Sweet Zugersee

12 July 2025

My wife and I were in Zug over the weekend for an engagement party for my wife’s cousin’s daughter (there some kind of in-law, numbering and “removal” in place to describe that relationship to me more succinctly, I think! ).

This was a beautiful, heartwarming, massively cross-cultural affair in a setting overlooking Lake Ägeri. At the pre-event where the families met each other before a larger set of guests arrived, we had people from Turkey, India, Canada, Switzerland, the USA, the United Kingdom, and a couple of American Hutterites/Mennonites who had just taken the train in from Hungary .  This kind of cultural melange is one of the many things I love about my wife’s extended family; being able to more fully immerse myself in these family events is one of the distinct advantages we get from living in London.

As Friday was very focused on preparing for the event, I took a rest day, but then woke up Saturday morning and walked down to the Bad Seeliken on the shores of Lake Zug.  The Canton of Zug has a number of these roped off swimming areas dotted around Lake Zug.  This one had lifeguards, a large wooden sun deck onshore, a cafe (see post-swim ), steps into the water, a floating dock about 10 meters offshore, a diving board and a few buoys to demarcate a swimmers-only area.

I wanted to go much further than the yellow buoys and the lifeguards told me I was pretty much free to swim anywhere.  There wasn’t a lot of boat traffic, but I did know there were two large ferries that plied these waters, so I just set my sights on a point that jutted out from the shore a bit in the distance, tried to stay close-ish to the shore and swam off.  

My plan was to swim out easy for about 30 minutes, turn around and come back.  I went very easy, just enjoying the warm, clear water and the sunshine.  I had to pause a couple of times to adjust my course to avoid a few four-person sculls that were heading in my direction, but otherwise had no other boats on the way down.  About the 30 minute mark, I reached a point where there was another roped off area, which turned out to be Badestelle Tellenörtli.  

On my return route, I thought I was hugging the shoreline more closely, but my route looks to be almost precisely the same.  I picked up the pace moderately for the most of that leg, but then decided to push faster into the “finish” so I could at least exert myself a bit before the feast that I knew was coming that afternoon.

This was a glorious 3,570 meters according to my watch.  I highly recommend this lake for your open water swimming pleasure.