Zürich

Country Switzerland

Travel Companion Andrea Haney

My Favorites

Rhine Falls * Schaffhausen * Stein am Rhein * Ballet at the Zürich Opera House * free outdoor movie in Sechseläutenplatz

Currency CHF - Swiss Franc

I did not use any CHF cash while I was in Zürich, but if you plan to take day trips to smaller surrounding cities or plan on visiting markets or local pop-up shops, I would advise taking out some CHF cash from an ATM. Credit/debit cards can be used everywhere and contactless payment methods are widely accepted.

Time of Visit June 2023

Weather 60-80 Degrees Fahrenheit

Closest Major Airport Zürich Airport (aka Kloten Airport)

Transport train, bus, boat

Packing

light pants * shorts * dress * short sleeve top * long sleeve top * sweater * good walking shoes/sandals * umbrella * sunscreen * sun hat * rain jacket

Above are the must-have items. If you want the complete list of what I packed for my 40 days in Europe, click here.

Accommodation Oldtown Hostel Otter

In this hostel, we stayed in a 6-bed female dorm suite. In the room, there was a sink with a mirror, 1 table with 4 chairs, a refrigerator, and a storage shelf. Each bed had its own locker and there were many hooks around the room to hang things on. This hostel did not have air conditioning, but it was not too noticeable because the temperature in Zürich in early June is not very warm and the room had two large fans to help circulate air. On our floor, which we shared with two other rooms, we had access to a private toilet and two private showers.

What I Did

Zürich was the first city Andrea and I visited during our 6-week trip to Europe in 2023. You can read about the entirety of that trip with this link. Because this was our first city to visit on this trip, we came out hot and visited more than what would probably be realistic for most people (and if we are honest, more than what was realistic for ourselves, leaving us very tired). Nevertheless, here is how I spent 4 days in Zürich.

(Day 1) Our flight arrived to Zürich Airport around 9 AM and after deplaning and exiting the airport, we headed to our hostel. We purchased a train ticket for 7 CHF to take us from the airport to the train station closest to our hostel then walked a little less than 10 minutes to our hostel. It was too early to check in to our rooms, but we were able to store our luggage in the common area while we went out to explore the city. Our first stop was the historic Café Bar ODEON for coffee, eggs, and toast. Café Bar ODEON opened in 1911 and has wonderful coffee and food as well as a beautiful interior design. Coffee was necessary after our 2-layover flight adventure to get from Atlanta to Zürich and Café Bar ODEON was a great place to stop.

After Café Bar ODEON, we walked across Quaibrücke (a bridge) to Fraumünster (a church), saw Münsterbrücke (a bridge), walked through Paradeplatz (a shopping district), and went in to AP House Zürich (a modern and high-end Swiss watch maker boutique). The AP House Zürich kindly let us walk through their store which was very fancy and very out of our price range, but very interesting to see. We continued down the street to St. Peter Church and stopped at Max Chocolatier for a small piece of milk chocolate that was delicious.

We continued down Bahnhofstrasse (a street) and Augustinergasse (another street), quickly learning how hilly Zürich is in certain places. We walked through a part of the city called Lindenhof which had great lookout points. We stopped at Läderach, another chocolate shop, walked through the main city bus/train station, and stopped to visit the Swiss National Museum. This place has a gorgeous exterior and we enjoyed everything we learned in this Museum. After spending a little under two hours at the Swiss National Museum, we walked through Platzspitz Park and then walked about 20 minutes back to the hostel.

On this walk back to the hostel, we walked through the Niederdorf neighborhood and down Niederdorfstrasse (a street with many restaurants). We stopped at the Coop (our favorite European grocery store) to pick up shower items, breakfast food, and other necessities we would need for our Europe travels that didn’t fit in our carry on bags. Back at the hostel we were able to check in and settle in to our room. I haven’t mentioned this before, but it is common for you to have to make your own hostel room bed when you arrive. So, part of settling in to this hostel was making our beds and figuring out where everything is. I had a Peace Corps conference call, so I was able to log on and participate with the hostel Wi-Fi.

We left the hostel again around 6 PM to get takeaway pizza from Napulé. The wait was very long, so I would recommend ordering in advance because we were a bit hangry by this point in the day. Our original plan was to take the pizza to Rechberg Park to eat, but the pizza was eaten before we got to the park. Rechberg Park was very nice though, and I would recommend going here for a sunset picnic. Before heading back to the hostel, we stopped at Cabaret Voltaire and The Old Crow, two popular bars. If I were to go back to one, it would be The Old Crow. We walked back through the Old Town to our hostel to end the night.

(Day 2) After waking up before our alarms because our bodies hadn’t adjusted to the time change yet, we had time to stop at Starbucks on our way to the bus. We each purchased a Zürich Card for the day which allowed us unlimited public transport for 24 hours. This was key to us being able to do everything we ended up accomplishing today. The bus took us to Lindt Home of Chocolate where we had a 10 AM tour. This was a great tour. We had an audio guide included in our ticket which was very informative.

