Monday, March 22, 2010

Last Day in Europe



Ok this will be a short entry because:

A. I've milked the hell out of my Europe trip

B. Since it happened almost 3 months ago, I don't remember most of the details.

On my last day in Basel, we tried to keep it low key. Earlier we had drunk (drank?) a bottle of local wine with a picture of this awesome looking water castle on the label.


So we decided to go visit.

It's called Bottmingen Schloss and it's right in Basel itself. Although it's a fine dining restaurant now and not so much a castle but still impressive to see.



(Side note, apparently Roger Federer lives in this district. I like how Wikipedia has to just randomly throw this in. But from having talked with my previous Swiss students and the overabundance of RF posters about town, it appears he's a pretty fricking big deal in these parts).


Next we went to this abbey which had the chapel literally carved out of rock. Mariastein. (Mary's Stone)

It looked like a totally normal church (albeit one that is hugging the side of a cliff) until you get to the chapel, which is hewed out of the side of the rock. Pretty amazing. You get the feeling of how it would be to attend services during the time when Catholics weren't so welcome around those parts. Switzerland is partially home to the Protestant Revolution after all.


I wish I had taken pictures but I would have felt a little awkward, being that there were quite a few people there praying. (this one was stolen from the Internet). I don't have exact directions here, but do know that you will need a car and a driver who knows where they're going.









4 comments:

  1. Beautiful! And so interesting how Roger Federer lives nearby :-) You can milk this trip as much as you want for me because I've loved reading about it. But I know what you mean because I too still have a load of photos & stories to share from my last trip to California. I'm just trying to come up with creative ways to share ;-)

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  2. Would it be weird if I requested a post on the wines you have consumed during your trip? :) I also have enjoyed reading about your adventures.

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  3. That does look like a church in a cave.

    My new blog is www.sarabeck.wordpress.com by the way ;)

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  4. Thanks for all the great comments!

    Becca-Thanks for the request but I don't think it would fill a whole post (since most of them were at my friend's parents house and I'm not sure of the name) but the 2 I remember were the the one from the water castle Bottmingen Schloss you can find in Basel and the other from Riquewihr, France (about 30 min outside Basel) called Mittnacht-Klack. (meaning midnight something) =)

    Sara-I like your new blog but as a total techo-idiot can't figure out how to follow...

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