Sarah & Nick
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Update August 2021 - We wrote a one-year later post! If you want to see how things are holding up, check it out here.

Just a couple months shy of completing our fourth year of home ownership, we embarked on possibly the biggest before and after transformation our house has seen so far - we painted our brick exterior! Since we first laid eyes on this yellow brick ranch back in 2016, painting the exterior white has always been on our to-do list.

I know painting brick can be a hot topic for many, but we're 100% sure it was the right choice for us. Our house was built in 1950, which I would say is on the newer end of homes within Pittsburgh (our last apartment was in a house built in 1890.) We also have to consider the fact that we plan on this being the house we live in forever. We love Pittsburgh, our neighborhood specifically, and our house even more specifically. The decision to paint our brick was the best decision for us and we're sticking to it.


The overall exterior makeover started right after we closed on the house (more on that below), but the painting process started towards the end of April 2020 and was just (mostly) finished last week. The painting was a full-on DIY, and we're going to break down all of the costs for you in case you're planning a big paint job yourself (or if you're just curious.)

So what all did we do? We...
- Removed about 20 overgrown hedges, slowly over the course of four years
- Removed a chain link fence that went around three sides of the house
- Planted grass or mulched all of the new hedge-free patches of dirt
- Pressure washed the entire house
- Painted (by brush) the entire exterior
- Planted new perennials in the front flower beds
- Decorated the porch for cozy evening hangouts

Below are some photos from when we purchased the house back in June 2016. You can see that it was surrounded by hedges and had a chain link fence on both sides and the back of the house. We removed the back fence immediately, as it made getting in and out of the driveway nearly impossible. Over the course of the next three years, we slowly cut down or completely removed a number of hedges - mostly the easy ones that we could do ourselves. There were several hedges that grew to be at least 8-10' tall and had insane root systems that we simply couldn't take care of on our own. It really felt like the house was suffocating beneath them and made it impossible to walk the path alongside the house to the backyard. Once the hedges got to the point of touching our neighbor's house and sending vines up their brick, we knew we needed professional help. We hired our friend Aaron's company, Ashton Landscaping, to remove the remainder of the hedges, fences, and do all of the edging/mulching. Once all of the hedges were gone, it was like the house could finally breathe again.


When it came time to choose our paint, I knew that I wanted to use a Romabio product because it's what John and Sherry of Young House Love had used to paint their brick house in Richmond. I know from following their blog for years that they really do their research, and the way they raved about Romabio really sold me. John and Sherry had their house painted with Romabio's Masonry Paint, however, we used the Romabio Limewash for our home. In all honesty, I would have preferred to use the Masonry Paint, but it simply wasn't available for me to purchase in our area. The Limewash is sold at Home Depot, making it easy to come by, and after reading about it extensively on the Romabio website, I thought it would still work for us.

Here are some quick facts about the Romabio Limewash:
- It is most commonly applied and then lightly washed off to give your home an aged, exposed brick look
- It is made of aged, slaked lime, which is formulated to be durable for decades without much maintenance
- It calcifies to the brick, which makes it super solid and prevents peeling or chipping
- It's a concentrated product, so you dilute it with water, making it as thick or thin as you want
- It can be pressure washed off within five days if you don't like it

While I was able to find a lot of examples of people using the Romabio Limewash for the washed off/exposed brick look, I couldn't find anyone else on the internet that had painted their brick home without any distressing. It made me a little nervous to go full speed ahead on a huge painting endeavor without being sure it would work as we intended, but we did it anyway and spoiler alert - it went pretty well!