The tour began with 3 rooms of information and then we continued to 3 rooms of chocolate tasting. The first room had liquid dark, milk, and white chocolate for you to try. The second room had a variety of unknown flavors for you to taste and then to try and guess which flavor you had tasted. The third room had a variety of wrapped Lindt chocolates that you could take with you for free. After the tour, you can go through the gift shop, but since we had gotten all of that free chocolate on the tour, we didn’t purchase anything.

We spent a little over an hour at the Lindt Home of Chocolate then headed to the bus stop to go back toward the city. We got off the bus when we reached Springbrunnen Aquaretum and walked along the docks on the lake. We continued to walk through Belvoir Park and Rieterpark. We ate a nice lunch with a great view at Museum Rietberg then walked through all of the parts of this museum.

From here, we headed down the hill to the FIFA Museum and I thought this museum was very interesting and engaging. This museum has 3 floors, each with a different purpose. The last floor had putt putt but with soccer balls and goals which was a lot of fun to play.

At the FIFA Museum, we realized our Lindt chocolates had melted in our bags which was not ideal because (1) it was messy and (2) we couldn’t eat the chocolate anymore. After cleaning out our bags, we got on the tram to go to the Tram Museum. This museum had a lot of different trams to look at and you could go in them and under one of them. This was not something we were super interested in, so we left soon after arriving.

From the Tram Museum we walked to and through the Botanical Garden (Botanischer Garten der Universität Zürich). We continued walking to Pavillon Le Corbusier, a unique house on the lake. We walked through Chinagarten Zürich which is in Zürichhorn Park and then got on a boat at the Zürichhorn boat stop. The Zürich Card only works for the small loop boat circuit, but the people working on the boat check your pass and will make sure you are on the correct boat.

We rode the boat all the way to the Central stop which was about a 30-40 minute ride and the views of the lake and the mountains were great. When we got off the boat, we were immediately engulfed in a group of people protesting which caused the public transport to be shut down. This caused us to have to walk to the Polybahn so we got popsicles to pass the time on our longer than typical walk. The Polybahn is a funicular that takes people from the river level to the University that is up on the hill. It is a very quick ride and we didn’t even get out of the car, we just rode it right back down.

Back at the river level, we were able to take public transport up to the Rigiblick funicular and this took us to a great view over the city of Zürich. Since we did both funicular rides, I would recommend doing the Rigiblick funicular ride because it gives you a much better view of the city. When we got back to the river level, I was on a mission to have a raclette dish, but we were also on a mission to not pay Swiss Fondu prices (they are outrageous). Typically, a raclette dish has cheese that has been headed and the melted part scraped off onto a plate with boiled potatoes and vegetables.

This proved more challenging than we thought it would because there was a fire on the main restaurant street where all of our saved restaurants were located and they were thus closed. The fire did not end up being very serios, but the streets are so narrow that they need to be closed down to foot traffic to ensure the safety of everyone. We ended up at Raclette Stube and had a great experience here. This restaurant also has fondu that they require you to order, but thankfully the waitress felt bad for us and allowed us to just eat our raclette dish (which was delicious). We had a nice walk home through the Old Town to end our night.

(Day 3) This was a day trip day. Scroll down to read about Rapperswil-Jona, Heididorf, and Liechtenstein.

(Day 4) All around, this was one of our most favorite days on our entire Europe trip! A large portion of this day was spent on a day trip to Rhine Falls, Schaffhausen, and Stein am Rhein. Scroll down to read about this portion of the day. We got back to Zürich around 3 PM and were able to do some really unique things. We made our own pasta in the hostel for dinner and took this with us to Sechseläutenplatz (the town square in front of the Zürich opera house).

We ate our pasta on the square while we watched the outdoor movie get set up. After we ate, we headed across the square to the opera house ticket office where we purchased 2 tickets for the ballet that started in an hour. They chose our seats for us, so we didn’t know where we would be, but we were just excited we were able to watch a ballet. Once we got got into the building, we had about 30 minutes to kill, so we wandered around the building and onto its rooftop terraces which gave great views of the lake and the city.

When it was time to find our seats, we were surprised to find out we had our own box to ourselves, so I think the person who helped us buy the tickets was nice to use because there’s no way the price we paid would’ve gotten us those seats. The ballet we saw was The Cellist. It was nice to be able to see the orchestra pit as well as the stage and I really enjoyed this ballet.

After the ballet, we walked back out onto the square in search of 2 seats to watch La La Land for free. The weather in Zürich is so nice in the summer that outdoor events like this are very common. We lucked out and found 2 seats and were able to watch La La Land as the sun set. Overall, this was by far one of the best afternoons we have ever had on any of our trips.

