“You never grow bored of Lake Geneva, it looks different every day,” is a phrase that was said to me more than once during my visit to the attraction.
I was in the canton of Vaud, on the Swiss side of the body of water overlooked by the Alps, for five nights, and it was more than enough time to be charmed. Every day of my stay, the lake had an entirely different feel. On a brisk but sunny day, light bounced off the water and I was almost tempted to take a dip — although my years being spoiled by the warm seas of Dubai put a stop to that; I am nowhere near Wim Hof enough any more. On an overcast day, it had the atmospheric feel of a Caspar David Friedrich painting; and on a windy day, there were crowds of sailing boats out, darting across the waves.
It did not take me long to understand why Mary Shelley, Lord Bryon and more Bohemians were drawn to the area in the 19th century. Or why some of the greatest stars of the 20th century chose to call it home — Freddie Mercury, Charlie Chaplin and Audrey Hepburn all resided on the lake. Even today, the likes of Shania Twain, the Schumachers and Sophia Loren all call Vaud home.
Navigating Vaud
Like most major European cities, you essentially have two options when it comes to making your way out of Geneva Airport: public transport or taxis. It is no secret that Switzerland isn’t the cheapest of destinations, so public transport is a more wallet-friendly way to start a Swiss stay. It could not be easier to navigate your way out of the international airport and on to the national rail system, thanks to the station inside the airport, a short walk from arrivals. From the UAE, both Etihad Airways and Emirates fly direct to Geneva.
My first stop was the city of Lausanne; a CHF29 ($31) and the 45-minute journey took us to the heart of the hilly city.
There is clearly a drive to get tourists travelling by public transport within Vaud. In Lausanne, Montreux and Vevey, with the booking of any hotel or holiday rental that pays tourist tax, visitors receive complimentary city transport tickets.
Indulging in chocolate and cheese
Switzerland’s most famous exports are well documented: watches, utility knives, cheese and chocolate. My budget doesn’t extend to a Rolex and I am already the proud owner of a Swiss Army knife, so for this trip, my focus was on the indulgent Cs: cheese and chocolate.
This was my first trip to the country, and before I went, I was told by friends that “chocolate just tastes different there”. They aren’t wrong. A visit to the Durig chocolate boutique in the heart of Lausanne had me won over and weighed down with 500-gram blocks of 80 per cent cocoa heaven.
For a cheese fix, a visit to the Lausanne farmers market on Wednesdays and Saturdays is a must. In Rippon Square in La Cite, I enjoyed a cheese stall crawl of sorts, hopping from pop-up stand to pop-up stand, sampling locally-made Gruyere, raclette and tomme cheeses, and trying to resist buying it by the wheel.
Another sure-fire way to get a cheese fix is fondue. As the evenings get colder and darker, this is a popular Swiss meal and pastime. We had a reservation at Pinte Besson. Founded in 1780, it is one of the oldest fondue restaurants in Lausanne, where hours were lost eating charcuterie meats and cheeses, and dipping bread and potatoes into the indulgent pot of melted cheeses.
Another C of note to watch out for in the Canton De Vaud is chasselas, the grape grown in Lavaux. Even if you’re not a wine drinker, a trip on the Lavaux Express tourist train through the steep vineyards is a stunning day out, enjoying the view of endless rows of vines while overlooking the lake.
Checking into the Royal Savoy
In Lausanne, I stayed at the Royal Savoy, a charming inner-city hotel that has been newly renovated. From the outside, you feel like you’re stepping into a grand manor house, and inside it’s a slick and modern hotel with a boutique feel.
The rooms are not enormous but are cosy and beautifully decorated, with a spacious bathroom. The majority of standard rooms come with a walk-in shower and no balcony. When it comes to vistas, they are split between those with a city and lake view.
Catering to global travellers, the television in the room had English, Arabic, German and French options.
On the ground floor is La Brasserie du Royal, a modern restaurant where we enjoyed a stunning meal on the first night of our stay. But the hotel’s crown jewel is SkyLounge, a rooftop spot that boasts panoramic views of Lake Geneva. A sunset reservation is essential when you’re in Lausanne, whether you’re staying at the Royal Savoy or not. Watching the sky shifting through shades of orange, purple, red and navy blue was the perfect way to end a day exploring a new city.
Exploring Lausanne
The metro will take you pretty much anywhere in Lausanne. For a day of culture, get on at Delices, which is opposite the Royal Savoy, and get off at Bessieres to see the sights and sounds of the older parts of the city at the top of the hill.