Here's what we purchased:
- Pressure washer
- Romabio Limewash in Bianco White (x2)
- Five gallon buckets
- Paint stir drill attachment
- Small paintbrush
- Medium paintbrush
- Romabio masonry brush

You may be wondering, "Why did you buy paintbrushes to do this project when you could have just sprayed the whole thing and saved yourselves hours upon hours of time?" Great question - the truth is that we just didn't want to deal with all of the prep and cleanup of a paint sprayer day after day for the extent of working on this project. Additionally, we knew that with brushing, we could be more precise, not need to prep at all really, and cleanup would be a breeze. I think spraying would have been the way to go if we were going to take time off work and really try to get this project completed within a few days, but after spending 10 days in Switzerland, taking that kind of time off work just wasn't in the cards. In order to prep the house for spraying, we would have needed to use an absurd amount of plastic waste to cover all of the windows, doors, and other things that shouldn't be sprayed, and then have to deal with cleaning the sprayer (which I've heard is a nightmare) and potentially removing/reapplying plastic everyday until the project was complete. With brushing we didn't need to do any prep, and the only cleanup was the few minutes it takes to wash out a paintbrush. Did it take way longer? Yes. Was it a lot more physically demanding? Yes. Do we regret brushing it? No.


Okay, so here we go. Before painting, Nick pressure washed the entire house to get it sparkling clean. We decided to purchase this pressure washer (also a recommendation from Young House Love) and it works great. The cost was comparable to renting a pressure washer, but we'll get to keep this one and continue using it for cleaning in the future. We also filled in any holes in the brick with masonry filler and recaulked the window and door seams to make sure everything looked nice. Next, we mixed our paint so that it was two-parts Limewash concentrate to one-part water. We mixed everything up in 5-gallon buckets from Home Depot and used a paint stirring attachment on our drill to ensure the paint was well mixed. We mixed the paint in small batches so that it didn't dry out, and on days when we didn't use up what was in the bucket, we covered it with a trash bag, pushing the bag down until it was touching the paint so that no air could get in. 

To apply the paint to our house, we used a combination of three different brushes. I purchased the Romabio masonry brush because the reviews for it were so great, but I think we could have done without it and just gotten multiple inexpensive brushes instead. The instructions on the limewash say to make sure that your brick is wet before applying, but after trying the paint on wet brick vs. dry brick, we saw no distinguishable difference. It was a lot easier to just paint the dry brick, so that's what we did for the entire house, other than the porch interior.


While our house is a ranch and looks like one story from the front, it actually sits on a hill, so the back of the house is two full stories and requires an extension ladder to reach the top. Some gracious neighbors allowed us to borrow their 8' ladder and extension ladder so that we could reach the second story and chimney. The entire house has two coats of limewash and all-in-all, it took us about four months to complete, but obviously would have taken way less had we been working on it every day. There were some weekends where we painted for two solid days and other times where weeks went by without any painting. It's pretty demanding work, especially as Pittsburgh temps have pretty steadily been in the 90s most of the summer. I may also have a problem with getting 90% finished with a project and ready to move on to something else, so perhaps that was in play here as well...

After we finished painting the front, we added some perennials from Shadyside Nursery. I wish we had finished everything and taken photos when they were in their prime, but I assure you they looked great earlier in the summer. In the back row we have Baptisia australis, also known as False Indigo, which produces cute blue flowers that our neighborhood deer love to eat. We also have Asclepias tuberosa, or Butterflyweed, which produce orange flowers. They've been serving as good pollinators for our bees, and we're starting to see quite a few caterpillars making their homes on them. We can't wait to see the monarchs soon! In the front row we have Creeping Phlox, which should grow flowers and start to "creep" and serve as ground cover for much of the flower beds. I specifically picked these plants because they're native to our area, per the Audubon Society of Western PA, and we could get them from our local nursery. They're perennials, so they'll come back each year, and I can't wait to see how they look in the years to come.


We also styled out our porch a little bit by adding an old rug that we used to have in the living room of our last apartment. It's an interior rug, but we sprayed it with waterproofing spray to try and extend the life a little bit. We weren't using it in our house and were planning to get rid of it at some point, so if it doesn't hold up long-term, we'll eventually replace it with an outdoor rug. For now, we love the pops of color it brings to the space, especially against the bright white brick. We also kept these black benches and coffee table from Target that we added last summer. They're a great design and hold up well over winter. Our porch light came from a Netflix prop sale - they were used in Mindhunter season 2, in the hotel scenes (which were filmed in the old Century III Mall here in Pittsburgh.) We also added a Letterfolk Tilemat, which I've had my eye on forever. Letterfolk is known for their letterboards, and the tilemat is like a letterboard in that you can change out the tiles to make it say whatever you want. I love it!


