The Last Day

The Last Day

I never know whether to count the travel home day of a vacation as part of the vacation or not. We were up at six…… (well, Jamie has to have extra time to worry so she got up at 5:45) for our 9:10 flight to Frankfort to catch a connection to San Francisco.. There is a four-hour layover in Frankfort and almost five hours in San Francisco. I think the airlines have given up on short lay over connection flights. Like everything else they do, they would rather inconvenience the traveler than the airline. Having said that, I am amazed at the sheer mass of people that they move through, and at the number of flights they fly with such an astounding safety record. We also thought that United did a good job, not the “friendly skies anymore but they were efficient and on time. I think the staff just has so many people to take care of that there is no time for personal contact. Jamie said this morning that she wished there were a “fast” flight home so that we could be there by lunch. It occurred to me that the flights home are pretty fast as it is. We’ll be home for a late dinner from half way around the world I think back on what it must have been her grandfather’s trip, hiking out of the mountains in Switzerland, through Italy, catching a sail vessel to America and then getting across country, maybe by train if he was lucky. A late dinner in Chico seems like a pretty good deal.

We had about a ten-kilometer drive into Interlaken from our wonderful lakefront Inn. We got to the Hertz dealership down a narrow lane off the main road and were amazed again at Sweet Sue the magic GPS. I’ve decided to never drive Europe (or maybe anyplace I don’t know) without a GPS. I’d still be roaming around Italy without it. The Car owner, manager, clerk, mechanic driver said that we would have to wait since he had to go to the train station to pick up a client. We made a pitch to combine the schedules and he drove us to the station. I have to say that I revised my opinion of Detroit cars (somewhat). We had a Ford Focus and it was bullet proof for us. I enjoyed the manual transmission, the car worked perfectly every time and it seemed bigger on the inside than it did on the outside. I may have to rethink my prejudice (I hate it when that happens). It wasn’t a Toyota but it was a good car for us for this trip.

They recommended (as usual) that we be there two hours early for our flight. As it worked out we were flying a Lufthansa airplane, operated by United. It was just a guess but we went to the United check in desk…….wrong, We then went looking for the Lufthansa counter…..wrong again. The proper check in was at the Swiss Air counter. Don’t ask, there is no logic that I could understand. Security was fast and easy. I suppose the two hours had more to do with working through the logic maze.

It was a good flight to Frankfurt. We had a sandwich and a German beer at a snack kiosk since there are no sit down restaurants. I was hoping to get to one of those German Oktoberfest type places where the stout barmaid would carry ten steins of beer and everyone would sing nationalistic songs but that will have to wait for another time. Time to board the flight. See you in California.

On The Lake

Car Train Adventure

We are back in the Alps in the small town of Domodossola. We stayed at a regular hotel in a ski town and concluded that it was owned and run by the gypsies. I’ve never seen such a combination of brilliant pinks, oranges, reds, greens and rust colors and plastic flowers everywhere. We did find humor in the decorations. The breakfast was skimpy and probably the worst of the trip. Jamie ordered hot chocolate again and again she got hot chocolate pudding. There are major snow covered mountains in every direction and each way feels so close that you could reach out and touch the tops. To the South and North you can make out the breaks in the mountains that make up the entrance and exit to the valleys. We are going up canyon this morning for what is supposed to be a drive of a lifetime. The guidebook says that you really should do this drive once but that you will not want to do it again. Jamie was nervous about the descriptions of the drive up the hill. At the end of the drive there is a train that takes us and the car over otherwise snowed in passes. We have taken a ferry across a lake on the motorcycle but never a car by train. It should be a good experience

Later

On The Lake

The drive up the canyon was one of the most picturesque ever. Mountain roads, snow covered peaks, sheer cliffs, thousand year old villages, spectacular alpine panoramas, and, did I mention sheer cliffs? A couple of times I had to have Jamie turn away from the window and talk to me until the exciting parts past. The roads were pretty good although very narrow and occasionally required stops while we communicated and negotiated by telepathy with a car coming the other way for appropriate protocol. Jamie was happy to find a second stage of the car train that would take us past the most interesting of the mountain roads so she was happy with the alternative of speeding through a pitch black tunnel sitting in a bouncy car. It was a little like being on Mr. Toads “E” ticket wild ride If I have any young readers, go ask your mother about an “E” ticket. Somewhere in the back of our minds we were wondering if they had the OHSA equivalent, not so much in Switzerland, but certainly for the Italian part. So, after a drive-train-drive-train-drive we were descending out of the Alps on the Swiss side

