Welcome to the final round of my European trip adventures: Switzerland! If you missed the Paris installments, check those out first: Paris Sightseeing and Food Recommendations, Running Boot Camp Through Paris, Giverny & Loire Valley, and Paris Running Tour.
When planning my trip to Europe a few months ago, my German friend Melli and I decided to meet up in Lucerne, Switzerland to cap off my trip. With a couple days to spare in between Paris and Lucerne, I knew I couldn’t miss the opportunity to visit my blogger buddy Ashley in Geneva on my way!
I arrived via train late on a Wednesday evening and the next morning Ashley and I were up bright and early to explore Geneva the best way we know how: with a run, of course! Gotta love visiting fellow runners. 🙂 She’s training for the Berlin Marathon right now – cool!
Ashley took me on a nice out and back along the lake. What a beautiful city! We covered 6 miles with lovely views.
We stopped at the turnaround for some bench push ups and dips. 🙂
After our run and some breakfast – avocado, tomato, fried egg toast – one of my absolute faves – we headed out and about to do some more exploring, this time via bike! Here I am with Geneva’s iconic fountain, the Jet d’Eau. It’s over 450 feet tall!
If you’re in Geneva in the summer, be sure to take advantage of the free (yes, free!) bike rentals – available for up to 4 hours at Geneve Roule from May through October. All you have to do is show an ID and leave a 20CHF deposit!
Halfway through our bike ride, we stopped for lunch and a little walking exploration in Old Geneva.
If you’re looking for a healthy lunch in that area, I’d highly recommend Mango Deck.
You pick one of their protein/veggie bowls and then it’s either served cold as a salad or steamed. So good and fresh!
I went for a delicious steamed salmon, fennel, string bean, and slivered almond dish. Yum! Plus some unpictured bread on the side.
Gelato for dessert. 🙂
Another restaurant recommendation is Cottage Café, where we dined that evening – it’s a cute little place in a park by the lake, so it has lovely views. We dined al fresco on some really tasty fresh and seasonally-inspired tapas. Bad photo, good food. As for cocktails, try L’Atelier Cocktail Club – we had some wine, cheese, and bread there before dinner and found the place fun and really friendly, too.
Our after dinner entertainment was the Fete de Geneve – the Geneva Festival! For 25 days each summer (July 17 – August 10), Geneva’s lake front is home to a carnival and music festival. There are fireworks, fair rides, multiple stages, fair rides, food, drinks, and more!
It was HOPPING and we had fun walking around and taking in all the action. Just for fun, we decided to join in and bought tickets for this awesome haunted ride, Spuk!
It was pretty epic, if I do say so myself.
Because you’re never too old for a little haunted ride. Am I right?! 😉
One last Geneva in summer recommendation – be sure to check out Geneve Plage – the Geneva beach! This was basically the most awesome thing ever – it offers a water slide, Olympic size pool, baby pool, five diving boards, and two floating platforms.
Ashley and I totally rode the water slide with the kids. And you know I had to jump off at least one of the platforms! I made it to the middle one (it was 5 meters) – saving the top one for my next visit. 😉
Thank you again, Ashley, for hosting me and showing me around your beautiful city! I’m sufficiently jealous and can’t wait to come back again soon. 🙂
