Basel Travel
About Basel
Basel is a city that is located in the North of Switzerland, close to the country’s borders with France and Germany. Basel is mostly famous for its arts gallery and its annual art fair, Art Basel, but most infamous for its heritage creature, the basilisk. Wherever you are, you will easily spot one. In Basel, it’s easy to experience the greatest things the Swiss are known for— the chocolate, the cheese, the hospitality, and of course, creative ways to incorporate a basilisk in as many ways possible.
What we did
Sightseeing:
1. The Golden ticket: the Basel Card
Our first impression of Basel, Switzerland was that it was extremely tourist friendly and man, do they know when they’re talking about when they talk about hospitality! First, our entire public transportation was included in our hotel fee. This wasn’t clear until we called our hotel to inform them that we are arriving really late. They said even from the airport to the hotel was covered. We just needed to print out our reservation. But we didn’t even needed this piece of paper. NOBODY checked. Hello, are you tourist? Then welcome! No questions asked.
While we were booking our accommodation, we didn’t know. I think they should start with phrases like, “We got your public transportation and more covered during your stay!” This Basel Card is included in most accommodation throughout the city, and not only covers public transportation fees but also offers different perks, such as 50% off most museum and art gallery entrance fees, free wifi access, free bike rentals, and more. You can read more about this golden ticket over here.
Basel city clearly got their system figured out with the accommodation industry and the tourism board to offer tourists a great experience. It just makes it so easy to see and do stuff, almost like you’re inside a Disneyland theme park, only there’s no fences and no one is in costume.
2. Museums and Art Galleries
We were there for the cheese, chocolate, and THE ART. I mean it’s not like we are deprived of museums and art galleries in our ordinary daily life, but Basel is a famous for this so there was no way we were going to pass it up. Even though it was the low season, there were many exhibitions we were interested in going. We couldn’t go do all of them, but here are the few we managed to make it to:
This place is all about papers. You can learn from how paper is made, from the rag cellars in the era where they did it all by hand, to the machine era where they invented typesetting. This is not a big museum, but you can get easily lost in the mini workshops in between. And you have to fight for the really cool interactive stuff with the millions of children who were just a psyched as we were to try calligraphy, printing, oil transfer, and more. It was quite entertaining.
We were there for the Edward Hopper exhibition, and it was definitely worth going to. The museum had incredible light and was surrounded by this big field of green. It was the wrong time to be there. It would have been nice to go during the summer, but even so it was a restful place to be. We were able to see some of the Edward Hopper’s less known landscapes, and it was just the right size that we felt like we really saw something, but we weren’t totally burned out by the end of the exhibit. This exhibition will not be a permanent one; it’s likely you won’t be able to catch it, but here is a video that will be able to give you a glimpse of it.
This one was very underwhelming. First this place was not easy to get to and it was too obscure to understand. You got to be into design—and I mean really into the decorative arts AND furniture design—to enjoy this one. We weren’t able to really see what Vitra campus had to offer (including structures by famous architects like Frank Gehry, Tadao Ando, and Zaha Hadid) but after seeing decades and decades of chairs, I was done. It was cold and and too obscure for me to take the time to figure it out. It was weird and we gave up getting to know the weirdo.
The eating:
Swiss Chocolate, Swiss Cheese, and Swiss pastries!
Is chocolate really better in Switzerland?? I think it’s universally good in Europe. But the Swiss chocolate we tried was especially great. We think it’s the quality of the dairy. It’s just so fresh that the chocolates are also great. To be honest, I cannot believe we didn’t eat more chocolate while we were there!!! What a missed opportunity.
It’s not that our current place of residence, Berlin, doesn’t have pastries. German pastries are good too, but it’s not quite what we like. We like the buttery French style croissants and baguettes. Swiss pastries? They’re kind of in the middle. We like them much better than the German style pastries. Creamy and delicious! Going to a pastry shop in the morning was such a treat. Also, it’s worth mentioning that most shops do not open on Sundays, so plan your meals ahead of time.
oThe Swiss are also very proud of their cheeses, and perhaps the most famous Swiss delicacy is the cheese dish fondue. It was our first time eating fondue. The fondue was okay, but the raclette… now that was very good. We can see a pattern here: good dairy in Switzerland! I bet their milk tastes like angel tears. We were lucky to taste so many types of cheese from different regiosn of Switzerland at the festival, but even without a cheese festival to attend, simply going to a supermarket and tasting cheeses should be sufficient!
How we got around in Basel
Basel’s airport is a little confusing. It’s technical name is the Euroairport Basel-Mulhouse-Freiburg, and it’s got three international codes: BSL, EAP, and MLH. All of them are technically the same airport, but because it borders on three countries—France, Germany, and Switzerland—it’s actually a tri-national. It’s easy to and from the airport to the city center via bus, but likely more direct via taxi, ride share, or private car.
Once you’re in town, if the weather is warm enough, biking is definitely an option, although lots of the walking we did through old town was up and down hills, stairs, and narrow passageways that would have made biking inconvenient. Instead we feel the best way to get around in Basel is the trams and buses. As mentioned above, all rides were included in our Basel Card. We had no trouble getting around old town, or going from old town to some of the museums a bit further out, but there were not a lot of options going from museum to museum (e.g., from the Foundation Beyeler to the Vitra Museum) without having to go back through the city center. It’s best to plan your route ahead of time to avoid going back and forth over the same bridges too often.
Where we stayed
We also recommend you book a hotel instead of an Airbnb or other accommodations. You will be granted Basel Card with your booking and all the perks that entails, and you’ll also get the chance to experience Swiss hospitality, which is in and of itself a tourist attraction. Unlike some other regions of Europe, there are a number of smaller hotels that aren’t chains and offer full service, but cost the same as the Airbnb listings do, and are usually better located closer to the city center.
There’s also a number of friendly-looking inns and bed and breakfasts in town. They feel very homey and comfortable, but the good ones always seems to go fast both on and off Airbnb, so book quick!
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