The geography on the two sides of the mountain are pretty much the same but the sociology is quite different. Switzerland is much more prosperous appearing, with newer, better cars, much more shopping, and, distinctly swiss architecture but also newer better quality buildings. We did stop in a small village for lunch and found that we were much less able to decipher the German menus than we had been for the Italian. The waitress found a food words list in English and German to help us It had about fifty words and their English equivalent, none of which were on the menu. I finally ordered a _______Chiken sandwich. It was one of only three words I recognized on the whole menu. The other two were, “Donald Duck” (we seem to have a Disney theme today). It was a great sandwich with hearty German brown bread and two thick layers of butter between a thick slab of cheese and something that looked suspiciously like Ham. It turned into a happy mistake.

We looked for hotels while we drove. Usually that is more frustration than it is success. The really nice places are not typically on the main roads. We did the GPS finder and tried a couple of places. The first two were a bit too quaint. The third was on the lake just outside of Interlaken and had off season rates of $360 if we took a non-lake view. We were a bit discouraged and decided to drive on in to Interlaken. On the way out of the lakeside drive we saw one last hotel that was so classy and perfectly situated with a lake view that I almost didn’t stop. Turns out it was very reasonable and was the best hotel of the trip. We also had the best dinner of the trip at the recommended restaurant with its orchid draped dinning room built out over the water. This morning, an elegant breakfast with linen and silver made it the perfect last stop of the trip. We are off now to Interlaken to turn in the car. After that we will walk to the train station and railroad our way into Zurich. We have a hotel close to the airport and will be on the westward flight in the morning. See you all soon.

Here are todays pictures

La Morra

Relaxing in Wine Country

We have been hiding out in La Morra, deep in the wine country of North Western Italy. We are staying in an Inn that is not yet open for business for the season but let us stay in the place by ourselves. It is a converted barn although you would never guess its history. The conversion was beautiful and the rooms and common areas are first quality. It’s a little eerie having the whole place to ourselves. Each afternoon I’ve taken a long hike through the countryside in mild drizzles, which felt like exactly what should be happening. Today we spent a good part of the afternoon roaming around the town and seeing the sites. The town is built on the top on a major hill overlooking the wine vineyards in all directions. At least we think it is overlooking the vineyards. The central plaza has a sign with distant landmarks on a bronze plate with a logo that says something about “as far as the eyes can see”. Unfortunately our eyes could only see the thick fog about ten feet beyond the sign.

The roads are very interesting. Most of the towns are built around castles and/or churches and the roads were established at a time when most traffic was by foot or cart and the fastest vehicle traveled in bursts of speed up to six miles an hour. The buildings are built right up to the road so that you could literally get hit by a car on your first step out of your home. As often as not, no more than one car can pass at any given time. There are often blind curves with large mirrors on the outside of the curve to see approaching traffic. I’ve yet to see a right angle. The Italian drivers have developed an odd logic of making up for the challenges with excessive speed. It really does add excitement to life. We don’t have the history that they do but we do have the good fortune of having most of our cities laid out when cars were the standard of the design rather than donkey carts.

Well, the news has reverted to the fashion industry in India so we are going to head off to dinner. Jamie was able to get a “Insalade” that actually included lettuce and no Squid this afternoon so she is encouraged. I don’t know if I’m going to be permanently hooked on pasta or avoid it for months, but it certainly has become a part of my diet for the trip.

Hope everyone is doing well. We are roaming back towards Interlaken to turn in the car Thursday and take a train to the airport in Zurich and home on Friday. It’s amazing how much you miss the people and things in your everyday life. Traveling is fun for the new adventures and is fun for appreciating the things you have at home. See you soon.

Here are some pictures from a couple of days ago.

Here are some pictures from the wine country.

On the Sea

Ditto on the note from yesterday

On the Mountain Top

We had a good nights sleep on our mountain top B & B. The Med is greyer today than it is blue. We had a very nice breakfast with our host. She seemed eager to stay with us and we suspected that she wanted to practice her English. She apologized for not cooking us a proper breakfast but told us that it was illegal for a B & B to cook for their guests but are limited to serving cold meals. She blames the restaurant political influence. It seems like the more things are different, the more they are the same.

