Day 2 started off with us meeting in the VisionApartments lobby. We decided to get some breakfast from the nearby Coop we discovered on Day 1. We got some light breakfast: croissant, pain au chocolat and fresh fruit juice.
To our surprise, we found out about a now unavailable drink in Mauriitus: Sinalco! The fun part is our house back in Mauritius is cornered by Tagore Road and wait for it…Sinalco Road!
Our planned itinerary for the day was:
- Visit Jardin Anglais
- Visit Geneva Old Town
- Visit Lake Geneva
- Take a cruise on Lake Geneva
- Visit the Jet d’Eau in Lake Geneva
- Visit St Peter’s Cathedral
First Stop: Jardin Anglais but with a twist!
We started off the day after breakfast walking to the Jardin Anglais. On our way to the garden, we passed by several shops but suddenly found us parallel to Lake Geneva!
Curiosity took over and we decided to push back the visit to Jardin Anglais and instead visit around Lake Geneva.
We walked around taking several pictures of the lake itself which is just magnificent looking; with all activities naturally gravitating towards it.
After some pictures, we reached the Mont Blanc Pier next to the lake where cruises happen. Since we had our Swiss Travel Passes, those cruises were available for free to us!
We confirmed the time of the cruises at the information desk and we agreed to come back later in the afternoon when the cruises happen to get on one of those!
Jardin Anglais
From the Mont Blanc Pier we could see, in distance, the Jet D’Eau of Lake Geneva. We set off to check it out by crossing over the bridge to the other side of Lake Geneva where to our surprise we found ourselves at the entrance of the Jardin Anglais!
Dana, of course, rushed to the first souvenir shop she found at the entrance. She’s still mad at me for not letting her to get some souvenirs from there. She’s obsessed with Switzerland cowbells which is sold nearly everywhere in the country.
A quick stroll in the Jardin Anglais showed us the flower clock and the lake ferris wheel which we penned in for a ride later on in the evening.
Jet D’Eau
We walked along the Jardin Anglais and eventually reached the docks near the Jet D’Eau. It’s an impressive water fountain which rises up more than 100m above the lake.
We got super close to the Jet D’Eau and even got a little bit wet in the process!
Finally, we decided to find a quiet spot to relax before moving on to St Peter’s Cathedral for our next point of interest.
We found some nice benches alongside the lake and sat down, enjoying the view. One of the nice things about Switzerland is that potable fresh water is readily available from public fountains all around the country.
While relaxing on our bench we noticed an ice-cream parlor in-front of us. With the blazing sun and hot temperatures, we went ahead and checked out what was on offer.
The place was called Movenpick and we would later find out that it’s a popular ice-cream place around the country.
We grabbed two cups with scoops of Lindt chocolate and caramel flavored ice cream. We moved places and sat down in the area next to the lake provided by the parlor.
Unexpected Lake Geneva Cruise
While eating our refreshing ice creams, Dana noticed that people were renting out boats for self-navigated cruises on Lake Geneva.
I wasn’t too keen on it, but went ahead and decided to grab one of the smaller, 4 person “derby” electric boats for us to take a cruise on Lake Geneva.
We started off the cruise with me navigating the boat. It took me a few minutes to get the hang of it, but once you do, it’s pretty easy and fun to steer the boat away from the docks onto the deeper areas of the lake.
We had to rebalance the boat because it was tilting to one side. Overall we had 30 minutes of boat ride available to us and mid-way through our available time, Dana decided to take over and steer the boat for the return trip.
We managed to pet some swans which were swimming over the lake. Overall a 10/10 experience for us!
Once our cruise was over, we grabbed our ID card from the boat rental counter and made our way over to our next stop: St Peter’s Cathedral.
St Peter’s Cathedral
One of the places we wanted to visit was St Peter’s Cathedral. We took out Google Map and set off in the general direction of the cathedral.
On the way, Dana founds some interesting clothing shops to look at and we made it to the cathedral around noon on that day.
We all decided to stop and grab our lunch near the cathedral with benches available to sit and relax there.
Once we were at the cathedral, we visited the interior, which had beautiful painted windows and a paid access to the two towers of the cathedral.
My parents decided to sit this one out as it would be physically exhausting for them. The fee for visiting the towers were 7 CHF per person. Once paid, myself and Dana set out to climb the 157 stairs of which brought us to the top of the cathedral. Once we reached the top, we are greeted with this amazing view of the Geneva old town and a view of the Jet D’Eau again.