We also added a metal planter from CB2 to house my pride and joy, our prickly pear cacti. I've been sharing their growth journey on my Instagram Stories over the past few months and can't get enough of how much they've grown. I've had several people ask me where we got them, but they were actually in our yard when we bought our house. We had one small patch of them that were dug out when the hedges were removed, so we saved them to transfer into a planter. Our neighbors have a huge patch of them in their yard and we've seen other houses in our neighborhood with them as well. They're surprisingly native to our area, which is super cool.

We also replaced our silver doorknob and deadbolt with new matte black options that match the doorknobs we've been using on all of our interior door makeovers. It's a little thing that makes a huge difference, and we love how the black ties into the other accents on the porch. I also learned how to rekey a lock, which was super exciting.

As far as the concrete slab in our backyard, we have big plans to add a small privacy fence around it and turn it into a real patio. Not sure when exactly that will happen, but we're very excited to see what that space can become someday.
 
 
 

So what do we think?

Well, WE LOVE IT. We'll be the first to admit that our paint job isn't perfect, but it looks a MILLION times better than it did previously, and we are so happy with it. I think white just suits our house better, and suits us better. I feel like our house had been in limbo for four years. We painted our front door pink shortly after moving in, and last summer we removed the hedges, added the black benches to our porch, and swapped out the light for something more mid-century modern, but all of those changes just accentuated the fact that the yellow brick didn't match. I think this house is meant to be painted white, and I'm glad we could make it happen.

How is it holding up?

I'll say, so far so good. I've had a few people ask me if we'll have to keep up with it for the rest of our lives and the truth is that I don't know. Our neighbor thinks we might see it crack or chip after going through a winter, but I don't know what he's basing that on. The thing that I think is important to note is that though we're saying we "painted" our house, the product we used isn't paint - it's limewash. It essentially becomes part of the brick, allowing it to breathe. Some masonry paints form somewhat of a seal on top of the brick and are designed to expand and shrink with changes in temperature, but don't actually breathe the way limewash does. I expect the limewash to patina over time, because that's what Romabio says it will do, but I don't know what that looks like on a house with two solid coats, rather than one partially washed off coat, as it's commonly used. We'll definitely keep you posted in years to come, but right now we're not really worried.


How much did we spend?

$538 - Romabio Limewash
$123 - Pressure Washer
$110 - Letterfolk Tilemat
$160 - Perennials
$86 - Planter
$163 - Paintbrushes, caulk, buckets, etc.
$106 - Door knobs and deadbolts
$61 - Garden supplies
$1,347 - TOTAL

We don't remember for sure, but we think we spent about $3,000 on the hedge removal and mulching, which we had done in the prior year. For what we spent this past spring, our expenses were a little over $1,300 and that includes a lot of the extra decor and things. Honestly this is a super small investment for the overall transformation. Even $4,300 is a small investment. We didn't get quotes for how much it would have cost to have a professional paint our house, but I feel certain that the labor alone would have been several thousand dollars (Elsie Larson, for instance, recently shared that paint & labor for her (albeit much larger) Nashville home was $8,500.)


What else is there to do?

Well like I mentioned, we're going to eventually turn the patio into more of an outdoor living space. We will probably also paint the siding above the porch on the front of the house, and replace the screen that covers the attic vent. Our butterflyweed in the front of the house has produced a ton of seed pods, so we might harvest those and plant the seeds in the mulched flowerbeds along the sides of the house this fall. Those are all of the planned updates for now!


I had no idea I could end up writing so much about this transformation, but we're so happy with our little white brick ranch. Here's our sources for everything (if I missed anything you're curious about, please let me know):

Romabio Bianco White Limewash - Home Depot
Romabio Masonry Paintbrush - Home Depot
Medium Paintbrush - Home Depot
Small Paintbrush - Home Depot
5 Gallon Buckets - Home Depot
Paint Stir Drill Attachment - Home Depot
Outdoor Caulk - Home Depot
Mortar Repair Sealant - Home Depot
Pressure Washer - Home Depot
Black Metal Porch Bench - Target (no longer available)
Black Metal Coffee Table - Target
Rug - Urban Outfitters (old, no longer available)
Black Metal Planter - CB2
Porch Light - Thrifted (similar)
Front Door Color (Glidden, Pink Carnation) - Home Depot
Pineapple Door Knocker - Anthropologie (no longer available; similar)
Rekeying Kit - Home Depot
Door Knob - Home Depot
Deadbolt - Home Depot
Doormat - Letterfolk
Landscaping - Ashton Landscaping
Plants - Shadyside Nursery

Shop the post:


Thanks for reading!

