Today, so as to make use of one of the three CFF day passes which I had purchased thinking we could entice the parents to come with us on some excursions in Switzerland by 8 May; however, as this proved not to be the case, we decided to spend the afternoon in Zurich so as to make use of one of the rail passes.

Flowers of magnolia tree, Gablerstrasse, Rietberg Museum, Zurich, 4 May 2013

Although I had not been in Zurich at this time of the year for 5 years now, I managed to find my way to the Rietberg Museum of non-European Art almost without any hiccups.

Magnolia tree, Gablerstrasse, Rietberg Museum, Zurich, 4 May 2013

My wife was almost spellbound by this large magnolia tree off Gablerstrasse. She took a lot of pictures.

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She enjoyed the flowers so much along Gablerstrasse that she literally took dozens of pictures. We then paid a visit to the adjacent park, Rieterpark, to enjoy the the view.

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Unfortunately, there was a blot on this beautiful panorama [click to enlarge]: the construction crane. This was not surprising as it is part of the Goldküste, a highly sought residential area whose meaning I think you can easily guess.

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Just boarding the tram to take us the other bank so as to visit the botanical gardens, my wife spotted these nice flowers growing on a tree. Unfortunately, we had to change trams at Central and ended boarding the correct tram but the one heading in the wrong direction. As my wife does not know Zurich well, we decided to stay on board just so as to enjoy the scenery. I think my wife likes Zurich better than Lausanne, which would not be surprising as the architecture is much nicer and place is much cleaner.

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Because of that we got to the University botanical gardens too late and decided to stop at Bürkliplatz to enjoy the view from the ZSG jetty [click to enlarge].

Panoramic shot of Lake Zurich from Bürkliplatz ZSG jetty, 4 May 2013

This panorama and the one below [click to enlarge]

Panoramic shot of Lake Zurich from Bürkliplatz ZSG jetty, 4 May 2013

… should look pretty much similar except that one was stitched using a series of shots by the camera itself, the other by some software.

Left bank as seen from ZSG jetty at Bürkliplatz, Zurich , 4 May 2013

Left bank of Zurich [click to enlarge] as seen from the ZSG jetty at Bürkliplatz. We enjoyed our afternoon in Zurich, even though to and fro we spent some 5 hours in train carriages (but it was on the double-decker intercity trains, so it was sufficiently comfortable). We have still not decided where we shall be going to today (Sunday), in a couple of hours …

My wife’s entry (on her blog) on the same excursion

Links to other spring excursions