Lausanne has the feel of a charming town, while proudly standing as the fourth biggest city in Switzerland. When you get off the metro in Bessieres, cross Pont Bessieres, which was built in 1910 and is the highest bridge in the city. You’ll arrive at the cathedral, which is striking and atmospheric; the 13th-century stained glass window is a stunningly preserved feature.
Make your way down the market stairs to Place de la Palud on the hour, where a musical clock chimes hourly, telling the story of the Canton De Vaud through song.
Lose a day on Lake Geneva
Lake Geneva is at the heart of life in the canton. In warmer months, an hour or so on a pedalo is a great way for tourists to proverbially and literally dip their toe into the lake, without committing to a sailing boat.
For a grander experience, book a lunchtime cruise on one of the Belle Epoque steamboats. Leaving from Lausanne, we travelled to the far end of the lake, seeing the vineyards of Lavaux, the towns of Vevey and Montreux, and the famed Chillon Castle, all while dining on a three-course lunch which consisted largely of locally sourced seafood.
We ended the cruise in Vevey, the next stop on our Lake Geneva journey, but could have taken it back to Lausanne for a round day trip.
The winding alleyways of Vevey and musical Montreux
Vevey is a thriving town, set directly on the lake. Give yourself half a day to get lost in its winding streets, browsing the many antique shops and stopping for the odd coffee or chocolate, hot or cold.
In the warmer months, the Montreux Riviera is perfect for a dip in the lake, with cordoned-off swimming areas and ladders into the water. For those who want to stay dry, along the Vevey shore are decked areas where you can sit and enjoy a drink, and chairs built into the rocks, to sit and fish from, or just admire the view.
A reservation at Ze Fork is a must. The lakeside restaurant is named after the fork-shaped sculpture in the lake, the Fork of Vevey, created by Swiss artist Jean-Pierre Zaugg in 1995 to honour the Alimentarium food museum's 10th anniversary. The restaurant serves modern Swiss cuisine and was rated by more than one local as their favourite in the area.
Nearby is Montreux, a town steeped in musical history, thanks to the famed Montreux Jazz Festival. The likes of Nina Simone, Miles Davis, Ella Fitzgerald, Prince, Leonard Cohen and David Bowie have all played at the festival. In 1971, the town was the site of a fire, which was immortalised in song by Deep Purple, which penned Smoke on the Water about the incident. In 2021, a pared back version of the festival was held in predominantly outdoor venues, but it is hoped it will be back in full force in 2022.
Freddie Mercury is a famous former resident of the town. It was in Queen’s legendary Mountain Studios that he recorded his final vocals before his death in 1991 and his time in the town is honoured with a giant statue that looks out over the lake.
Visit the Queen Studio Experience for a mini-museum dedicated to the band, which has famous costumes and handwritten lyrics exhibited, and a plaque to mark the spot where Mercury stood during his last recording session.
At home with Charlie Chaplin
For fans of cinema, a visit to Chaplin’s World is a must. Famed silent film star Charlie Chaplin spent his later years living near Lake Geneva, after his US residency was revoked in 1952.
Until his death in 1977, he lived with his family in a stunning manor house, set in a spacious plot of land overlooking Lake Geneva. It has since been converted into a museum that meticulously details the English actor’s life and career.
Split into two sections, the house tracks the actor’s life and a second building details his career. The main residential building is still set up like a family home, which tells Chaplin’s story through a series of informative digital attractions and immersive room displays as you move from the study to the living room, dining room, bathroom and bedroom.
The Studio is a newer building. Experiences begin in a large cinema, and you are then able to walk through life-size silent film set recreations in a Hollywood-style studio.
Tickets for Chaplin’s World cost 27 Swiss francs.
Covid-19 in Switzerland
At the time of writing, masks are mandatory on public transport, but they are not required when outside. As of February 17, they are no longer required in shops and supermarkets.
Per the new rules, travellers can enter Switzerland without any Covid‑19 requirements, such as pre‑departure testing, vaccination or the need to complete passenger locator forms.
To return to the UAE, a PCR test still needs to be taken within 72 hours of your flight. Tests can be booked and taken in pharmacies and cost around 125 Swiss francs.
HOW DO SIM CARD SCAMS WORK?
Sim swap frauds are a form of identity theft.
They involve criminals conning mobile phone operators into issuing them with replacement Sim cards, often by claiming their phone has been lost or stolen
They use the victim's personal details - obtained through criminal methods - to convince such companies of their identity.