Sarah & Nick
x
Matterhorn in Zermatt, Switzerland

If you've been following along on Instagram, you know that last month, Nick and I were in Switzerland! I'm here today to give you the low down on our trip - and you guys asked for details so I am going IN DEPTH.

First, a little background. Nick and I have both wanted to visit Switzerland for a long time. When we were planning our honeymoon, we had considered adding it as a stop on our little Eurotrip, but ultimately decided against it (we went to Amsterdam, Brussels, and Paris - which I never ended up blogging about.) We decided that when we did visit Switzerland someday, we would want to dedicate a whole trip to traveling around the country, rather than just spending a few days in one city.

I booked the trip back in October, honestly, kind of on a whim. I was feeling super wanderlusty, looking at flight prices every day, and just wishing we had a big vacation booked so we had something to look forward to. I had been very confident that our next visit to Europe was going to be a Scandinavian trip (most likely Oslo, Stockholm, and Copenhagen - it's next on my wish list!) but when I saw round trip flights from Baltimore (BWI) to Zürich for $330, it took me like two seconds to decide that we needed to buy them (and like two hours to convince Nick.) Finally, we were booked for 10 days in Switzerland!

When we first booked the trip, we didn't know where in Switzerland exactly we were going to go, but as we researched we found this 10-Day Switzerland Itinerary from The Travel Intern, and kind of mimicked that for our itinerary (eliminating one of their stops to spend more time in Zürich.)

Here's how it all broke down:
Day 0 - Fly out of BWI
Day 1 - Land in Zürich, take a train to Lucerne
Day 2 - Lucerne
Day 3 - Take a train to Interlaken
Day 4 - Interlaken
Day 5 - Take a train to Zermatt
Day 6 - Zermatt
Day 7 - Take the Glacier Express to St. Moritz
Day 8 - Take a train to Zürich
Day 9 - Zürich
Day 10 - Fly home

All in all, we had a full day and two partial days in each city, with the exception of St. Moritz. As you can see, we took a lot of trains to and from cities, and we also took a lot of public transit to go on excursions. Since we were going to be doing so much traveling around, we decided to purchase Swiss Travel Pass, which gives you unlimited travel by train, bus, and boat throughout the country. You also get free admission to museums, and discounted admissions on a lot of mountain excursions. It was pretty expensive, but honestly - everything in Switzerland is expensive! We haven't taken the time the time to figure out if there were any cost savings with Swiss Travel Pass vs. purchasing single tickets for trains, museums, buses, etc., but even if we didn't save any money, we paid for the peace of mind that we were allowed to get on any train at any time and it was no problem.

Speaking of cost, we were also super fortunate to have a lot of airline miles that we could use on this trip to cut down on out-of-pocket costs. We ended up being able to cover both of our roundtrip flights, our hotel in Lucerne, our hotel in Zürich, and half our Airbnb in Zermatt. This was a huge help - we love you Capital One Venture Card. Here is my referral link if you are interested in snagging one yourself.

Before any trip, we always prepare a Google Map with airports, train stations, hotels, Airbnbs, bars, restaurants, shops, etc. We like to do a lot of research before a trip to find places that we'd like to go if the opportunity arises. We of course go to places that aren't on our map too, but this helps keep us organized. It also makes it super easy to find a pin and start directions. Here's our map for this trip:


One last thing before we get into the good stuff! All of the photos in this post were taken on our iPhone 11s. At this point, we're much more skilled at taking and editing photos with our phones than with our DSLR, and we got new phones back in the fall in anticipation of this trip. We have absolutely no regrets about not taking the DSLR with us and love all of our photos (we hope you do too!) Okay, now since Nick is a much better writer than I am, he's going to give you the lowdown on all of the trip details. Take it away, Nick!

