Zurich - September 2020

I took the early morning train from Milan to Zurich.  It was around a 3 hour journey and while the carriage was quite empty to start with it got quite full (by coronavirus social distancing standards) as we got close to Zurich.  As you would expect we arrived on time in the very clean and tidy Hauptbahnhof.  I stored my bag in the luggage lockers and off I went to explore the city. I picked up a City Map from the Tourist Info office on the station and it had a walking tour on it so I thought that would be a good start.  

Zurich Hauptbahnoff

Outside the station there was an impressive statue to a Mr. Escher.  I thought perhaps M.C. Escher the artist but no, some other Escher who was a Swiss Railway pioneer.  I walked down the main shopping street leading away from the station, Bahnhofstraße, before turning off into the older part of town and going down to the River Limmat.  As I expected everything was quite perfect - no littering, no graffiti, no evidence of homelessness, everything orderly.  Sometimes that is not so interesting. I wandered around the old part of town for a while before finding a nice restaurant for lunch.

River Limmat from Old Town

After lunch I again went out to Bahnhofstraße and walked towards the financial district and the main square, Paradeplatz.  There were some very impressive buildings - old buildings. They obviously also have a great public transport system in Zurich - there were trams everywhere. 

Paradeplatz

Fraumunster Church

I next paid a visit to a church, the Fraumunster Church.  This was a plain and simple church (we were no longer in a Catholic Country) with a nice, though quite unpretentious, interior.  The most remarkable thing about it was the stained glass windows.  These were works of art in themselves being designed by Marc Chagall and by Alberto Giacometti.  What beautiful things for such a simple church.

Chagall Windows in Fraumunster Church

I walked down the side of the Limmat towards Lake Zurich.  There was a nice park alongside the lake and lots of bicyclists and runners were enjoying the early afternoon sunshine.  I had read on the internet about a more edgy and artsy neighborhood called Rote Fabrik and thought I might pay it a visit.  It didn’t look too far but after a while I realized I still had a long way to go, and then to get back and my time was limited.  Fortunately, at that very moment, there appeared before me an electric scooter.  That was the perfect solution so I downloaded the app, created an account and away I went as fast as it would go.  What fun.  

Rote Fabrik

The Rote Fabrik area was not that interesting to be honest.  A few graffiti clad warehouses and that was about it.  Not to worry though as I now had a means of speedy transport and I set off back for the city center again to pick up on my walking tour (now a scooter tour) where I left off before.   

Le Corbusier House

Next stop was the Le Corbusier House.  A wonderfully colored modern building by Le Corbusier that sits in a nice neighborhood adjacent to the lake.  The house doesn’t actually fit in with the beautiful older homes around it but I liked it.

Zurich Opera House

Turning back towards the city again I passed by the rather splendid Opera House and then on up into the more older sections and the Grossmunster Church.  The scooter was quite aware of where I was going and in this older section of town its speed became limited.  You don’t want scooters careening through town in old narrow streets.  At this point I decided to abandon the scooter and to continue on foot.  I went inside the Grossmunster Church which again was quite plain.  It did have wonderful doors however - large bronze doors depicting biblical scenes.  Again there were beautiful stained glass windows by Giacometti.

Grossmunster Church

Door at Grossmunster Church

Giacometti's Windows in Grossmunster Church

I wandered on around the old town on the east side of the Limmat.  There was the Cabaret Votaire where in 1916, in World War I, the Dada art movement was born. It was not open but there was a commemorative plaque on the wall to recognize the event.

Further along there was a plaque recognizing where Lenin lived during World War I.  It is from here that he left by train for St Petersburg to take a leadership role in the Russian Revolution.

My final venture was to visit one of the major art galleries in Zurich - the Kunsthaus.  I walked over to it, only to find that on Mondays it was closed.  So much for that.

Steamer on Lake Zurich

I walked back down to the mouth of the Limmat on Lake Zurich and enquired about boat tours across the lake. There was a boat coming along shortly that would take me a little ways down the lake and then return and go up the Limmat as far as the station. That was perfect so I bought a ticket and boarded the boat for a little jaunt down the lake and then up the river. A nice way to see the city.

