I’ve been living in Lausanne for roughly 5 months now. I got the opportunity to make a few trips around Europe, and even though I would love the chance to visit all these timeless cities that I have yet to visit, I hope to make a few more short trips locally before I put this year’s journeys to an end.

The budget carriers (infamously EasyJet and RyanAir) are not so cheap in the summer. It is peak travel season and the prices are easily twice that of the off-season. During final exams, I didn’t really plan ahead, so now I’m limited in choices to those nearby that I can access by train.

I also have a Swiss demi-tariff and voie 7 card, allowing me cheap train travels within the country, and I hope to get more than my moneys worth out of it before I leave. (It definitely has paid for itself already.)

I am also limited to weekends as I spend these last few weeks continuing/finishing a semester project that I have been doing in the lab. I won’t bore you with the technical stuff, but I’m doing research on storing solar energy with hydrogen using nanowires. I know there are a lot of places in Switzerland that I have yet to see, so I hope to cover as much as I can. It doesn’t really make sense to see all of Europe right now when I still have barely seen the country in which I am studying. I know I will definitely be back sometime in the future to explore the rest.

And when I am not traveling, I hope to be out on the Lake Geneva sailing. I just bought a student season pass to the nautical sports center, so I hope that I can take full advantage of that too before I leave. I try to go evenings after leaving the lab, but since experiments are rather unpredictable, I often get off late. The Lake is also the perfect place for a walk/run (as I wrote about previously), but also for barbecues with friends and hanging out until the sky is pitch black.

I have to say that Lausanne is much livelier in the summer, and I can’t believe I will have to leave this place so soon. However, many adventures lie in between now and then. (I’m not sure to where yet, but I will keep you all posted.)

Originally posted on halfwayaroundtheworld.studentsgoneglobal.com.