Days 1-3 - Lucerne


Kicking off our 10 day journey through Switzerland was the city of Lucerne. Even though we flew into Zürich, we got right off the plane and right onto a train into the next town. Despite buying a ticket for the wrong destination (we hadn't yet activated our Swiss Travel Pass), getting yelled at by the ticketing person, needing to pay more money on the train for a new ticket, my card not working, and the ticketing person saying, "Forget about it, it's okay," it was a pretty easy train ride. We were about to be in the open air for the first time since we had arrived at BWI probably about 20 hours ago.


Lucerne was one of the largest places we visited in Switzerland, yet was still quite small. It was a really easy city to navigate and become familiar with in just a few days. After dropping our bags off at the hotel, it was off to explore and visit a few noteworthy places right out of the gate. First up was the Lion of Lucerne, which Mark Twain described as "the most mournful and moving piece of stone in the world," then a bit of a walk through old town. Old town was really beautiful with brightly colored murals and paintings on a lot of the buildings. It was pretty much all repurposed as a shopping district, but I liked walking the skinny, winding walkways among the buildings.


Chapel Bridge is the oldest wooden covered bridge in the world, so of course, we walked across it, took some photos, enjoyed the river, and said, “We did it.” The riverfront through Lucerne is a nice place to stroll with lots of restaurants and easy bars to stop and enjoy a few drinks. On our first night in town, we did just this, stopping at Rathaus Brauerei and an Irish/English pub a few doors down.


The most hiking we did on probably the whole trip happened that first night in Lucerne as well. We walked the long switchback foot path up to Château Gütsch and caught some incredible views along the way. The top was of course stunning, with a fancy little restaurant where we had a drink and some fries before heading back down the mountain to beat the rain.


The next day would set the tone for the type of things we could anticipate for the remainder of the trip. We took a bus ride out to the town of Kriens to catch the cable cars up to the summit of Mt. Pilatus. This was our first excursion up a mountain on a cable car and it was absolutely exhilarating. As far as elevation goes, it pales in comparison to what we ended up doing later in the trip, but as our first summit, it was truly magical. I think we can let the photos speak for themselves.


After a tiringly long morning up and back down Mt. Pilatus, we spent the remainder of the day exploring more of Lucerne, popping into a few places for a drink, and finally taking some Indian food back to our hotel for our final night.


Days 3-5 - Interlaken


Compared to Lucerne, Interlaken was much more laid back. A significantly smaller town, Interlaken seems to exist pretty much exclusively for tourists. I realize how conceited that sounds and I don't mean to reduce the existence of what is undoubtedly a very old and storied place, but I hope you get what I mean. There were as many souvenir shops as there were private homes, a Hooters, and that's about it. Interlaken's industry is this way because of it's incredible geographic position. Nestled between two giant lakes, Lake Brienze and Lake Thun, this town is right at the foot of the Alps. The proximity to the surrounding mountains makes Interlaken a central hub for all kinds of mountain excursions: cogwheel trains, funiculars, cable cars, paragliding, hiking, boat tours, you name it.


Our time in Interlaken was fairly peaceful. Neither of us are about to jump off the edge of a giant mountain, and some of the other attractions like certain outlook points and train rides were still closed in March, as a lot of things are only seasonally available. One thing we did manage to do was take the funicular and gondolas up the Neiderhorn to see some spectacular views. My favorite part about this particular mountain trip was how clearly the difference between the base of a mountain and its summit was illustrated. At the bottom of the Neiderhorn, right on the banks of the beautiful Lake Thun, it was a crisp, spring like day - blue skies, lush greenery, birds singing, sun shining. At the summit, it was nearly unbearably cold. Every inch of available surfaces frozen with ice. At the lookout observation deck, I was unable to scrape clean the placard to see what it said. I managed to have my phone out of my pocket, and my hands out of my gloves to take photos for about 40 seconds before I couldn't stand it any longer, and had to retreat back to the semi-sheltered comfort of the cable car back down.


