Geneva Part 2, where we were constantly stared at

We wandered around the lake for a while. Apparently it was the place to be. There were so many people around the lake.

 It's quite the enormous lake..

People strolling along the promenade. It doesn't actually look like there are a lot of people. But there were. Especially later when we walked by again.

Adrienne looking lovely and wind blown

 Allison also looking lovely and windblown.

 There we are!

 And of course, there were several birds in the water.

 Here are our shadows, artistically photographed.

 A nice bird.

 Another bird

A dog that was adorably prancing in the water.

Blue Steel!

We stumbled upon adorable baby birds. They were so small!

They were so small!

 Just cutely swimming along.

I love birds. Especially baby birds.

It was easy to forget we were on a lake and not the ocean. The lack of ocean smell tipped me off though.

While wandering the lake, the girls noticed that people in Geneva seemed to stare creepily a lot at us. I say the girls noticed this because I was completely oblivious.

I'm guessing I was oblivious because I live in Korea and am constantly being stared at or worse. Apparently, I've grown accustomed to the staring.

We referred to the starers from then on as "Starey Mc-Stare Stare."

To the right is Adrienne looking ridiculous.
I also discovered in Geneva that I can still read and understand French, even though it's been more than 7 years since my last French lesson. I was not able to say anything. If i tried, it tended to come out in German or Korean. Or a mix of German and Korean since I was practicing German in my head in preparation  for Vienna. Hopefully some day I can get my French skills up to par. I love France and learning French.

 I love this picture.

 The Swiss flag.

 We walked around a bit more.

We saw this giant clock which is actually a functioning clock.

 We walked through a park with this statue.

 Adrienne creeping in the statue.

We made a very brief stop at Allison and Anna's hostel. It was enough time for Adrienne and Anna to fall asleep on the bed.

Only 4 could go in the elevator up to their room, so I ended up alone in a elevator with a father and his son, who was about 4 years old. I was looking through my pictures when the boy said to me in French, "Can I see your photos?" When I showed him, he said "Ooohhhh." It was so adorable.

I guess I did have one more picture of the Cathedral. It's still really far away, unfortunately.

 We walked through the old city again.

And headed over to a park with the Reformation Wall. It's located on the University of Geneva campus, which John Calvin founded.




The Reformation Wall is built into the old city walls.

It's the International Monument to the Reformation. It depicts the main people and events of the Protestant Reformation.

Geneva was the center of  Calvinism, so it mostly depicts Calvinists. Obviously, John Calvin is one of the statues. There's also John Knox, William the Silent and Oliver Cromwell, among others.

Here we are!

Adrienne looking morose, as usual.

Here Adrienne and Anna are jumping off the wall. They're so irreverent.

BRAS


I'm so mature.

There were some people doing yoga near the wall.

The wall from afar.

We headed to the other end of the park, where we found several giant chess and checkers sets.

They were pretty awesome.

As you can see, there were also small chess and checkers sets as well.

So cool.

Adrienne!

Continuing to be morose.

We continued wandering around.

Looking at the trams.

Adrienne and Anna imitating the eagles.

The museums near the university were in beautiful buildings.

A random church. I don't know what church it was.

We headed back to the lake to walk around some more.

A pretty little clock tower.

Manpower!

Maison de la Couture! The family name!

For those that don't know, my grandmother's maiden name is Couture. She is French, clearly.

This was a beautiful monument.

There's a proud lion.

The lake was beautiful at sunset.

The staring continued and there were more people.

We headed back to the hotel early, so we wouldn't miss our train to Annecy, France in the morning. Adrienne and I thought we knew a shortcut to the hostel, but as usual, we did not and ended up walking around in circles for a while, before finally making it back. At this point of the trip, my feet hurt a lot and I was not happy about getting lost. I did not whine, but felt like I should whine. Luckily, once we made it to Budapest, we had a day of rest where we could recover from being over-walked for so long. Not that I'm complaining, I loved that we were seeing so much in so little time!

We headed to Annecy the next morning, which was probably my 2nd favorite new location on our trip. The first being Granada. But that will be in the next blog.