Lausanne is an up and down town. Straight up and straight down. In other words, its as hilly as the mountains around it. I've never been in a metro where the station and the line were on a slant, almost like it should have been a funicular (see my blog on Orvieto). And talk about growing strong legs. You definitely need strength to climb the hills here.
Lausanne, in a word, is Hills and more hills. It reminds me of the hills in San Francisco, but I think it is probably steeper and has fewer areas of level ground. The good news is that their is frequent and effective public transportation, in fact, it is such a recognized issue that every hotel give you a free transport card for every day you have a hotel room.
Like most of the European cities I visited, there is an old core based around a church, in this case the Cathedral of Lausanne. It is about 800 years old and is very beautiful. The city has just about finished a complete restoration and it looks as it did when first completed. They are still working on the exterior detailing. It is in the Baroque style with immense flying arches over the chapel and the main body of the church as well as the naves.
It is a very beautiful city with the main focus being the 800 year old Cathedral of Lausanne, a protestant, non-denominational church.
On the outside the steeple is very old stone with lots of detail which is beautifully lit up at night.
Because of the steepness of the hills, the old town of Lausanne is very irregular. There are no streets that are straight for more than a block or two.
It seems impossible to get from point A to B without a map because things change rapidly due to the steep hillside.
This is Switzerland and I expected hills, but it is fascinating that such a town was built on these tough hills.
When I first arrived at the train station, I was told to go up the street across from the station to get to my hotel. The street was so steep, I thought it couldn't be the one I wanted. So I zigzagged up for the next 20 minutes in a light rain to find I would have been there in 3 minutes if I'd believed it was really a walk and drive street. You certainly see strong calf muscles in all the residents.
The metro subway was designed to accommodate the these hills. Some of the stations are actually on an incline. I guess it was too difficult or would take it too deep underground to do it in a more typical stair-step manner.
I went to dinner with my host Nathan the second evening. Unlike other tourist cities, one of the nicest local Swiss-style restaurant is in the train station. A very clean and well maintained place. As in most of the places I visited, I went for the local food and culture. What is more Swiss than Cheese Fondue which was fabulous. The cheese dip was a secret mixture of swiss cheeses that was a little tangy, certainly more flavorful than I was used to. We also paired it with an excellent Swiss Red Wine. I was thinking this was going to be my Gelato Tour, but its becoming more of a Red Wines tour of each country.
Of course, that is the motto and style of the whole country, clean and well maintained. Everything always worked, and well. After all, this particular city is the home of the Olympics Organization. There is an Olympic Museum near the waterfront but is is in the process of being renovated and expanded.
There is another blog on the Chocolate tour which was next on the itinerary.
But to counteract the cold temperature, we did go the the Baths at Lavey, a natural hot springs, which has been converted to a hot springs water park. There are immense pools of naturally heated and conditioned water and they have added air jets for a jacuzzi effect. There is this very cool round river that sweeps you off your feet (good swimmer only, it cautions) And moves you around this walled circle. After spending a couple of hours in the various pools, of differing temperatures, we went into the dry sauna, where i promptly fell asleep, it was so comfortable. After I woke up, it was time to try the Hammam, which is what the europeans call a wet sauna or turkish steam sauna. I didn't get any pictures of the baths, my camera couldn't stand the wet and I'm not sure the clientele would appreciate a nosy American snapping their photos in bathing suits. But i did take an after picture of me in the mirror, totally relaxed after all that.
I spent the next day in Geneva which is appears to be a larger and more commercial city than Lausanne. Lake Geneva is very large with many cities dotting its shores.
Geneva, the city, is still on its namesake Lake, but it is almost a fast hours train ride away from Lausanne. Geneva is not as up and down as Lausanne. But looks very similar, maybe a little older because it was easier to populate. And because it is flatter in the core, it is easier to get around and site see.
I will put my trip to Geneva in a separate blog. But for now its goodby Lausanne and Going south where there should be no snow.
The pictures of this segment, a lot more of the city and architecture can be found in this link: Lausanne Switzerland
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