Day 34- Geneva

Day 34- 18 September 2008 Today we started off the day with a nice breakfast at our hotel and then got the very very packed bus to the Palais De Nations, Geneva Office of the UN. There were two double sized buses going to the same place at the same time and still both buses were bulging with people. We had to wait for our tour and Ness got a fancy UN Visitor ID badge with her photo. Our tour was suppose to go for 1 hour but the guy just talked and talked and it ended up going for 1.5 hours. He explained all about the UN and the structure and then we had a look at one of the large conference rooms and the tour ended up at the largest conference room which is where the UN general assembly sit when they sit in Geneva. Although the normal scheduled general assembly sits in New York at the UN headquarters, the general assembly very often sits in Geneva. After our tour and the sending of some post cards in the UN mail system (which provides diplomatic immunity)we checked out the Red Cross Museum which is across the road. This was quite an interesting place and houses the records of all prisoners of war from world war one and many other interesting pieces. From there we headed to the main street Mont Blanc and had a brief lunch before finding the seagulls near Lake Geneva and we got on board a small yellow ferry and headed across the Lake to see the park on the other side. We had a look at the famous Flower clock and then headed to the old town of Geneva whose coblestone streets and old gothic buildings was a nice change from more trendy and 20th century geneva. We also went and had a look at the Cathdrale de St Pierre and beneath it one of the largest archaeological sites in Europe which is the uncovering of over 1000 years beneath the cathedral with many buildings and chapels and baptistry's which were at the site but have been unearthed and now you can walk around. It was very interesting. From there we headed back to the Lake and saw the worlds tallest fountain the Jet Deau and took another ferry to Parl de La Perle du lac which is quite a distance from the main part of geneva on the lake. We then headed back to geneva to our hotel.