Sunday in Zurich – under the blanket of fog

Zurich has its pitfalls in winter. A big evil (at least in my opinion) is the constantly prevailing high fog. Of course, there are sunny days, but most of the time the gray sky blanket predominates and the most beautiful city panorama is of no use. The really depressing thing about this fact, however, is that about 500 meters higher up, there is usually the most wonderful sunshine. Sure, you could also travel to the mountains, but on this Sunday we got the best out of gray Zurich.

Coffee under the blanket of fog in Zurich

First, we took a leisurely walk from Escher-Wyss-Platz in district 5 along the Limmat to Bellevue. This works much better in grey weather than in sunshine, as the walk path then becomes too narrow for the crowds relatively quickly. At Bellevue we stopped our walk at Café Felix. A nice travel and food blogger colleague drew my attention to the café with her Twitter tweets and blog entries. If you want to whet your appetite, check out her great blog Flânerie Féminine. By the way, this week starts her new blog post series, where she presents restaurants along Zurich’s most famous streets every week. I’m looking forward to more gourmet tips from her.

Café Felix did not disappoint. I enjoyed a delicious Viennese café mélange with “Schlag” (6.80 CHF) and a Gugelhopf (7.20 CHF). With all the decoration and the ambience it reminds a bit of the famous Parisian coffee houses, although they are a bit more ahead (at least I think). In any case, a great culinary stop before we went on to the Kunsthaus. The best way to reach the Kunsthaus from Zurich’s main train station is by tram no. 3 to the “Kunsthaus” stop. From the Bellevue stop, tram numbers 5/8/9 go in the direction of Kunsthaus.

Visit to the Kunsthaus Zürich

Although I drove past the Kunsthaus almost every day for a while, I actually never saw it from the inside. I was primarily interested in the temporary exhibition “Das Neue Kunsthaus”. On 25 November 2012, the people of Zurich were able to vote on an extension to the Kunsthaus, a competition project won by David Chipperfield Architects. As part of this vote, the Kunsthaus has put together a special exhibition on the new building project (one of Europe’s largest museum projects). By the way, the vote was then accepted, probably also thanks to the public relations work in the context of this special exhibition. I found the temporary exhibition exciting, as there were many models, architectural plans, visualizations but also ideas for the new room layout and art focus to look at.

I was surprised by the large number of collection rooms. I wouldn’t have expected so many paintings, but the Kunsthaus offers works from all eras by the respective well-known artists. Among them, it also has some works by Swiss artists, such as Giacometti, Albert Anker and Franz Gertsch. Personally, I find Franz Gertsch’s pictures extremely impressive, because they are drawn in such an incredibly detailed, almost photorealistic way. By the way, there is a Franz Gertsch Museum in Burgdorf, near Bern, which I would also like to pay a visit.

If you want to stroll through the Kunsthaus with the audio guide, I recommend that you plan enough time, because, as mentioned before, there are many pictures to see. In any case, our afternoon flew by and by the early twilight, the gray weather was forgotten.

This excursion tip doesn’t quite meet your expectations? No problem! In the article linked below you will find further suggestions on what you can do around Zurich: 9 great excursion destinations and short hikes in the vicinity of Zurich