Switzerland!

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I enjoyed staying at Malpensa Garden Bed and Breakfast and the owners were super nice. They actually, with the two guests who arrived last night, helped me figure out what I needed to know when I got into the city this am which made life a bit easier…who am I kidding, a LOT easier. Bruno even had me put the google maps street view up so he could tell me which direction to leave the metro. Phew! I ended up getting up an hour later than I would have had to otherwise. The other two guests last night were a couple of guys who spoke some English. I could understand some of what they were saying in Italian, but that only gets one so far so I was glad to have some English conversation.

Ok so this morning arose at a little after 5:30am, got ready quickly and was out of the door by 6:07. I booked it to the bus station as I had planned to leave at 6 and didn’t think I had time to wait for the next shuttle. I arrived just in time and the shuttle over was only about 5mins and thankfully dumped me right at the train station ticket counter which actually had NO queue. YAY! …and the guy spoke English. DOUBLE YAY! The platform was easy to find but I didn’t realize (wasn’t a big deal) that I was supposed to stamp my ticket…and I still have no idea where it is. The guy on the train told me not to forget next time. Ok, sure, buddy. Not sure there will be a next time. The train arrived down in Milan just after 7am and I had to be at the meeting point at 7:30—just enough time to walk there, grab a water in a café and meet up with my fellow tourists (was kind of nice being with other tourists for the day since I had one more day solo).

We took a bus up to Tirano, Italy, which has a Church where(?) visions of Mary occurred and apparently the Black Plague stopped after one such vision. On the way up we passed Lago Como which is the vacation spot of celebrities such as George Clooney and Madonna. Tirano was a nice little town in the mountains, just on Italy’s side of the Italy-Switzerland border. I stopped in a little store and found a postcard with a picture of the town. I also stopped in a pizzeria and had a piece with prosciutto and funghi. Interrupting myself to say that everyone speaks to me in Italian. Not sure if they assume I can speak it or if they think I look Italian. I mean, I am…half…but I’m pretty sure I don’t look it! I’m amused but sometimes I just sheepishly ask…English?...I don’t always understand! I understood the pizza guy though! We also had a couple on our trip who spoke Spanish. Oh the little things that excite me.
From that point, we took the train—the Bernina Express—through the Alps. I can now say I’ve seen real mountains. Well, I suppose I saw the Sierra Nevada in Spain, but those were in the distance. We traveled up through Brusio, which I think was the point where the train corkscrewed up an aqueduct. I was expecting something more grand, but it’s ok, it was still cool. Just smaller than I expected! We passed Lago di Poschiavo, and Cavaglia before we twisted around Alp Grum and saw our first glacier—Piz Palu. We continued up to Ospizio Bernina where we could see glacier #2, Piz Bernina (4048m). Lago Bianco and Lej Nair (black & white) were alongside us at that point. Ospizio Bernina, was the highest point of our route (2253m) and is the highest-altitude station on the rail. My flyer says that it also marks the linguistic boundary between Italian Puschlav and Engadin where Rhaeto-Romanic (Romansh) and German are spoken. I wrote a paper on Romansh so I find that part cool. We continued up past Morteratsch and Pontresina and finally arrived at St. Moritz. Unfortunately, due the the nature of a trip such as this, there is not ample time allotted for St. Moritz and I think it took us a bit longer to arrive there so we only ended up having an hour to scope the place out. I flew around and found a couple of stores, an amazing dessert and a couple of St. Moritz views. I would describe St. Moritz as this…Lake Placid is a baby version with baby mountains. I definitely would love to return there again someday. On the way back, we traveled a different route and passed through the Malojapass, which I think is the one that is famous for HEIDI! Yay! Childhood come to life. :P Not going to lie. That was cool. Very cool. What really perplexes me is how people can live in these houses on the sides of mountains with no way to get up and down—I’d love to be a fly on the wall for a day. It’s a completely different lifestyle and I can hardly grasp the concept in such a connected world. Really cool. I couldn’t stay awake all the way back but that’s ok, I saw the most important parts and experienced the 8000 hairpin turns on the bus leaving the highest peaks…there were literally maybe 8 or more in a row. Interesting scaling a mountain by bus.

So after we got back, they had to drop us off at a slightly different location since there were streets blocked off for a gay pride gathering. Was interesting though I didn’t want any more excitement traveling solo! I found the metro and made it on, changed lines and actually found my destination only to find out that we actually had to switch hostels and I had to amble along the streets of Milan just before 9pm looking for the one I’m actually at right now. I found it. FINALLY. I’m so over traveling alone in countries where I don’t speak the language and know no one! Actually not all that impressed by Milan in general but maybe tomorrow will change my view. We’re going to go see the D'Uomo—third largest Cathedral (I think it's third, to the one in Sevilla and the one at the Vatican), the castle and possibly da Vinci’s Last Supper painting. Going to call it a night EARLY and then get up super early to get out of here and move on to Venice!

Speaking of turning in, my compadres are in bed so I’m going to end this…and I can’t send it til I pay for internet tomorrow…one full day is better than a few hours!

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