Geneva 日内瓦 — Journey of Our Dreams (追梦)

May 30，2022

We got up early again in the morning and walked to see Montreux's old town up the hill before breakfast. The old town was small and peaceful. But it doesn't have the glamor like other old towns in Switzerland have. The historical museum was part of the preserved old house. Up the hill, we overlooked the train station and the lake. Then we came down to have breakfast near the train station. We found this wonderful bakery across from the train station, the only one that opened in the early morning. We had coffee and pastries there. Everything was so good, and we knew we would come back later. We returned to the promenade after breakfast while waiting for our friends to get ready. We walked along the lakeshores towards the nearby town, Clarens. We just couldn't get enough of the beautiful view of the lake.

Today we had another day trip. We went to Geneva by train, the best well-known city in Switzerland. Chenggang went on his way to visit the European Organization for Nuclear Research, known as CERN. CERN has the world's largest and most complex scientific instruments for fundamental physics study. The latest discovery is the Higgs boson, a god particle described in the news. It is also a place where the WEB was invented. The CERN offers the public a guided tour of the oldest particle accelerator every hour. But you have to get the tickets at the visitor center in person. After getting off the train, Chenggang went on a separate way to catch a bus to CERN. The bus ride was about 45 mins. When he got there, there was a line for the tickets. Each hour, the tour had 21 tickets. Unfortunately, he got a ticket three hours away. There was not too much to do near CERN. He decided to get back to the city by another 45 mins bus ride and had lunch in the beautiful outdoor courtyard at Kiosque des Bastions in Parc des Bastions. The salad was good, and the atmosphere was even better. After re-energized, he returned to the CERN by a 45 mins bus ride. By the bus schedule, he would arrive a few minutes before 3 pm when the tour started. But it never worked that way. The bus was delayed, and the tour was about to begin when he arrived. He went inside the visitor center to get the pass badge; initially, the staff refused to give it out. He went outside to talk to the tour guide and back to the center to tell the staff that the tour hadn't started yet. Finally, the staff handed him the pass, and what a relief that he didn't waste time riding buses back and forth for approximately 3 hours. The tour was informative, and the first generator was huge to us, imagining how big the latest accelerator would be.

When Chenggang was riding buses between CERN and Parc des Bastions, three ladies went to see the Broken Chair, the giant chair with a broken leg that stands across the street from the United Nations building and the world's tallest water fountain on Lake Geneva. They took a lake ferry in the afternoon from Geneva to Yvoire, a beautiful small medieval village located on the French shore of Lake Geneva. They had a brief time there, enough to have ice cream and coffee and then headed back to Geneva.

After visiting CERN, Chenggang went to see the broken chair as well and strolled along the lake shore. He even took a ferry to the other side of the lake, and the Swiss Travel Pass covered all ferry rides. Four of us were united near Parc La Grange and wandered through the park. After dinner, we went to Parc des Bastions to see the Reformation Wall. At dawn, in front of the wall, was a dance class and some kind of pot-luck going on. One day's trip to Geneva was hectic, and we were tired. We got on the train back to Montreux, and everybody took a short nap.