When we finally completed the tour of the two towers, we met up with my parents and we decided altogether to chill for a little bit in the courtyard of St Peter’s Cathedral which was really peaceful and enjoy the spectacular architecture of the building.
While we were sitting on the courtyard benches, Dana made a new flurry friend. Several people were bringing their dogs for walks around the cathedral and an old lady sat next to us with her white labrador.
Dana of course could not resist petting the dog. She went ahead and talked to the lady and asked if she could pet the dog.
The old lady obliged and gave Dana some dog treats which she could use to become friends with the dog.
After a while we decided to get going for the Lake Geneva cruise which would be in approximately an hour.
On our way back, of course, Dana found some more shops she wanted to visit; including a jewellery shop called Lovisa.
With her spending more than an hour there, this meant that we missed the first schedule of the cruise but could still catch up to the second or third one.
When she was finally done, we started back towards the Mont Blanc Pier but decided to go for a ride in the ferry wheel next to the Jardin Anglais prior to that.
This was our first time on a ferris wheel and we got pretty excited. We could see most of Geneva from the top-most point of the spin and once again, the Jet D’Eau was at the forefront of our sight!
Cruise Disappointment
Once we completed our ferris wheel adventure, we headed back the Mont Blanc Pier waiting for the second cruise on the schedule.
We talked to the person at the information desk who disappointingly informed us that the second cruise was cancelled due to a technical difficulty with the ship. The ship crew were trying to fix it and if they succeeded, we’d be back on track for the third cruise that day.
While waiting for the ship to be repaired, myself and Dana decided to leave my parents at the docks and go check out if there was a Migros somewhere near. While doing so, we realised we were just a few clicks aways from our hotel.
We backtracked after we found out the Migros we were headed towards was the Migros we identified near our hotel 😅
On our way back, we found a couple of watch shops which Dana checked out. She wanted to get her dad a Tissot watch as well as a replacement strap for her uncle’s Tissot. Very much a Tissot family from her side!
We eventually entered one of the shops and identified a watch which would suit Dana’s dad perfectly. We took a picture to confirm with her dad about strap colors and we agreed with the saleswoman that we’d come back the next day to finalise the deal.
Amazingly the owner of the shop, we came to know from the saleswoman, was dual Swiss-Mauritian - happy coincidence!
With that deal in place, we headed back to the docks where my parents were waiting for us. The heat was intense at that point in the afternoon and we opted to grab some chilled crushed iced fruit drink from a nearby stall called Muller’s Factory.
While we enjoyed the drink, we got offered free ice cream from the saleswoman at the stall.
After finishing our drinks and ice creams, we moved back to the lower part of the dock where we are supposed to embark onto the ship.
We took some additional pictures there and while we were in the midst of the photoshoot, the info desk person came over to let us know that the third (and last) cruise of the day had also been cancelled as the ship crew had not been able to resolve the issues they had with the vessel. Disappointment settled among the group.
Back to the Hotel
Our parents decided to call it a day and we headed back to the hotel which was just a few streets away. We grabbed some dinner from Coop and retired to our hotel rooms.
Impromptu Adventures
Once in our hotel rooms, myself and Dana refreshed ourselves and stared at each other in the face with a single though in our minds: It’s too early to stay inside!
We grabbed our bags yet again and stepped out of VisionApartments. We never travelled by tram since we got in Switzerland and decided to give it a shot so that we got acclimatised to using this mode of transport.
Mauritius only recently got trams as mode of transport and none of us travelled by it yet since we all have cars; hence the novelty 😅
Where to go though? One of the things we had on our list was to visit the United Nations office. We knew it was too late to get inside but at least we could view it from the outside and check out the famous broken chair in front of the building.
So off we set and we grabbed the tram which Google Maps indicated we should take and set off to the UN building.
Once we reached there, we spent roughly fifteen minutes taking pictures before we headed back to Gare Cornavin.
Ending the Night
When we got off at Gare Cornavin, Dana wanted to hit one of the pubs for a couple of beers but all of the pubs were super crowded at that point in the night and we decided to call it a day and grab some local beers from the Coop near us and drink those back in our room.
With that, we settled in our beds after taking a shower and eating our dinner and decided to Netflix and chill and watch the One Piece TV show. We had to sleep early because day 3 was going to be even more packed and hectic!