The criminal can then access any online service that requires security codes to be sent to a user's mobile phone, such as banking services.
How Tesla’s price correction has hit fund managers
Investing in disruptive technology can be a bumpy ride, as investors in Tesla were reminded on Friday, when its stock dropped 7.5 per cent in early trading to $575.
It recovered slightly but still ended the week 15 per cent lower and is down a third from its all-time high of $883 on January 26. The electric car maker’s market cap fell from $834 billion to about $567bn in that time, a drop of an astonishing $267bn, and a blow for those who bought Tesla stock late.
The collapse also hit fund managers that have gone big on Tesla, notably the UK-based Scottish Mortgage Investment Trust and Cathie Wood’s ARK Innovation ETF.
Tesla is the top holding in both funds, making up a hefty 10 per cent of total assets under management. Both funds have fallen by a quarter in the past month.
Matt Weller, global head of market research at GAIN Capital, recently warned that Tesla founder Elon Musk had “flown a bit too close to the sun”, after getting carried away by investing $1.5bn of the company’s money in Bitcoin.
He also predicted Tesla’s sales could struggle as traditional auto manufacturers ramp up electric car production, destroying its first mover advantage.
AJ Bell’s Russ Mould warns that many investors buy tech stocks when earnings forecasts are rising, almost regardless of valuation. “When it works, it really works. But when it goes wrong, elevated valuations leave little or no downside protection.”
A Tesla correction was probably baked in after last year’s astonishing share price surge, and many investors will see this as an opportunity to load up at a reduced price.
Dramatic swings are to be expected when investing in disruptive technology, as Ms Wood at ARK makes clear.
Every week, she sends subscribers a commentary listing “stocks in our strategies that have appreciated or dropped more than 15 per cent in a day” during the week.
Her latest commentary, issued on Friday, showed seven stocks displaying extreme volatility, led by ExOne, a leader in binder jetting 3D printing technology. It jumped 24 per cent, boosted by news that fellow 3D printing specialist Stratasys had beaten fourth-quarter revenues and earnings expectations, seen as good news for the sector.
By contrast, computational drug and material discovery company Schrödinger fell 27 per cent after quarterly and full-year results showed its core software sales and drug development pipeline slowing.
Despite that setback, Ms Wood remains positive, arguing that its “medicinal chemistry platform offers a powerful and unique view into chemical space”.
In her weekly video view, she remains bullish, stating that: “We are on the right side of change, and disruptive innovation is going to deliver exponential growth trajectories for many of our companies, in fact, most of them.”
Ms Wood remains committed to Tesla as she expects global electric car sales to compound at an average annual rate of 82 per cent for the next five years.
She said these are so “enormous that some people find them unbelievable”, and argues that this scepticism, especially among institutional investors, “festers” and creates a great opportunity for ARK.
Only you can decide whether you are a believer or a festering sceptic. If it’s the former, then buckle up.
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Mercer, the investment consulting arm of US services company Marsh & McLennan, expects its wealth division to at least double its assets under management (AUM) in the Middle East as wealth in the region continues to grow despite economic headwinds, a company official said.
Mercer Wealth, which globally has $160 billion in AUM, plans to boost its AUM in the region to $2-$3bn in the next 2-3 years from the present $1bn, said Yasir AbuShaban, a Dubai-based principal with Mercer Wealth.
“Within the next two to three years, we are looking at reaching $2 to $3 billion as a conservative estimate and we do see an opportunity to do so,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Mercer does not directly make investments, but allocates clients’ money they have discretion to, to professional asset managers. They also provide advice to clients.
“We have buying power. We can negotiate on their (client’s) behalf with asset managers to provide them lower fees than they otherwise would have to get on their own,” he added.
Mercer Wealth’s clients include sovereign wealth funds, family offices, and insurance companies among others.
From its office in Dubai, Mercer also looks after Africa, India and Turkey, where they also see opportunity for growth.
Wealth creation in Middle East and Africa (MEA) grew 8.5 per cent to $8.1 trillion last year from $7.5tn in 2015, higher than last year’s global average of 6 per cent and the second-highest growth in a region after Asia-Pacific which grew 9.9 per cent, according to consultancy Boston Consulting Group (BCG). In the region, where wealth grew just 1.9 per cent in 2015 compared with 2014, a pickup in oil prices has helped in wealth generation.
BCG is forecasting MEA wealth will rise to $12tn by 2021, growing at an annual average of 8 per cent.
