After last weekend’s trek up Uetliberg, I decided to find a hike for this weekend that was a little more on the easy side (for me). Some Googling told me that we should bike down to Küsnacht and hike on some of the trails around Tobelweg. It’s about a 9 km bike ride down the Goldküste (the Gold Coast) of the Zürichsee. On the way down, we stopped at the lake to take some photos. It happened to be the exact location where we would walk to for swimming when we stayed at an Airbnb a few summers ago. Since we were so close, we also went to take pics of the Airbnb. This house was designed by an artist as one of her art installations. It’s a really unique property, and the photo does not do it justice at all. It has these large multi-colored triangle flaps that you can move up and down according to the weather to let in light and air. There’s also a really cool floating boardwalk all the way around it that totally reminds. me of Mr. Miyagi’s house in Karate Kid. It looks like it’s been rented out permanently (no more Airbnb), and the landscaping was a little overgrown. But it was neat to see it again.

Once we got to Küsnacht, we rode around the town until we found the trailhead. I snapped a few pictures, and then we found a restaurant to get some lunch.

This trail follows the Küsnachter Dorfbach, which is a spring that runs into the Zurichsee at Küsnacht. It’s a big gorge that is heavily forested. At some point, there are a bunch of other hiking trails that branch off and go different places, I think Tobelweg is the main trail. I would describe it as more of a hilly area than an actual mountain. There are several waterfalls along the trails, and we got photos of the first few that we saw. We came upon the giant boulder, which was called Alexanderstein (Alexander rock). The sign was of course in German, but I think it’s named for a geologist named Alexander something-I-don’t-remember (so many great facts!). Google translate told us that there are some species of special moss that grow on the boulder, so don’t climb on it. Oh, and I think the boulder is from the Alps somehow. I promise, I’m going to start German class soon so I can read the signs and know stuff.

Cass loves to go up hills (and I HATE it), so we had to climb the wooden stairs of course. It looked like just a little bit of stairs up, but then it kept going and kept going and kept going. Some parts had a safety rail, and some parts didn’t. It has rained a lot lately, so a lot of it was slippery as well. When we got. to the top, there was a sign for Ruine Wulp. That sounded interesting, so off we went in that direction. It was uphill some more (OF COURSE). Google told us that Ruine Wulp is the ruins of Wulp Castle which was built during the high Middle Ages (sometime around the 11th century I think). It is said to have been destroyed in 1267, so that lines up I guess. When we got up there, there was a couple and 2 young boys and they were having a campfire/BBQ/picnic. The kids were climbing all over everything.

We walked around for a bit. It was interesting because what’s left of both the buildings and the walls were just stacked stones/boulders. The sign indicates that there have been several archaeological digs at the site over the years.

After we were done at the castle, we went back down the way we came. Cass took the photo of the trees because we don’t. have tall trees like that in Texas. And of course, the stairs of death on the way down. We biked back home (9km!) and relaxed for the rest of the weekend.

I think it’s really cool. that we can go see stuff like this, and we haven’t even really left Zürich yet. Once we get moved into our apartment in a few days, we’ll start thinking about taking a train ride to elsewhere in Switzerland to see something new. Hopefully it won’t be long before we are free to move about the continent.