Switzerland 2014

In the summer of 2014 i've been on business trip to Switzerland. Finally got some time to share few photos.

The most iconic one is probably the cows eating grass in Alps, 2000 meters above the sea level:


Really liked hotel in Zurich - tidy and stylish:


Not much luck with attempt to visit chocolate factory - all we've seen there was some old-school phone at the gate:


Countryside looks like Belarus, just a fair bit less flat:




Geneva is very different - immigrants from Africa, painted walls, red light district at the center of the city...




French starts right on the other side of the Geneva lake. It feels that everything in Europe is so close here... (especially comparing to Russia)


Montreux - is a small, calm city on the Geneva lake. One might like it for retirement. You could guess why Montreux Convention (still actual BTW) was called this way:crazy: Also Queen was recording their albums here.












Visited Italy by car when we got some spare time. To get there we had to drive over Alps (speaking of Europe distances again...):


The highest point of the route was just over 2000 meters above sea level. It was quite a surreal feeling to drive at the level of clouds... Just 50 years ago crossing Alps this way was not available all year around, and in Roman Empire times it was taking weeks...


Drove by The Eagle on the Simplon pass:


Suddenly a tunnel, carved in stone:


Somewhere along the route noticed Movenpick Hotel. We used to think that Movenpick is just an ice-cream. Not surprisingly, their restaurant was serving this ice-cream even though it's 2 different companies now (Movenpick ice-cream is being made by Nestle these days):


My overall impression of Switzerland was that it is no doubt a very quiet and beautiful country (excluding Geneva obviously). The only downside is extreme cost of life and real estate which is somewhat compensated by higher average income. Business though feels just fine thanks to cheap capital - it's really nice when you can finance projects with 10-20 years long business plans...