Buchs SG / Schaan / Bregenz–October 6, 2026

I took a train in the morning to Buchs in the canton of St. Gallen in Switzerland. From there, it is a short walk across a bridge into Schaan, Liechtenstein. There were no border crossing stations, no nothing. I never had to show my passport, not even on the train from Austria to Switzerland.

Oval sign with coat of arms and text Fürstentum Liechtenstein. Beneath the sign, a metal plate with Liechtenstein at left and Schweiz at right.

Notice the metal plate below the sign; it shows where the country border is.

Schaan (Liechtenstein)

Blue street sign with Schaan in white letters

Metal sculptured palm trees with silver leaves and rust-colored tree trunks.

Large orange sculpture of a worker in a safety helmet. He is holding a wheelbarrow vertically, as if emptying its contents. Forested mountain in background

View across Rhine river, bridge in midground, mountains in background

Narrow stream in middle; trees at right, mountain in background left

Large brown stone. Atop it, a round stone carving of a face with a toothy grin.

In front of a stonemason’s shop.

Rectangular gray stone. At top, a circle representing the sun. In middle, a bird perched on roof.

Large red-painted wooden shed with ladders and wood leaning up against it.

Large modernist building with array of irregularly spaced dots on the walls.

Here’s a fairly modern building...

Several cows grazing. One is white with black stripes, the other primarily black with a skunk stripe down its back.

...and then this only a few meters further down the road.

Large abstract rust-colored statue of a person

Churched framed by tree at left and upper right. The clock is visible on the church tower.

Steep, forested hill. Near top, a cleared-out meadow

I have to wonder who lives up there and cleared out that area.

Wall painting. A farmer with a scythe is waving to a man and woman in early 1900s style clothing in an automobile

Sculpture of a seated woman. She is in a flowing robe that covers her face.

metal sculpture of bulldog atop a garden furniture store sign

Wall painting of a barefoot man playing a flute. he is seated beneath a tree.

Buchs St. Gallen (Switzerland)

Sign on bridge. Red shield with white cross. Text: Schweiz (Switzerland)

And back across the bridge into Switzerland...

Highway sign, blue with white lettering: Buchs. Mountain in background.

Old black steam locomotive in front of Buchs train station

In front of the train station.

Metal fence with vertical bars. One bar has a glass portion in it.

This is an interesting fence with the glass section.

Closeup of glass section; it has what look like air bubbles in it.

Tree-lined pedestrian shopping street. In background, a mountain with trees about 3/4 up the side.

Church tower. Two sides have a clock with a pink face. Mountain in background.

Back to Bregenz

Some wall paintings on a building across from the train station, plus a public bike repair station.

Wall painting on side of building with a couple of human figures

At left, man with hat and t-shirt with skull on it. In middle, a woman with a robotic head, at right, another woman.

Painted building wall. At left, a woman with flowing hair At right, a man being squeezed in by a window frame and the top of the frame he is in.

Man in blue coat and blue top hat with brim curved down. He has a blue scarf concealing most of his face.

The hotel had a different abstract painting in front of the elevator on each floor

Gray background; squares and letters of multiple colors. Text: VIER 4

Gray background, text FÜNF 5 the Ü is in red

Pfänder

These pictures were taken on the way to, and at the base of Pfänderbahn, a cable car that goes up to a mountain overlooking the lake. I did not take the car, and started on a foot path to the top, but was too tired to go all the way up there.

Pastel colored painting of two people kissing.

Spire of church with brown and black shingles in a geometric pattern

Lifeike wood statues of a man in green sweatshirt and long-haired woman in yellow shirt and blue jeans

View downhill. In foreground, bushes. In midground, homes. In background, the lake

Martinsturm

I did, however, go to St. Martin’s Tower, which provided a pleasant view above the city. The area near the tower had some good photo ops as well.

Stone archway with stag head above the arch; coat of arms to left and right of head. An open portcullis is in the arch.

Carved wooden door. Above it, a religious sculpture.

Trapezoidal wood box decorated with metal buttons that form shape of an eagle and the numbers 1918 above a coat of arms

View of city; church at right, city buildings in midground, lake in background.

Geared mechanism in rectangular open metal frame

Relief sculpture of two coats of arms with a crown above.

Miscellanea

Metal sculpture of an arm holding a bunch of flowers. The sculpture protrudes from the wall of a building.

City block made out of blocks similar to Legos.

Snack stand in shape of a mushroom with a red cap with white dots

This is a snack stand called the „Milchpilz 🇦🇹“ (Milk Mushroom). Why they decorate it to look like a poisonous mushroom is beyond me. I mean, yeah, it looks fun, but...

Signage

öziv Vorarlberg / Interessenvertretung für Menschen mit Behinderugen. The z in öziv is made of two interlinked hands.

Representation for people with disabilities

VMOBIL CENTER: the letters become more widely spaced in VMOBIL and more closely spaced in CENTER.

The letter spacing is intentional; probably to convey the idea of motion.

VMOBIL SBAHN. Letters in VMOBIL become more widely spaced, letters in S BAHN become less widely spaced.

...and the same here

Merging the two Ms in „DEMMEL“ is very clever indeed.

Drawing of woman holding out hands in “stop” gesture. Black text on red background: Bitte nicht so schnell

Please, not so fast (sign near a school)

Sticker at left is a Pac-Man style character. Tet: Achtung! Dein Fahrrad steht hier falsch. To its right, a circular sticker with a picture of a bicycle and a diagonal slash through it.

Attention! Your bicycle is parked in the wrong place here.

Umlauts

Here are some very creative uses of the umlaut as a design element.

Sign with word KÄRCHER. The umlaut is one dot at left and right side of the A rather than atop it.

I rotated this 90° so you could see the position of the umlaut more clearly.

Sign OCHSNER SPORT in red. The O has a black arc of about 20 degrees near the top.

I thought this was a very subtle umlaut, but it turns out that no, it is just a part of the logo.

This one appears to use the negative space on the right side of the U to symbolize the second dot. The architecture and building firm 🇦🇹 did several of the buidings in Schaan.

Sign reading FRÜHAUF with only one dot for the umlaut inside the first U.

A situation where there simply wasn’t enough horizontal space for two dots.