I like trains. Ever since “The Big Bang Theory,” this statement has become a surefire way to out yourself as a nerd. I won’t deny it – I am a nerd. Sometimes, I’m even a bit sad that I’m not the nerdiest person in the room. Some of my friends are way more knowledgeable about trains than I am.
People often ask me what I like so much about trains. The answer is probably that I’m generally fascinated by infrastructure. For me, infrastructure is a bit like magic. A lot happens behind the scenes to make a gigantic system run smoothly (Germans might disagree about the “smoothly” part, but that’s another story).
This love for trains, combined with my newfound free time after my CERN contract ended, led me to buy an “AG découverte été” from the Swiss Railway company SBB. It’s essentially a train flat rate for one month in summer, valid on the entire Swiss rail, bus, and boat network.
So, I’m off to discover Switzerland during this month. The plan is simple: visit as many places in the country as possible. Living in a remote corner of the country (the very southwest) means it always takes a while to get anywhere, but this gives me plenty of time to write this blog and do other things.
Day 1: Nyon to Frauenfeld
On the first day of this journey, I took the train from my home in Nyon, at the Lake Geneva, to Bern, then changed to the Intercity that runs from Interlaken (between Lake Thun and Lake Brienz) to Romanshorn on Lake Constance. I got off in the lovely city of Frauenfeld in the canton of Thurgau.
Why Frauenfeld, you ask? Well, I’ve been on a specific Swiss challenge for almost two years: visiting every canton capital and taking a selfie in front of each canton’s parliament building. It’s taking two years because Switzerland doesn’t have 16 cantons like Germany, but 26. Yes, twenty-six. These range from large cantons like Vaud (800,000 inhabitants) or Zürich (1.6 million) to tiny ones like Obwalden (40,000) or the smallest, Appenzell Innerrhoden (16,000).
Over the past two years, I’ve taken selfies in front of 17 out of the 26 canton parliaments, and I’m determined to complete this challenge during this month.
In Frauenfeld, I initially made a mistake by taking a selfie in front of the wrong building. The “Regierungsgebäude” is the government building, but my challenge was to find where the parliament meets. For Thurgau, it’s actually two buildings: the town halls of Frauenfeld and Weinfelden. Luckily, I noticed my error and managed to get the correct selfie before leaving.
Lake Constance and Büsingen
Next stop: Lake Constance! I took an Interregio train across the border to Constance to walk along the shores of this truly trinational lake. Interestingly, the borders between Germany, Switzerland, and Austria are not fixed on the lake – a geographical curiosity.
From there, I boarded a regional train along the “Untersee” (a smaller part of Lake Constance after the Rhine passes Constance) towards Schaffhausen. I hopped off in Diessenhofen, known for its beautiful covered bridge across the Rhine to the German town of Gailingen. From Diessenhofen, I took a boat to Schaffhausen.
During this boat ride, I passed another geographical curiosity: Büsingen, a German exclave surrounded by Switzerland. I was excited to see if I could tell it was German territory from the outside. At the pier, there was only a town flag – no national flag. In Switzerland, the communal flag is always accompanied by the cantonal and national flags, so this was an indirect clue that we weren’t in Switzerland. The town’s logo, visible from the boat, cleverly depicts its unique situation: a German flag surrounded by Swiss crosses and the Rhine river.
Schaffhausen and Central Switzerland
In Schaffhausen, I had to correct a past mistake. On a previous visit, I’d taken a selfie in front of what I thought was the canton parliament but turned out to be the city administration building. This time, I made sure to get the correct selfie at the actual town hall.
From Schaffhausen, I headed south to central Switzerland to visit two cantons that are part of the cradle of the Swiss Confederation: Nidwalden and Obwalden, or more precisely, their capitals Stans and Sarnen. Both are lovely towns situated on scenic narrow-gauge train lines operated by the “Zentralbahn.” Stans is on the Luzern-Engelberg line, while Sarnen is on the famous Luzern-Interlaken route, which passes along Lake Sarnen, Lake Lungern, through the Hasli valley, and along Lake Brienz.
I took the Luzern-Interlaken line, which offers stunning views over lakes and valleys. Pro tip: sit on the right side of the train for the best views. Keep in mind that the train changes direction in Meiringen (in the Hasli valley), so your viewing side will change as well.
The journey concluded with a change in Interlaken towards Bern, and then onto the Interregio towards Geneva. And that’s how this first of hopefully many travel days this month came to an end.
