Is it Switzerland or is it Germany?

What a whirlwind few hours. In the space of three hours we have gone from speaking French (badly) to German (exceptionally badly). I need to explain. Switzerland is really a country with split personalities, three to be exact. Those in the west of the country, Geneva for example, speak exclusively French. The buildings look very French and it's basically just like being in France. The north of the country, cities like Basel and Zurich, speak pretty much only German. In fact, getting off the train you could easily think you were in Vienna or Munich; the buildings are distinctly German. Finally, if you visit the south of Switzerland, close to cities such as Milan and Turin, they mostly speak Italian. It appears there is no real Swiss language as such, no Swiss culture, architecture or even cuisine. Talk about an identity crisis.

A typical Basel street, typically German

Our first impressions of Basel are very good. As I said, it's a bit like being back in Vienna, even the trams are carbon copies. It was very busy in the streets when we went for a walk but, surprisingly, all the shops were closing early. We only just found out that tomorrow is a public holiday, so many of the attractions will not be open. It's uncanny the number of times we arrive in a country only to find we are smack bang in the middle of a holiday period. It means that not only are many shops closed, but public transport is full to overflowing (no seats for us oldies). 

The famous Rhine River runs through many European countries

The Rhine

We've really only got one full day (tomorrow) in Basel, so we'll need to be a bit selective about what we do. To be honest, we're not that concerned if we don't do much at all, as we've been on the go for the past eleven days and a bit of a slower day will do us good.

We took a tram a few hours ago, basically just to have sit and relax, and it ended up taking us right out of the city, in fact, right to the German border (which admittedly is only a few kilometres from the city). The countryside was absolutely beautiful, indeed, picture post card stuff. I'm really looking forward to more of the same tomorrow.