Drivers of wealth generation in the region will be split evenly between new wealth creation and growth of performance of existing assets, according to BCG.
Another general trend in the region is clients’ looking for a comprehensive approach to investing, according to Mr AbuShaban.
“Institutional investors or some of the families are seeing a slowdown in the available capital they have to invest and in that sense they are looking at optimizing the way they manage their portfolios and making sure they are not investing haphazardly and different parts of their investment are working together,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Some clients also have a higher appetite for risk, given the low interest-rate environment that does not provide enough yield for some institutional investors. These clients are keen to invest in illiquid assets, such as private equity and infrastructure.
“What we have seen is a desire for higher returns in what has been a low-return environment specifically in various fixed income or bonds,” he said.
“In this environment, we have seen a de facto increase in the risk that clients are taking in things like illiquid investments, private equity investments, infrastructure and private debt, those kind of investments were higher illiquidity results in incrementally higher returns.”
The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, one of the largest sovereign wealth funds, said in its 2016 report that has gradually increased its exposure in direct private equity and private credit transactions, mainly in Asian markets and especially in China and India. The authority’s private equity department focused on structured equities owing to “their defensive characteristics.”
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What is blockchain?
Blockchain is a form of distributed ledger technology, a digital system in which data is recorded across multiple places at the same time. Unlike traditional databases, DLTs have no central administrator or centralised data storage. They are transparent because the data is visible and, because they are automatically replicated and impossible to be tampered with, they are secure.
The main difference between blockchain and other forms of DLT is the way data is stored as ‘blocks’ – new transactions are added to the existing ‘chain’ of past transactions, hence the name ‘blockchain’. It is impossible to delete or modify information on the chain due to the replication of blocks across various locations.
Blockchain is mostly associated with cryptocurrency Bitcoin. Due to the inability to tamper with transactions, advocates say this makes the currency more secure and safer than traditional systems. It is maintained by a network of people referred to as ‘miners’, who receive rewards for solving complex mathematical equations that enable transactions to go through.
However, one of the major problems that has come to light has been the presence of illicit material buried in the Bitcoin blockchain, linking it to the dark web.
Other blockchain platforms can offer things like smart contracts, which are automatically implemented when specific conditions from all interested parties are reached, cutting the time involved and the risk of mistakes. Another use could be storing medical records, as patients can be confident their information cannot be changed. The technology can also be used in supply chains, voting and has the potential to used for storing property records.
Brief scores:
Barcelona 3
Pique 38', Messi 51 (pen), Suarez 82'
Rayo Vallecano 1
De Tomas Gomez 24'
Other acts on the Jazz Garden bill
Sharrie Williams
The American singer is hugely respected in blues circles due to her passionate vocals and songwriting. Born and raised in Michigan, Williams began recording and touring as a teenage gospel singer. Her career took off with the blues band The Wiseguys. Such was the acclaim of their live shows that they toured throughout Europe and in Africa. As a solo artist, Williams has also collaborated with the likes of the late Dizzy Gillespie, Van Morrison and Mavis Staples.
Lin Rountree
An accomplished smooth jazz artist who blends his chilled approach with R‘n’B. Trained at the Duke Ellington School of the Arts in Washington, DC, Rountree formed his own band in 2004. He has also recorded with the likes of Kem, Dwele and Conya Doss. He comes to Dubai on the back of his new single Pass The Groove, from his forthcoming 2018 album Stronger Still, which may follow his five previous solo albums in cracking the top 10 of the US jazz charts.
Anita Williams
Dubai-based singer Anita Williams will open the night with a set of covers and swing, jazz and blues standards that made her an in-demand singer across the emirate. The Irish singer has been performing in Dubai since 2008 at venues such as MusicHall and Voda Bar. Her Jazz Garden appearance is career highlight as she will use the event to perform the original song Big Blue Eyes, the single from her debut solo album, due for release soon.
Our legal columnist
Name: Yousef Al Bahar
Advocate at Al Bahar & Associate Advocates and Legal Consultants, established in 1994
Education: Mr Al Bahar was born in 1979 and graduated in 2008 from the Judicial Institute. He took after his father, who was one of the first Emirati lawyers
Electric scooters: some rules to remember
- Riders must be 14-years-old or over
- Wear a protective helmet
- Park the electric scooter in designated parking lots (if any)
- Do not leave electric scooter in locations that obstruct traffic or pedestrians
- Solo riders only, no passengers allowed
- Do not drive outside designated lanes
