Mount Pizol

We are on a mission today, which is to go to Mt. Pizol and try sledging.  Why not skiing? I said, do things one at a time, read as toddler friendly.  It was about 1hr+ journey in total from Zurich to Sargans, Bahnhof by train and short bus ride to Pizolbahn, Wangs. Once there, immediately we realized how under-dress and gear-less we are compared to others. Never mind, we don’t need it as our jeans are insulated with natural heaters, our fats! Hehe…  

 

We head off to the peak and rent the sledges then R said, “Ok, you hop on this one”

I gave R a look and shrieked, “you expect me to do this by myself?!”

A short note yes and he scoot away slowly with Iman. Ok, this look easy besides I just go slow…very slow. The first 300meter was ok and then it turns out that the route was an advance level for a first timer because at one point I almost crash the barrier. There is a sharp turn that I decide to walk, tumble, walk, fall on my butt and walk rather than sledge because if I do, you will see me with broken bones nauzubillah.

I actually wanted to stop and do a U-turn but only to be told it is a long way down. Even Iman seems to enjoy himself and keep saying mummy go! go! go!  After overcoming my nerves, I went ahead and pray to god I’ll survive.  Half way down, I got the hang of it and started to loosen up but still screaming…hehe

Keep telling myself that I can do this and yes I did… unharmed, alhamdullilah. It was scary but undeniably fun and when we finally reached the bottom I was already excited for a second round. Oh yeah, we freeze our butts off up there so we thought of pizza takeout on the way home is a perfect choice to buff up the natural insulator of course!

When in Pizol, I fall down on my butt once, flat of my back twice, hit my knee twice, overthrown from sledge twice but overall experience is priceless. Mission accomplished. Now, I need to tend to my bruises. Tschus… 

Metzingen, Germany - Outlet City

Part 2

The journey to Metzingen was supposed to be a day trip as we are planning to go Mt. Pizol for skiing and sledging on Sunday. We timed our shopping so we can catch the last train out and reach Zurich latest by 9pm but then again at Horb we discovered the connection train got delayed for 20minutes because of an accident. From 20mins it becomes 45minutes and then nearly 3hours! Apparently someone decided to commit suicide by jumping to a moving train…what?! Of all the options, that person could have pick a less dramatic and painful way…So the railways have to be close, to collect the remaining (if any) and to ensure tracks are safe for usage.

By then it is dark and freezing cold so we have to seek refuge at the nearest bar. We are also penniless since we only carry Swiss Franc and forgot to exchange to Euro, we only have loose change to buy us hot chocolate. The whole situation is a chaos as the police keep on saying “don’t know” and the railway operators keep saying trains got delayed and with no tentative time when they will resumes operation. They did provide 3 shuttle buses to go to the next town Doverhohf , with a working station but it is not enough to commute everyone and it seems everyone is being selfish and try to get on despite giving us who are traveling with young kids. 

The taxi wants to charge us EU200 (potong kepala punya style!) but then except neither Francs nor cards. We even plan if the train to Stuttgart resumes operation earlier than our connections, we will spend the nights there since it is big city with more options but everything seems to stand still. So basically, we are stuck in a small town in Germany late at night and penniless! To make it worse, the kids are hungry sleepy and freezing, it is -12 degrees that night and Isya, my sister youngest daughter started having panic attack, feverish and non-stop vomiting. 

Finally the trains resume operation around 11pm but we need to change trains 3 times but in the end we safely reached home around 3pm, alhamdullilah. The next day, we just went to Zurich town instead to the mountain as everyone end up waking up late. Lesson learned; always have EURO currency ready when in EU regions.

Metzingen, Germany - Outlet City

Part 1

We heard about the Outlet City and have wanted to check it out. What is it? It is a designer outlet, a place where you can secure a bargain on designers stuff etc.  Burberry, Prada, Gucci, Salvatore Ferragamo. It is of course an original pieces but mostly past seasons collections and there are a few similar outlets across Europe. Read about our trip to FoxTown Outlet.

Coincidentally my sister and her two daughters are in town for a short holiday so the more is the merrier. Unlike FoxTown, this Outlet City is closed on Sunday (open on Sunday for special occasion only!) so we plan the trip to be on Saturday instead.

