2010 Trip: Konstanz Day 6

1st June 2010

Today, I got moving pretty swiftly as I had a lot of ground to cover. I caught the train (with several changes) to St. Gallen, east of Konstanz, in Switzerland. St. Gallen is a classic northern Swiss city (well, somewhere between a town and a city). You can walk down certain streets and feel that you are in a cliché - chocolate shops and banks abound.

I spotted a Migros - one of the large supermarket chains in Switzerland. Oh my god! The selection of cheese is purely amazing! My main goal in St. Gallen was to visit the library there. This is not just any old library - it was once part of a monastery in the area and features a collection of some of the oldest texts in existence. It has illustrated manuscripts and early compendiums of plant illustrations. It also has one of the oldest plans of a monastery - detailing the layout of the buildings, animal pens, and fields. However, what struck me most was a giant globe (actually a replica of the original which is now in Zurich), with rather accurate maps of the world including the newly discovered Americas.

From here, I caught another train to Buchs on the border with Liechtenstein. I then caught a bus over the border into this tiny country. Its very green, with small towns, surrounded my towering mountains, sheaved in forest and then wrapped in low hanging clouds and fog. It is very picturesque.

My main destination was the capital, Vaduz, with a massive population of 5,000. While not the greatest of attractions in Liechtenstein, it is possibly the most interesting. This is a place that tries really hard to be a capital city. They have municpal buildings, churches, and the national art gallery. They have strange “we are really cultured - enough to be a snobby capital” horse sculptures and enough banks to shake a fist at. But they fail. The entire place feels like a village that is trying too hard.

I wandered around the town, getting my passport stamped for a nominal fee at the very flash tourist information centre and eating a couple of very nice pastries. The country makes about 30% of its revenue from banking related activities due to sufficiently lax tax laws. The state is at pains to point out that the majority of income is from tourists and manufacturing businesses. But the wealth of the place is palatable and banks, especially different branches of the Liechtensteinische Landesbank, including such things as buildings specialifically for Hedge Funds, Trusts, and other financial insundry.

I wandered up the hill behind the town to the edge of the prince’s castle. A very pretty walk through beautiful forest, past little streams, and being past occasionally by overtly expensive Audis.

The political system here is very interesting, it advertises itself as a democratic monarchy. The prince, who is very popular here, maintains the right to veto and all parliamentary decisions go through him. It seems to work pretty well as a system of government, at least for a nation of this size.

From here, I grabbed several trains to get me back to Konstanz. That evening, my last here, we grabbed dinner and had a relaxed and early evening.