The River Limmat through Old Town Zurich

It was now late enough to get a quick dinner before going to catch my train to Berlin.  As I had really enjoyed lunch and hadn’t seen anywhere better I returned to the same restaurant.  Again I was out of luck as the restaurant was closing in 10 minutes at 5:00.  It took a while to find another restaurant and when I did it wasn’t really that good - too much meat, and the place had a cheesy smell - but nevertheless it did sustain me for the rest of the day.

I went back to the station and bought a few supplies for the overnight train and by then it was time to board.  It wasn’t quite the clean and luxurious sleeper that I was expecting but it wasn’t too bad.  I had a compartment to myself for the 12 hour ride to Berlin and I slept very well.

Overnight Train to Berlin

Milan - September 2020

I somehow got sidetracked into a rather circuitous route back to the USA after my stay in England during September.  I had discovered a rather good deal on flights from Berlin to San Francisco.  If I looked for a ticket from London to SF then business class was coming out way too expensive ($3,500) whereas if I looked for Berlin to SF then it was half the price (approx $1,500).  That is a good deal.  I had to return my car to East Midlands Airport and usually you can get cheap flights to Berlin from there, courtesy of RyanAir.  However, that didn’t turn out to be the case on the day my car rental was up.  But for 10 pounds I could go to Milan.  Admittedly to carry my bag was another 35 pounds but that is still a deal.  So I flew out on a Saturday afternoon to Milan. I would then get the train from Milan via Zurich to Berlin - a nice little adventure.

Actually the flight wasn’t to Milan airport but to Bergamo airport (one of those RyanAir cheaper airports that are just a bit further out from their destination).  Not to worry though there was a comfortable coach waiting at the airport for the 45 minute drive into Milan.  I was dropped off at the Central Railway Station, a magnificent building, and I walked the half kilometer over to my hotel -the quite nice and modern and affordable iQ Hotel.

After check in I walked down the street to a lovely little restaurant where I dined outside on the street.  A delicious Margherita Pizza.  I discovered that in Italy they don’t slice your pizza for you they deliver it whole so you have to tackle it yourself with a knife and fork.  Oh the inconvenience.  

Milan Central Station

Next morning, I was up early before breakfast and went to explore around the Central Railway Station.  This is a magnificent structure.  Started before WWI it struggled to be built and was not finished and opened until 1935 in the Mussolini era.  Frank Lloyd Wright apparently said it was the most beautiful station in the world.  It is still the largest by volume in the world.

Central Station Interior

It was back to the hotel for breakfast and then off for a walk around town.  It was a pleasantly warm morning and only a 45 minute walk to the more interesting parts of town - i.e. the Piazza Duomo.  The first interesting thing I discovered was the statue of Leonardo da Vinci in the park outside the La Scala Opera House.  A nice small park, a quite modest statue of Leonardo and the not at all remarkable La Scala.  I discovered that while normal operas were not being performed there was a piano concert that evening - alas it was sold out.

La Scala Opera House

Leonardo Da Vinci Statue

Just past La Scala is the very fine and ornate Galleria Vittorio Emanuele.  This is a most splendid arcade of very high end shops, cafes and restaurants.  Versace, Prada, Louis Vuitton - they are all there.  It was built in the 1870’s and it is truly a wonderful structure even if you can’t afford to buy anything there.  Apparently in the 1990’s McDonalds moved in.  When their lease was up 20 years later the owners would not renew.  Obviously McDonalds customers were not the clientele they were trying to attract. McDonald’s sued but later dropped the case.

Galleria Vittorio Emanuele

Passing through the arcade you come out onto the Piazza del Duomo.  This square is dominated with the exceptionally beautiful and ornate Duomo, the Cathedral of Milan. It is truly a wonder to behold, so many spires, so many statues, so much ornamentation - all in a light white marble - the building just takes your breath away.  Its construction was started back in 1386 but it was not fully completed until the 1960’s.  It is the largest church in Italy, St Peter’s is larger but that is not in Italy, it is in the Vatican, an independent state.