Another big draw to Interlaken is its closeness to an incredible little ski resort town, Grindelwald. With our Swiss Travel Pass, we hopped on a train and about 50 minutes later stepped off into our most mountainous landscape yet. Grindelwald is situated among three of the highest peaks of the Alps: The Jungfrau, The Monch, and The Eiger. They are terrifyingly impressive. I had never been so humbled by the overwhelming scale of a landscape like this before. I remember before the trip reading a section on a Swiss travel site advertising the view from the top of a particular mountain: "Marvel at the frozen witchery of the Monch, the Eiger, and the Jungfrau." I still can't get that phrase out of my mind, for 'frozen witchery' is the best descriptor I've yet to come across.


In Grindelwald, we took the cable cars up Mt. First. A more accessible, yet slightly stouter mountain with some incredible views. As non-skiiers, there are limited activities to do on these mountains other than ski. Often times, buying expensive cable car tickets and ascending the mountains in our street clothes, and not bundled up with all our ski equipment made us feel foolish. If you find yourself thinking this: don't. Simply being on these mountains is a chance of a lifetime with views to last you forever. At the top of Mt. First, we walked the Cliff Walk around the edges of the mountain. This sturdy but terrifying bridge suspends you thousands of feet above ground as you make your way around to the main lookout point. This is where I learned of my fear of heights. Not a crippling fear, but a nagging one that turned my legs to jelly as I walked next to the mountain instead of on it.


After some fun bopping around Grindelwald, making fun of the skiiers outfits, and having a few beers, it was back to Interlaken. Our hotel in Interlaken was exactly the kind of comfort we long for on a big vacation. As much as it is fun to see the sights and go on adventures, we also LOVE a good hotel, and some quality hotel time. Interlaken was great for buying wine at the store, heading back to the hotel, and binging some Netflix. I'm never ashamed to watch TV on vacation. It's the epitome of relaxation, and being abroad doesn't change that.


Days 5-7 - Zermatt


I've been struggling to accurately describe Zermatt. It's a small ski town that is perhaps one of the hottest destinations in the whole country. Despite it's small size, it's an incredibly busy place, with electric powered hotel taxis zooming through the streets, and a mess of skiiers and sightseers trying to get up the mountains for the best views of the Matterhorn and (probably) some of the best skiing in the whole world. Zermatt is a car-free town, with the exception of those electric hotel taxis and emergency vehicles. I won't lie, without proper sidewalks (since it's supposed to be a pedestrian-only town) these taxis make navigating around comfortably pretty difficult. They go fast, and don't care about you.


As I mentioned above, the main draw to Zermatt is the impeccable views of the Matterhorn. THE Matterhorn. Easily the most impressive mountain I've ever seen in my life, visiting it in person was a real bucket list moment.


We took the Gornergratbahn cogwheel train up to the summit of The Matterhorn's neighbor mountain, Gornergrat. This was the highest point we experienced in all of Switzerland. At over 10,000 feet, we still gazed an additional 4,000 feet up to take in The Matterhorn. The train ride up to the summit had some of the best scenery of the entire trip. A bird's eye view of Zermatt, vast valleys, sight lines all the way into Italy, and at points, snow deeper than the train itself.


Apart from sightseeing, as non-skiiers, Zermatt was mostly eating and drinking for us. This is our real bread and butter. My favorite part of the day is when we look at each other and say, "Well, do you want to find somewhere to grab a drink?" The best way to explore a new city or country is to get into the local bars and restaurants and have some fun.


After a quick couple of days, it was off to board The Glacier Express, the 8.5 hour scenic train ride to St. Moritz. We were really looking forward to The Glacier Express - the train has panoramic windows and it takes you through the Alps for some amazing views. Unfortunately we think it would have been a more enjoyable journey during the summer - since so much of the landscape was covered in snow, it was just a white abyss for most of the trip without much to see. We also anticipated that the car would be pretty empty, with a lot of room to spread out and move around, but that was also not the case - we shared our section with a couple from New York. Regardless, still a cool experience, but not the one we were expecting!


