Travel

Travel Reports

Zurich

Unless you're into skiing or money laundering, or have a thing about cheese, Switzerland may not be that high up on the list of countries you want to visit.

It certainly wasn't on mine, but when I was invited to go on a swift tour of the country, I felt an unexpected yearning to accept. And I have no regrets. I came away feeling that I'd just been to one of the most charming and beautiful countries on Planet Earth.

Switzerland does have a bit of an image problem. It's seen as ever so slightly boring, a place where nothing's ever happened. People are fond of quoting Harry Lime's line from The Third Man; "In Italy, for 30 years under the Borgias, they had warfare, terror, murder, and bloodshed, but they produced Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci, and the Renaissance. In Switzerland, they had brotherly love, they had 500 years of democracy and peace, and what did that produce? The cuckoo clock!" But, as any good Swiss will happily tell you, the cuckoo clock is actually a German invention. They did come up with three of the greatest inventions of the 20th century, however; Toblerone, LSD and Valium!

But Switzerland isn't boring! It's a fascinating country, perhaps because it's not really a country at all, but a federation of 26 cantons; small, self-governing republics. Its people have been at each other throats in the distant past, but now they all get along pretty well by agreeing not to tread on each other's toes. So, it's now happily quadrilingual, with areas that speak German, French, Italian and Romance. Most people also speak some English, even if it's only "F**k Bush!"
It combines influences from three much bigger neighbours, but is quite unlike any other place on earth; and rather delightfully so. They have a form of direct democracy here, where all major political issues are decided by referendum (and, of course, they're currently tussling over gay marriage), but women only got the vote in 1971. It's also a fiercely neutral country, admirably rejecting membership of both the EU and NATO. But the flipside to this is that Switzerland has one of the most intensive National Service regimes in the world. All men under 32 have to do regular military training, which might be why so many Swiss men have rather pleasing physiques.

The largest city, Zurich, has a population of only 350,000. It's famed for being one of the key financial centres of Europe, so there are lots of swanky shops selling designer stuff, if that's your thing. It was apparently voted the city with the highest quality of life in the world. I've no idea how they work such things out, but its streets are as squeaky clean as Disneyland.

It's also the gay capital of Switzerland. Much of the scene can now be found in the former industrial centre in the west of the city. The area looks a bit grey and East European, but many of the old warehouses and factories are being turned into restaurants, bars and loft apartments and it's all got ever so trendy. The coolest club nights are situated here; Supermarket (Geroldstrasse, 17), Spidergalaxy (opposite Supermarket) and Labyrinth (Pfingstweidstrasse, 70).

I met up with Kurt Aeschbacher, a TV host and arguably the most famous out gay man in Switzerland. He's affable and rather charming. He owns a restaurant, Zuppa Mundial (Giessereistrasse, 18), which serves nothing but soup that's both delicious and healthy. And the handsome waiters are clearly all hand-picked by Kurt. He also owns Labor Bar (Schiffbaustrasse, 3), a kind of social centre by day and club by night, which seemed to be very popular. The most fashionable bar, however, was The Cranberry (Metzgergasse, 3), although the people seemed a bit cold to me. There's also a nicely racy hustler bar, Carrousel (Zahringerstrasse, 33), and, if you want a different kind of fun, you should visit the cabaret bar, Pigalle (Marktgasse, 14). Barfusser (Spitalgasse, 14) boasts that it's "the longest-running gay bar in Europe", but it hasn't stayed stuck in the past; they serve sushi and host a regular Electro night called Electroboy.

I ended up at a place in the old town called T&M (Marktgasse, 14), which, rather brilliantly, looks like the inside of a cuckoo clock. A most unusual place, laid out like a theatre, it's "popular with a younger crowd", as they say in the gay guides. This was the venue that I enjoyed the most, perhaps because it had a huge, fun-packed cruising area upstairs! One word of warning, though; alcoholic drinks are ridiculously expensive. Just one could set you back €8 or €9.

The following day, I was up early for a guided tour of the old town. Wandering round is an absolute hoot; it's like something out of Vulgaria in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang. Like most Swiss cities, you can still see how it was built as a place with natural defences; in this case, where the rivers formed a moat for a fortress. It's best known as 'the still centre of the European wheel' during the First World War. This is where Lenin plotted the Russian revolution: (All together now; "In every city, in every nation, from Lake Geneva to the Finland station"). James Joyce wrote his unreadable big books here, and the Dadaists complained about the war by making rubbish art.

Switzerland has long been a place that exiles have called home, but if you Google the words 'famous' and 'Swiss' you get exhaustive lists of people you've never heard of, apart from William Tell, who didn't really exist. So maybe Harry Lime was on to something. There is a world famous art gallery called the Kunsthaus, but there wasn't time to squeeze in a visit, which is a shame, as I really wanted to get in a taxi and say, "Take me to the Kunsthaus!"

Getting There:
Swiss International Airlines flies to Zurich, Basel and Geneva from London Heathrow, London City, Manchester and Birmingham. 0845 601 0956. www.swiss.com/uk

Accommodation:
For a list of gay-friendly hotels log on to the official Swiss Tourist Board website, www.myswitzerland.com