It is 4 hours journey by train from Zurich to Metzingen Wurtt with 2 train change, at Horb and Tubingen Hbf (another option is from Zurich to Stuttgart Hbf and then Metzingen Wurtt) or if you want you can drive (its only 2hrs jourbey by car). We decided to catch the first train in the morning, started off good but then we arrived 7 minutes late to Horb and missed our connection train to Tubingen. We have to revise the plan and find another way and finally arrived there around 1pm. 

Peoples say never go shopping with an empty stomach so we decided to go for an Italian lunch, I forgot the restaurant name but it is the same row with McDonalds and next to a bakery shop. We opt for all seafood with pizza, pasta and salad and overall taste is only so-so but enough to “alas perut” and it is quite cheap about EU55 for 4 adults and 2kids. We can’t get that in Zurich…

The shopping begins, the first stop is Bally. It was just a browse through and then we saw almost everyone is carrying Hugo Boss and Coach paper-bags so they must have a good deals going on! True enough, Coach is giving 20% winter sale discount and there are so many designs to choose. The Sales Assistant is eager to serve and my sis bought like 8 handbags with wallets and it is worth every penny since it is way cheaper compare to KL.

Hugo Boss is also another hit since this is their hometown so their outlet is the biggest (read as huge collections). Even 2-storey Prada are filled with amazing stuff, their shoes collections is so gorgeous!! We come across crazy cheap clearance at Fossil outlet where their watch is selling at EU20 only! Mana nak dpt dkt KL weiiiii….even R comes home with shoes, shirts and items from Timberland but nothing for Iman. All in all, we are very happy with our purchases and ready to head home…..and then misadventure happened…

Jet Plane

Once again we are off for another long distance journey, 20hours to be exact but since I am travelling with Iman, the travel bits have already started three days prior to the actual departure date. Refer to my travel preparation here. 

I have always preferred night flight but this time it is morning flight and full house. As i anxiously waited for my turn at the check-ins counter, I was already restless; please don’t charge me with extra baggage and please don’t ask me to leave behind my supplies of canned food. Thankfully I was spot on with the kilos and it wasn’t overweight after all, impressive since I’ve always have issue in going overboard with the baggage allowance..hehe.

So, the peak of travelling with kids is that I always get a good seat with legroom at the dedicated area but the pit is that there will be other kids as well in the row. It’s like you are stuck in daycare with screaming and cranky children and nowhere to go except the lavatory and even then I have to carry Iman with me.  Luckily the guy seating next to me was nice enough to occasionally playing and entertaining Iman. He is flying as a family of four but his wife and older kids sat on the next row and during flight, his wife was having some sort of asthma attack and it was pretty scary as she look like suffocated but later on she seems to be okay. Found out that, the stewardess thought this guy is my husband, erm not….They are surprised that I travelled alone with a toddler in tow. 

It was such a release when we finally arrived in Amsterdam for a downtime before onboarding connection flight to Zurich. Iman was cranky at first, understandable considering how tired and cold it was. It was snowing heavily! He also vomited twice on the plane and once at the airport. When we finally arrived to Zurich, it was such a relief. Yeay! And seeing R face…is priceless.

Day trip to Munich

No planning whatsoever, an impromptu really as we were toying with the idea; “hye, it would be fun if we go to Munich!” since Sunday in Zurich are pretty much dead as the shops are closed except those in bahnhof (main station) or flughafen (airport). Just sharing, working on Sunday is against the law in Swiss… 

The journey via train takes about 4hours+ and the cost is about CHF180+ so better to book early or check latest promotion for better fares.  Btw, it is direct services to Munich main station but the coolest thing is we cross over Swiss, Germany, Austria and then back to Germany (I think because the tracks is criss-crossing between this countries). 

We arrived around 12afternoon and found that the town is celebrating Octoberfest! Everyone is all dress up in tracht and dirndl (cute outfits!) they are also drunks…the sober ones are all heading to one direction which is to the fest to get the free booze. Pictures below is google-ed...

One thing I noticed, they have a lot of sex shops and mini casino like in every corner and the streets is dirty with foul smells (like urine) ewww…  The staffs at the station and info center were quite grumpy probably because they have to work on Sunday instead of partying…hehe. Other than that, the day trip is okay with nothing to shout about and I just managed to shop for some knick knacks. However for R, he is super excited because being a football fanatics we decided to pay homage to the Alliance Stadium (the home ground for Bayern Munich) so I guess the feeling is similar for me being able to shop at La Fayette :))