Day 7 - St. Moritz


After 8.5 hours aboard the Glacier Express, we finally arrived in St. Moritz. I hate to write this, but St. Moritz was not for us. Yes of course, even just being in such a beautiful country as Switzerland, and exploring as much as we did is such a privilege. But unless you're a bajillionaire who is there to ski and buy designer handbags and genuine fur coats, St. Moritz probably isn't the place for you either.


Easily the fanciest, most expensive place I've ever been in my life, St. Moritz was dripping with wealth, and it did not feel good to be there. Our brief couple of walks through town were enough to make us Google the nearest take out pizza place, and high tail it back to the hotel. Luckily, we were only there for one night. We had just taken an 8.5 hour train ride, so going out and exploring wasn't really on the docket. We found that pizza and hunkered down in the hotel for the night, and left first thing in the morning to Zürich.

Days 8-10 - Zürich


After spending eight days on what has easily been our most rural solo vacation, it felt great for us to get back into our comfort zone, a city. Compared to the small ski resort and mountain towns that we had just visited, Zürich was easy and comfortable. The being said, Zürich is frankly a lot like many large American cities, and European cities. We LOVE exploring new places like this, just visiting local places and hanging out. I'm sure there were lots of cultural experiences to be had that we just didn't get to, but let's be honest, if you're in Switzerland, you're there to see the mountains. Zürich isn't necessarily a groundbreaking must-visit destination, however, it did have a few of our favorite things from the trip.


Our favorite meal: Hotel Hiltl. Well, technically, our two favorite meals, seeing as we ate there twice. The world's oldest vegetarian restaurant is in Zürich, and luckily for us, it was just a block away from our hotel. It was a massive buffet of completely vegetarian foods. Load up your plate with whatever you want, as many times as you want, and pay by the weight! What I particularly loved about this restaurant (other than the fact that everything we ate was completely delicious) was that it was a vegetarian restaurant, not a vegan one. That means no meat, but plenty of cheesy dishes, eggs, etc. The baked goods and desserts weren't vegan approximations of favorites, they just were the favorites. If you're in Zürich, you have to go.


Our favorite shopping experience: A random giant thrift store. We tried in all of the places we visited to buy gifts for our friends back home, but nothing felt right. Everywhere was extremely tourist-y (no surprise) and the gifts just felt pretty junky. Instead, we went to a thrift store and bought actual junk! I kid, but you know how it is. The finds at this shop were incredible. It's like being at a thrift store here, walking through the homewares aisles, but EVERYTHING is super cute, Swiss, affordable, and of incredible quality. I highly recommend thrifting gifts next time you're abroad. Unfortunately we each only had a carry-on so we were limited in what we could bring back (still regretting not getting a fondue set.)


Our favorite hotel: CitizenM. This of course is a chain hotel, but you just cannot beat the comforts of a really great hotel. The best shower experience, the best bed and room functionality. The best customer service, everything! We had trouble with our TV and boom: Free beer and wine sent to the room. That's what I'm talking about. Apart from these few stand outs, exploring Zürich was fun and simple. We were nearing the end of our trip, so we were taking it pretty easy. Not a lot of aggressive exploration or big plans. We'd just meander until we found somewhere interesting for a drink, or pop into somewhere for a light meal. This is what vacation is all about.


On the morning we were to leave Zürich and head back to the US, we woke up to about a million texts and phone calls asking if we were going to be able to get back into the states. Panic briefly set in as we read the news that because of the COVID-19 pandemic, there was a travel suspension going into effect Friday at 12AM. Switzerland was among the countries banned from traveling to the US. Though I think we would have been okay getting home as US citizens, we were very lucky that we didn't encounter any roadblocks. We didn't have to move any flights around or emergency change any plans. It just so happened we were getting back into the states on Thursday afternoon, just before travel was to stop. Talk about a relief.


After nearly a full day of travel, we finally arrived back in Pittsburgh safe and sound. Switzerland was the trip of a lifetime and we are so grateful that we got the chance to go. If you have any questions, be sure to leave them in the comments below!

Sarah & Nick
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We're Sarah & Nick. Here we like to talk about renovating our 1950s ranch in Pittsburgh, traveling the world, and the odds and ends in between.

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