Geneva Attractions

The Jet d'Eau is a large fountain in Geneva, Switzerland, and is one of the city's most famous landmarks. It is also one of the largest fountains in the world. Situated at the point where Lake Geneva empties into the Rhone River, it is visible throughout the city and from the air, even when flying over Geneva at an altitude of 10 km (33,000 ft). Five hundred litres (132 gallons) of water per second are jetted to an altitude of 140 metres (459 feet) by two 500 kW pumps, operating at 2,400 V, consuming over one megawatt of electricity. The water leaves the nozzle at a speed of 200 km/h (124 mph). When it is in operation, at any given moment there are about 7,000 litres (1849 gallons) of water in the air. Unsuspecting visitors to the fountain—which can be reached via a stone jetty from the left bank of the lake—may be s...

The Olympic Museum in Lausanne (easily accessible from the tourist hubs of Geneva to the SW and Bern to the NE), houses permanent and temporary exhibits relating to sport and the Olympic movement. With more than 10,000 pieces, the museum is the largest archive of Olympic Games in the world and one of Lausanne's prime tourist draws attracting more than 250,000 visitors each year. The Olympic Museum is surrounded by a park containing numerous works of art on a sporting theme. Among the most notable works of art in the museum's permanent collection are the French sculptors Auguste Rodin's The American Athlete and Niki de Saint Phalle's Les Footballeurs, the Luxembourgish sculptor Lucien Wercollier's tribute to the pole vault Altius, the Colombian sculptor Fernando Botero's Jeune Fille a la Balle and a kinetic art sculpture by the Swiss sculptor Jean Tinguely which combines a hockey st...

The St. Pierre Cathedral is a cathedral in Geneva, Switzerland, today belonging to the Swiss Reformed Church. It was begun under Arducius de Faucigny, the prince-bishop of the Diocese of Geneva, in the 12th century, and includes an eclectic mix of styles. It is best known as the adopted home church of John Calvin, one of the leaders of the Protestant Reformation. Inside the church is a wooden chair used by Calvin. The area beneath the Cathedral has recently been excavated extensively, revealing a rich history of the site dating back to the time of the Roman Empire. From the 8th to 10th centuries it was one of three cathedrals to coexist on the site. The present building has grown from a cathedral devoted to ecclesiastical use and an early Christian funerary cult; the other two structures, subsumed in the 12th century by the growth of the surviving building, were apparently for diff...