adrian, Etel, and Janosh then took me to a restaurant that does a folklore show. We dined on fondue, rosti, and veal while a band played Swiss folk music. They played the water glasses, the cow bells, the saw, the accordian, the Alphorn, and got the whole crowd singing Edelweiss and yodeling their hearts out. When they brought out the Alphorn, they pulled people up on stage to try their hands at blowing it. I was one of the lucky guests to get to try, and I got the horn to sound, but it was anything but melodic!