The Duomo

I purchased a ticket to go inside the church and it is almost as spectacular inside.  Being Sunday there was a service going on, but of course that did not stop the flow of tourists around the edge of the church.  You can also visit the roof of the church to get a closer view of all the carvings and ornamentation on the exterior.  I must have taken a hundred photos.  There is so much ornate carving and decoration - no wonder it took nearly 600 years to complete.

Interior of the Duomo

Rooftop exterior of the Duomo

From the rooftop you can see a nice view of Torre Velasca, an interesting looking modern building with a wider top section than its base. Some people like it, some people don't.

Torre Velasca from the Duomo Roof

There is a Duomo Museum next to the church that I visited but that is just more statues and carvings - literally hundreds more of them.  I was getting overloaded with viewing carved stone.

Entrance to Galleria Vittorio Emanuele

The Piazza del Duomo is certainly the highlight of the city.  It has the wonderful Duomo itself, then the entry arch into the Galleria Vittorio Emanuele and then there is a statue of King Victor Emanuele himself seated on his horse and of course decorated with pigeons and their excrement.  There was a man, a blind man I believe, that was playing a Theramin in the square.  I love the sound of that instrument, so spacy and weird, but I had never seen one played before in real life.

The Theramin Player

Castle Sforza

Next stop on my walking tour was the Castle Sforza.  This dates from the 14th century though most if what we see today was from the 15th Century.  Not the most impressive of castles but pleasant enough.  There are several museums on the complex, three of which I visited - one for Michaelangelo’s last attempt at a Pieta, one for old musical instruments, and one for Applied Arts. It was a combination ticket, the Pieta was the draw for me.  Actually the Pieta is not that remarkable - it is unfinished and is quite simple and basic. I do recognize its historical significance though.

Michaelangelo's Pieta

Beyond the Castle Sforza there is a nice park, Sempione Park, leading up towards the Arco della Pace, the Peace Arch.  There was one guy playing electric guitar in the park and he was quite good - Shine on you crazy diamond - Pink Floyd - it made for a most enjoyable walk through the park.

Arco della Pace

I was getting tired now but I though I would make an attempt to see Leonardo’s Last Supper which is hanging in a refectory attached to the Convent of Santa Maria della Gracie.  I found the convent but alas there was no signs of life.  It looked like it was closed on Sundays or closed for coronvirus.

From there I headed over to the nearest subway station and caught the subway back to the Central Station and to my hotel.  Navigating the subway was straightforward - tickets were easy to buy for 2 euros, and the stations and trains were clean and not too crowded.  

A brief cleanup at the hotel followed by a light late lunch/early dinner and then I went off again towards the Duomo to see if I could get a ticket for that night’s La Scala concert.  There were a few people milling around the ticket office and I was told to come back one hour before the concert and see if there were any tickets turned in.  This I did and was fortunately rewarded with a single ticket.  A bit pricy at 95 euros but it’s not every day you get to visit La Scala.

The La Scala Concert

The concert was a piano recital by Mauricio Pollini - a bit of Brahms, a bit of Schoenberg, a bit of Beethoven.  Pollini, a local Milan boy, is 76 and the poor guy looked it.  I felt sorry for him as the audience gave him so many encores and he had to keep hobbling off and then back on to the stage each time.  Of all the pieces I liked the Schoenberg best.

La Scala

Inside La Scala it is quite small.  A small main floor where I was seated and then 6 levels of small boxes around the perimeter.  With the Coronovirus restrictions only around a third of seats were available.  My row had 13 seats with only 5 available for sitting.

After the concert I took the subway back out to the Central Station and to my hotel.  My phone told me I had walked 13 miles that day.  No wonder I was a little tired.  The next morning it was off again with an early start for my 7:10 train to Zurich.

Early Morning Train to Zurich

Crosby Beach - September 2020

After completing my 14 days of quarantine in my mum’s old house I was finally released in early September to visit a few places in the UK.  My first destination was Crosby, on the Irish Sea coast just above Liverpool.   Crosby beach is the location of a sculpture installation by Anthony Gormley, Sir Anthony’s Gormley, called Another Place.  It consists of 100 life size bronze statues of Mr Gormley, naked, all looking out to sea. 

