switzin's blog

Art's Role in Travelling

switzin — Fri, 21 Nov 2008 14:32:10 -0800

Have any of you ever been to the Paul Klee Zentrum (center) in Berne, Switzerland? Or maybe the Salvador Dali Museum in St. Petersburg, Fla.? Do you even like abstract art?

I must say that while I am not fond of many of Klee’s pieces, and while some of Dali’s works have the ability to cause a...

Bratislava

switzin — Fri, 21 Nov 2008 14:05:55 -0800

This October I visited the capital of Slovak Republic. With roughly 450,000 inhabitants, Bratislava is in size comparable to Edinburgh.

However, the day I was there, fog hung low and on the 75-minute boat ride from Vienna to Bratislava we didn’t see much of the famous Danube. Fortunately the fog lifted...

Nashville Attractions: Part III

switzin — Sun, 03 Aug 2008 10:07:58 -0700

Okay, okay, this is the last of my “Nashville attractions” series, which is based on the Nashville Business Journal’s newly released list.

However, I will close with a few more tips. One, the Chaffin’s Barn Dinner Theatre, is a favorite of mine. I especially like to go there for New Year’s...

Nashville Attractions: Part II

switzin — Sun, 03 Aug 2008 09:59:13 -0700

In my last blog, I focused on the top three attractions in Nashville based on a list published in the Nashville Business Journal.

Numbers four through eight mention the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum, a place I’ve never fully explored because I am just not that much into country music (even...

Nashville Attractions: Part I

switzin — Sun, 27 Jul 2008 11:51:54 -0700

I just read the Nashville Business Journal, one of my many regular weeklies and monthlies that I am trying to get through. In it, I saw a list of the top 25 Tourist Attractions in Nashville, Tenn.

Some of you may remember that while born and raised in Switzerland, I live in Nashville. I’m still a...

Appenzell, cheese and folk art

switzin — Fri, 29 Feb 2008 08:29:01 -0800

Appenzell Innerrhoden (also known in English as Appenzell Inner Rhodes) is a half canton in Switzerland. I won’t go into history here, but Switzerland consists of 26 cantons of which six are half cantons (they are divided mostly for historical and religious reasons). Half cantons have their own state...

Art and Travel

switzin — Mon, 25 Feb 2008 16:16:55 -0800

Combining travel with art is always high on my list. Especially when I have the opportunity to visit an artist’s home country or even the city he was born in.

In Switzerland, I made it a point to explore the Paul Klee Center in Bern. The building itself is very modern and its silver, rolling shape...

Agadir, Morocco

switzin — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 08:40:29 -0800

Agadir, located in the south of Morocco, did not strike me as a model out of A Thousand and One Nights. On the contrary, the modernity of the city was rather a disappointment. After the disembarkment from our ship, the Marco Polo, we were shuttled along a three-mile stretch of dusty roadwork before we...

A stroll through Mindelo on Sao Vicente

switzin — Sun, 16 Dec 2007 11:59:59 -0800

Even though it is a beautiful morning, the waves are rolling high as we enter Porto Grande on the island of Sao Vicente. Soon we are surrounded by soft, brown hills on three sides as we glide closer towards Mindelo, the capital of this small island, which belongs to Cap Verde.
Leaving the port, we immediately...

Photo View

switzin — Thu, 13 Dec 2007 07:50:16 -0800

I just got back from my trip to Switzerland, Spain, Morocco and Brazil.
While for some of you this continent hopping is a usual occurrence, it still amazes me how easy traveling has become, and how much we can see in one trip.
Over the next few weeks, I will share some of my pictures with you....

Middle Tennessee

switzin — Mon, 08 Oct 2007 16:51:04 -0700

Since I am living in Middle Tennessee, near Nashville, I spend a lot of time walking in this area. Today I took one of my dogs to Edwin Warner Park on Highway 100 in Nashville. I literally gasped when I spotted a barn owl sitting on a 10-foot tree next to the walkway! It was 9:30 a.m., and the owl was...

Blue Heron river cruise

switzin — Sun, 23 Sep 2007 12:02:33 -0700

Sometimes you just have to get away from the daily grind, out into the quiet of nature. While I usually take one or two of my dogs and go for a walk along Cumberland River, this time I joined a friend on a two-hour boat cruise on the very same water way that influences my life so deeply.

What a...

Barrel Organ Market

switzin — Sat, 22 Sep 2007 12:12:51 -0700

I had no clue how many barrel organ enthusiasts roam through Europe in the hope to exhibit their musical treasure boxes, until my uncle dragged me to a small town in the Toggenburg valley in northeastern Switzerland. Lichtensteig, the location of the annual Barrel Organ Market, would not qualify...

My home town in Switzerland

switzin — Sat, 15 Sep 2007 11:03:27 -0700

When I was little, we had five restaurants, two bakeries, one butcher shop, and one cheese maker in our little Swiss village. The cheese maker is now gone, but the village’s character remains seemingly undisturbed. I moved to the United States 12 years ago and was not able to visit my home country...

Climbing a Church Steeple

switzin — Thu, 13 Sep 2007 10:09:51 -0700

I’ve undertaken several fruitless attempts to describe my church tower adventure as a travel story. Now I’m at the point of giving up. Nonetheless, I want to share my little excursion in which I persuaded my American friend to join me in climbing the 500-year-old steeple of the Swiss Catholic...

Texas

switzin — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 15:23:56 -0700

Just as Americans who first hear about Switzerland think of clocks, chocolate and cheese, when I envisioned Texas, I saw imaginary cowboys chasing after large cattle herds through grassy bush land or oil tycoons reigning over multi-billion estates the way J.R. Ewing did in the TV show Dallas. That...

Hello

switzin — Tue, 28 Aug 2007 22:15:43 -0700

So ... I just discovered matadortravel.com and - of course - had to sign up immediately to read and write about traveling, to enjoy and envy other people's entries, and to share cultural adventures.

I'm looking forward to being a part of this network.