And back to Zurich

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We were all up around 5an today for an early departure from Luxembourg. We had our Ibis Sytles included breakfast and checked out. Clay & I went to retrieve the car/SUV from the Fort Weddell car park garage and discovered it cost us $47!

We drove around the block to return to Ibis for the luggage and the ladies and in minutes were out of Luxembourg city. We took the same route back to Zurich as we had made Friday night/Saturday morning but today in bright sunshine it was scenic. We must have passed through France's corn belt! We also saw cauliflower (maybe?), hops, grapes, hay, sunflowers and tobacco. We saw some small French deer in a field. We saw at least 3 storks. We saw Germany. We stopped at a gas station/rest area in Longeville, so Mom & Carol both got a new country. We saw Germany across a river but as we'd been delayed over 15 minutes at the Swiss border there was no time to zip over for a new country for them both. Too bad. They saw it!

We returned the car full of gas about 15 minutes before our 1pm deadline. We checked into the Radisson Blu, our 1st Trafalgar hotel about 1:30pm. They had our rooms ready on the 4th floor. At 2:30pm, we meet Stephane our guide in the lobby and ride the bus into Zurich proper. We will get a tour, free time and a light meal and back to the hotel at 8:30pm and good night.

Tomorrow we visit Lichtenstein on our way to Salzburg Austria for an overnight there.

We had about 15 minutes drive each way to and from central Zurich. It is a beautiful old city with a river and a lake. After a severe but brief storm passed through after a particularly hot afternoon, the skies cleared and you could see snow-capped Alps beyond the lake. We had about an hour's guided walking tour with our guide this trip, a Frenchman named Stephane. It was a grueling walk up and down stairs, ramps, and narrow alleys. We ended between an equestrian statue and a church, Fraumunster. Fraumunster has a set of Chagall stained glass windows. We had about 1.5 hours of free time and headed in there at 5 $, Euros or Swiss Francs per person. Clay paid for us all in order to break a 100 Swiss Franc note. The windows were breathtaking. Sorry, no photos allowed! We left for Storchen Hotel's outdoor riverside bar for Clay to have ice cream. Carol stayed at the first riverside bench instead. The storm hit right after the 3 of us sat down  on that riverside bench with our ice creams. We ran under the Storchen canopy. Clay and I decided to pay to sit there with drinks and Mom went back to join Carol. At the end of the storm, the wind really blew hard and sent the umbrellas from the next door cafe tumbleweeding down the way into the hotel's canopy area. It was terrifying and dramatic as people who had been cowering under those umbrellas and the canopy scrambled out of the way as they tangled and piled up right beside our table 2 in. Fortunately, it blew through right as the time approached to rejoin the group for dinner. We reloaded the bus and drove about 10 minutes to Linde-Oberstrass restaurant where we had a fixed dinner in a private upstairs group. Not everyone in our group has arrived yet but it is a big group of over 40 people. We had 2 drinks each of beer or wine, water, salad, lamb or vegetarian ravioli and lemon sorbet with tea or coffee. It was fine, not great. The group size is bigger than we'd hoped but it is probably less than the published max of 51.

We have an early start tomorrow, so good night.

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