Zurich

After I got back from Australia, I was only in Tripoli a couple of days before it was time to fly to Zurich with Dog for his annual rabies shot – it can be done here, but I, and many expats, are concerned about the validity of the Libyan rabies certificate – specifically, about whether such a record is acceptable to the European authorities. If it isn’t, I can’t prove Dog is rabies-vaccinated, so I can’t get him into Europe anymore, so I can’t get him home (Australian quarantine rule being strict and specifying that any animal coming from Libya must spend six months in a more ‘acceptable’ country first). The original plan was to share the cost of flying a European vet here with his European stamp of approval but that didn’t work out, so off to Switzerland it was.

I was concerned that leash-pulling, dog-and-child-adverse Dog would be shown up by all those well-socialised, well-trained European dogs but as it turns out, not only were they worse-behaved than I expected, but Dog was a near-angel for the whole time (aside from the aggressive barking all the way through the Tripoli airport both going and coming – and for people who are supposedly scared of dogs, an awful of Libyans thought it would be a good idea to tap on his cage and stick their faces close to the bars). He was so well-behaved it was like he was angling for a European holiday every year…

So I had a far better and easier time than I expected. I did make the mistake of thinking two-to-four-hour walks in the morning would tire him out, but a kelpie, even an eight-year-old one, isn’t impressed by that – all I did was train him up into peak physical condition and condemn myself to marathon efforts back here in Tripoli.

Zurich itself is nice enough, though I wouldn’t call it a ‘destination city’ like Paris or Venice; it was overcast the entire time and a lot of the various attractions are closed or not running for winter, but I managed to entertain myself and Dog for our week there with things like:

a visit to the museum (located in this palace of a building, which was only built 100 years ago, and had always been a museum),








a city tour by bus (featuring among other things, a view of the largest clockface in Europe – you can’t really tell, but it’s more than 8m across).




















a ferry trip on Lake Zurich

a train trip up the hill to Uetliberg with a lovely view over Zurich and a hike back down with Dog (dogs being allowed on public transport, and Dog proving himself surprisingly amenable to train and tram travel; I didn’t risk the buses with him); no photo of this, got sick of waiting for Blogspot and my dodgy internet connection to come to some sort of agreement.















and a day trip out to Plaffikon for a walk along the pilgrimage route Camino de Santiago to Rapperswil along the longest bridge in Switzerland (Dog did not come on this trip as I was not sure how long the train trip would be and I sensed his goodwill towards train travel beginning to expire and I still needed to get us back to the airport). This trip to Rapperswil was the closest I got to snow.



Also, given how unexpectedly impressed I was by the clock and watch section of the British Museum, I naturally had to go to the Zurich clock and watch museum (where this creepy little fellow was among the amazingly intricate collection).

Any advice, by the way, on whether a Libyan rabies certificate is acceptable to European authorities would be greatly appreciated – Dog was good, but not so good I want to have to take him off to Europe every year…





We’re off to Austria at the end of this week, not back till March.