Today was Valerie and Mom’s first full day in Europe! We made sure to fill it with plenty of exploring by wandering the streets, getting döner kebap, and checking out their first cathedral.
Trains
Isaac dropped us off at the train station this morning. For how smooth my train experiences have been on this trip, our luck was not great today. Our first train, a simple metro one to Frankfurt main station, was 10 minutes late. We still had plenty of time to get our ICE train (intercity), so no big deal. Except they decided to change the track on us only 5 minutes before it departed! My goodness. I figured it out when the train on “our” track turned out to be red. ICE trains are always white, so we ran over to the other side to board with 2 minutes to spare.
We enjoyed a relaxing 3 hour trip through the rain to Basel, Switzerland, where we got a connection to Zurich. As the 3 hour journey went along, our estimated arrival time got further and further and further back. By the time we were pulling into Basel, we only had 3 minutes to catch our connection. Nope, scratch that! We took our time pulling into the station, so we arrived literally when the next one was supposed to leave. We jumped out of the train and literally sprinted as fast as we could to the train on the next platform over. Luckily, hundreds of other people were doing the same thing. They weren’t going to leave so many people behind, so we made it! It was a little stressful though. Mom sure impressed us with her ability to run!
The final hour-long ride was beautiful, watching green mountains and quaint villages pass by. We made it to Zurich and our hotel was only two blocks from the station.
Exploring
The weather was cold and wet today. We went out anyways! We walked along the river leading to the Zurich lake. The city is beautiful as they all are, but much less so than I was expecting. Maybe it was the rain. At any rate, we were able to see plenty of church spires and imagine the events that were taking place here 500 years ago. The river was filled with swans and ducks today, making our river watching even better. It occurred to us that we don’t know if we’ve ever actually seen swans in person before. They’re huge! Way bigger than geese and even prettier.
I decided to take Mom and Valerie into their first cathedral. We settled on Fraumünster because it’s one of the more famous churches here and we’ll see Großmünster tomorrow. The church was magnificent but it’s a Protestant church, so much less intricate and artistic than the Catholic cathedrals. Even so, the church was commissioned in 853 AD by King Louis II of Francia (in Germany). In 1524, shortly after the Reformation spread through the area, the church became a Protestant church. Many of the “idols” present in the church were destroyed to make room for a humble faith. That’s why most Protestant cathedrals with long history are fairly plain. We were grateful to see that the starry ceiling over the chancel has been uncovered, with restorators carefully uncovering the original depiction of the heavenly realm.
To finish off our journey, we got some hot food, walked along the edge of the lake, and spent time enjoying the unique plants in a local park. I’ve run out of words to say that everything is beautiful, but it absolutely is.
Big day!
In the morning, we drop Mom off for her tour of Zurich and the Lindt chocolate factory before heading to the Anabaptism @500 Conference. This year marks the 500th anniversary of the Anabaptist movement, the predecessor to the modern day Amish, Mennonite, and Baptist denominations. We’ve really been looking forward to this conference and learning more about how our shared history has impacted others around the world. Tomorrow is also Ascension Day, a very important holiday for Christians in Europe. I’ll talk more about it in my blog tomorrow.
Oh! And Katie and Hudson are here. We’re hoping to find a way to surprise them, if they don’t already know we’re here. If you’re reading this blog, surprise!
That’s it for tonight. I’m hoping to have a lot to say tomorrow! If you’re curious about the conference, check out the website for more information.