The statues are mounted on the sands, each one a hundred or so yards from the other.  As the tide goes out their bases are exposed but as the tide comes in the statues get submerged, some all the way.  It makes for an interesting site.  Some of the statues further out and subject to more sea water immersion are quite corroded whereas others nearer the shore are more intact.

It was a windy and blustery day but it was an invigorating walk on the beach.  You have to be careful as the sands are very flat and the tide moves in quite quickly.  In the 30 or 40 seconds it took me to take a picture of one statue I found water lapping around my feet and the statue’s base was quickly submerged.

Apparently the statues being relatively fixed in place are being used to monitor sand movement on the beach area.  There were quite a few signs of beach sand being moved around both by tides and by the wind. 

Other than the statues I didn’t see much of note in Crosby.  There was, at one time, supposed to be a lot of debris from the WWII bombing of Liverpool on the beach.  Supposedly bricks and architectural ornaments and the like.  All I saw was a few bricks and rubble in one location.  I think the sand has swept over and covered the rest of the debris.

Liverpool blitz debris perhaps

Yorkshire Sculpture Park - September 2020

On Monday 21 September I paid a visit to the Yorkshire Sculpture Park in West Breton near Wakefield.  I had noticed the signs for this park from the M1 many times but had never paid a visit.  In these times of Coronovirus, it seemed an appropriate place to visit.  Social distancing shouldn’t be a problem in an outdoor park.  Obviously other people felt the same way and there was a little surprising number of cars in the parking lot. The park, however, is over 500 acres in size so there was more than enough space for everyone to be comfortably spaced.

There is a small internal space containing an exhibit by Joana Vasconcelos which I entered first before setting out over the vast estate.  The afternoon involved a lot of walking as the exhibits are quite well spaced.  By the end of the afternoon my iPhone told me I had walked 7.5 miles.

There are so many pieces in the grounds that I could never possibly remember all of them.   The ones that stuck out in my memory were….

Barbara Hepworth’s - Family of Man

Family of Man - Barbara Hepworth

Ai Weiwei - Circle of Animals/Zodiac Heads - this piece was in the Crocker in Sacramento a couple of years ago.

  

Circle of Animals Heads - Ai Weiwei

Ai Weiwei - Iron Tree - a beautiful huge metal sculpture of a tree situated in a small churchyard.

Iron Tree - Ai WeiWei

Sophie Ryder - Sitting - a large sitting woman with a rabbits head formed out of galvanized wire.

Sitting - Sophie Ryder

Andy Goldsworthy - Hanging Trees - three beautiful stone wall sunken enclosures with fallen dead trees appearing to grow out of the walls.  Perhaps my favorite of all the pieces but then I also liked Andy's Outclosure - a circular dry stone wall in a small wood called Round Wood and his Shadow Stone Fold - a beautiful stone walled sheep pen with a square section in the middle with a huge rock in the middle of it.  I doubt there is any finer dry stone walling anywhere. 

Hanging Trees - Andy Goldsworthy

Sean Henry - Seated Figure - a wonderful large statue of a man seated and looking out over the valley below. The location is perfect and the larger than life sculpture is just perfect.

Seated Man - Sean Henry

Damien Hirst - The Virgin Mother - a very large figure of a pregnant woman one side normal, the other side with the skin peeled back to reveal the muscles, intestines and foetus.   

The Virgin Mother - Damien Hirst

The Virgin Mother - Damien Hirst

Damien Hirst - Charity - a large model of a spastic child clutching a teddy bear and a donation box.  On the back side a crowbar and an opened donation box with coins scattered around on the ground.

Charity - Damien Hirst

Henry More - various pieces of his.  Always interesting.

Henry More

Joana Vasconcelos - Pop Rooster - a beautiful large colorful rooster sitting on top of a hill.

Pop Rooster - Joana Vasconcelos