In 1858 a local man named Jakob Messikommer began digging in the peat bog at Robenhausen, on the southern end of the Pfäffikersee in the Zurich Oberland, and he spent decades uncovering a remarkably rich Neolithic pile-dwelling settlement. His finds, from stone axes to woven textiles and charred bread, travelled to museums around the world and helped make Swiss lake dwellings famous. Today Robenhausen is one of the components of the UNESCO Prehistoric Pile Dwellings around the Alps, though what remains lies underground in a protected wetland.
The Robenhauser Ried is a nature reserve of reed beds, wet meadows and peat, and it is a refuge for birds, frogs and dragonflies. Footpaths and boardwalks lead through it, and in early summer the meadows are bright with orchids and irises. The Pfäffikersee itself is a small, clean lake popular for swimming, with a quiet shoreline that feels remote even though Zurich is only half an hour away.
On a bike, the Zurich Oberland is a pleasant surprise. Lanes climb from Wetzikon and Pfäffikon onto rolling hills toward the Bachtel and the Hörnli, with farm roads that twist through woods and open onto views of the Alps on clear days. Traffic around Wetzikon can be heavy, and Swiss speed limits are enforced rigorously, but once you leave the main roads the riding becomes quiet and rhythmic, the kind of hill country where you are always going up, down or around something.
Wetzikon, a town of over twelve thousand people right next door, has fuel, supermarkets and cafés, so there is no need to plan ahead. The Oberland was an early industrial region, and old spinning mills along the streams are reminders of a time when water power drove the local textile trade. Take a swim in summer if the weather is kind, walk a stretch of the reserve, and imagine this lake shore five thousand years ago, with smoke rising from houses on stilts and canoes drawn up on the mud.