I heard that in the US, a hundred years is a long time, but in Europe, a hundred miles is a long way. My favorite activities (in addition to my fabulous internship at the ILO-IPEC, of course), is to take weekend trips around many small towns and destinations nearby Geneva.
After researching (through google) and listening to my coallegue's story of her parents' honeymoon, we decided to go to Annecy, which is about an hour bus ride or 42 kilometers south of Geneva.
Annecy is definitely a must-go destination. The town website has a load of information of what to do and see, but the stores, hotels and restaurants available in the area seem to be ready for tourists. The bus leaves every morning from Gare Routiere (gare-routiere.ch) and the last bus from Annecy leaves at 7pm.
This is the "old town" of Geneva, in the medieval era that influenced the character of today's Geneva. It's located in the Haute-Savoie, Rhone-Alpes region of France, where the lake and mountain is the center of the town. I forgot to print out a map, but it turned out that we did not need it at all. The town is so small, we walked through it probably twice in a day! But, this is an established tourist destination, so the tourism office will have all the information we need: lac-annecy.com. And of course wikitravel (wikitravel.org) has a page or two of basic information.
There are many things to do such as sailing on the lake, or parasailing, but most people I saw were content and were having a good time, watching people, shopping, strolling, throwing a blanket on the grass. Every June, there is a big International Animation Film festival that take place in this town.
We came on a Saturday, where they have an occasional antique market, but the town's farmers market is on Sunday. We were lucky to see the antique markets and many other souvenir stores selling knick-knacks to furniture. Specialty stores, wine, herb, crazy herb aged-cheese that looks more serious to even to think about how it taste, to some monogramed mugs. The variety of wine came from both Switzerland and France (the Rhone-Alpes region). Since the stores are for tourists, we hit the local grocery stores to get some decent wine with a better price.
I suggest to bring some Euros, in case the exchange rate from Swiss Franc is terrible (which was the case with us), since everything in France is way cheaper than in Geneva (to the half of what everything is cost here).
The day was well spent. We had a good time.
Dyah Kartikawening is a student at University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Department of City and Regional Planning. She is participating in the Human Rights Track of the 2009 Duke Geneva Program in Global Policy and working as an intern with the International Labour Organization - International Programme on the Elimination of Child Labour. She enjoys photography, small things, and a cup of coffee.
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