Day Trips Rapperswil-Jona * Heididorf * Liechtenstein * Rhine Falls * Schaffhausen * Stein am Rhein

(Day 3) Today we took a day trip to Rapperswil-Jona, Heididorf, and Liechtenstein through a guided tour. I always like to plan about one guided tour a week because it gives me a day to not have to make any decisions and to just go along with the group. This was also the best way for us to see Liechtenstein, one of the smallest countries in Europe, since we didn’t rent a car.

Today, we left the hostel around 9 AM to get lunch for the day from the Coop. The check-in for the tour was by the main train/bus station and it was very easy to find. We did the tour through Gray Line. The tour bus was a nice charter bus and it was not completely full so we were able to space out.

Our first stop was Rapperswil-Jona, on the southern end of the lake that Zürich is on. The drive took a little over an hour because of traffic in Zürich. All of the drives today were gorgeous. In order to drive on highways here, you need to buy a yearly pass and the speed is checked everywhere by radars, so keep these two things in mind if you plan on driving in the Zürich area.

When we arrived in Rapperswil-Jona, we walked through Old Town to the church and castle. By this time, it was time for lunch, so we found a shaded bench behind the castle that overlooked the lake and mountains and ate our packed lunch here. If you are traveling in Switzerland and are hoping to stay on a budget, grocery store lunches are a must because you will save easily 10-20 CHF per day.

After eating our picnic lunch, we walked around the rose gardens of the town before getting back on the bus to head to our next stop. Our next stop was Heididorf, about another hour away. Heidi is a character in a book series about an orphan girl living in the Alps. Movies and TV series have also been created about this character. On the drive from Rapperswil-Jona to Heididorf, we drove alongside Walensee (a lake) and this was a gorgeous area that I would assume has great hiking opportunities.

The drive up the hill to Heididorf was covered in vineyards and it was about a 10 minute walk from the parking lot to the Heidi village. At the welcome building, we purchased a popsicle and an entrance ticket to see all of the museum buildings. This would be a fun thing for smaller children, but we still enjoyed walking around. You can also purchase animal food to feed the farm animals around the property. At the welcome building, there is the smallest post office in Switzerland, so it would be a fun place to send a postcard.

After Heididorf, we drove a little less than an hour to Lichtenstein. They are the 4th smallest country in the world, have 150,000 inhabitants, and low taxes. Our first stop was the tourist office so we could get the Lichtenstein country stamp in our passports because there is no border control or customs on the road. We spent about an hour here so we didn’t have time to go up and see the Royal Castle, but we could see it from the town below. We saw the town church and spent a lot of our time window shopping in the various stores in town.

The drive back to Zürich took about 3 hours and there was more traffic in Zürich at this time of day than when we left. Because we got back a little later than planned, we opted for McDonalds for dinner to end our day. It is fun for Andrea and I to try McDonalds in the different countries we visit to see what their menu looks like and to try their McFlurries.

(Day 4) Andrea and I were at the train station by 8:30 AM so we could grab a Starbucks drink and be on time for the Rhine Falls train. Ahead of this trip, we purchased a 10-Day Eurail pass, and we used one of our travel days for today because of the various train rides we were taking. The train ride from Zürich to Rhine Falls took about 40 minutes and when we got off the train, we were right at the falls.

We took the elevator up to the town above the train station and wandered around the castle for a little bit. There is not much here besides a welcome center and a restaurant, but it is cute. We took the elevator back down and walked down the free trail to the water to the boat ticket office. We got the ticket to let you walk up the rock and we were picked up by the shuttle boat that brought us across the river and to the correct boat for our ticket.

It took us a couple minutes to get to the falls and it was very cool to be so close to them. It was great to go early in the morning because the temperature was perfect and our boat was not full. The boat took us to a drop off point where we were able to leave and walk up the rock in the middle of the falls and we spent about 20 minutes on this rock because you have to climb up and back down it.

We got back on the boat and it dropped us off on the side of the river opposite the one we arrived on. We walked alongside the river to the top of the falls on this side of the river and got great views of the falls from the top side. This was really all there was to see here, so we got on the train on this side of the river to go to Schaffhausen.

When we got to Schaffhausen, we didn’t have a plan so we went to the tourist office and they provided us a detailed walking guide that we followed for a couple hours. It was great and walked us through the entire city giving us details about what we were seeing. We ate our lunch on a bench outside of the castle and we had the best view overlooking the river and the city. When we had completed the walking guide, we headed back to the train station and took another train to Stein am Rhein.

We also didn’t have a plan when we arrive to Stein am Rhein, so we picked up a guide from their tourist office and this was very helpful as well. We spent about an hour here and I would’ve liked more time in this town. We saw everything within the city walls but were unable to see things outside of the city walls. Both Stein am Rhein and Schaffhausen are well preserved medieval cities, so there’s a lot to see and it is all very interesting. The train back to Zürich from Stein am Rhein took over an hour, but we were back to the hostel by 3 PM.

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