It is embarrassing that we speak no other languages. The joke is: “What do you call a mono-linguist?.........an American”. Everyone is proud at how many languages they speak and we seem to be stuck playing charades. I got a huge “Bravo” from the hostess last night at dinner because I could identify and pronounce (badly) ravioli. I was way to hard on the “a” and didn’t roll my “o” nearly long enough, but she was delighted. The bar for American linguists is really low. I hope as a country we take a renewed energy in helping our children to be better.

After breakfast we braved the winding road to get off the mountain and headed for France. It was barely noticeable going across the border with no document check at all. We thought of going to Monaco that is just west along the coast but stopped one bay short since it is apparently quite crowded on the road once you get there. The roads are so narrow and fairly crowded anyway. Once we got into the bay front town we parked the car and walked for most of the afternoon. The beach and the city were beautiful. We eventually turned inland and toured through narrow alleys that had a Saturday market going. Lots of overpriced but interesting things. Some French art but that was mostly cheap looking and not so impressive.

On the way back we stopped at a restaurant and had lunch. We had been told that there was good seafood there. Jamie decided to stay on the safe side and just ordered a salad. I ordered something that was in the pasta category and included “gifts from the sea”. Mine turned out to be a well-populated fettuccini with about six different fish items. Jamie got the big surprise since her salad turned out to be sliced potatoes drenched in butter and ……….sliced squid in a very recognizable form. The good news was that it was a generous portion of Squid. You would have loved to see her face. Even the two old women beside us laughed at the commotion. It turned out that she traded her squid for some of my salmon and prawns and some of the noodles. We are still laughing about our adventure.

There is very little on television except in French or Italian. We did find an English speaking French world news station with a repeating cycle of the same news items about every fifteen minutes. Actually it is more of a fashion channel with a little world news thrown in. They are very concerned about fashions, fashion shows, models, designers, shoes, perfumes and every thing related. They also seem to spend an inordinate amount of time on the American news. They are giving a great deal of attention to the health care fiasco and the conservatives attempts to kill it. It is pretty interesting to watch the foreign news and the different perspectives they have.

No pictures until we have a faster upload.

The Mediterranean Sea

This is a late posting of our entry two days ago. We have been without internet connection for three days. Also, no pictures for now since we are sitting outside of a tourist information site pirating our internet. We'll do better when we can. Huge hugs to everyone.

We are looking over the Mediterranean Sea from a Bed a Breakfast on a mountainside right on the border of Italy and France. From our room we are looking East along the coast of Italy and on the other side of the street for dinner we will be looking out along the coast of France to the West. Our place is about fifty feet short of the end of the road. At the very end is a church overlooking the Mediterranean and next to that is a Restaurante’ where we will have dinner. The drive up the hill was epic, with a cliff on one side most of the time and occasionally on both sides. Jamie says that it was the scariest drive she ever took. I’m not sure how she knows that since she had her hands over her eyes for most of it. The road was one car wide for most of the way with an occasional pull out to allow for on coming traffic.

We knew that we would be early in the year. The vineyards have not bloomed out yet but it was a beautiful drive over to the coast. They have toll roads across country which rally lose a lot of the character but allow you to get there in a much shorter time. We could never have come this far in a day on the back roads but I would much rather be traveling more slowly on the back roads. The cost of the roads is high totaling about thirty dollars to get to the coast. We were told that the roads would be clear of traffic and they were. Now we know why.

It was very exciting to see the Mediterranean when we came over the hill for the first time. The towns and villages are very ………..Mediterranean looking. It is almost exclusively red tile roofs and light beige and pastel colors on the buildings. Almost every square inch of the hills that do not have buildings are covered with grape vines or olive trees. They build on every level of the mountain sides and have a very high incidence of church towers When you are not on the toll roads, the roadways are impossibly narrow and twisty. The cars are mostly small and I think they have to be to fit through some of the roads.

The Italian drivers are in a league all their own. Jamie says that I’m clearly not crazy enough to compete. I actually become a traffic hazard by driving only 20 or 30 Kilometers over the speed limit. I get passed regularly and have found that they speed up to my bumper then ease around as closely as possible without actually leaving my lane entirely. Driving is an adventure. We have renamed the Bitch. She is now “Sweet Susie”. I don’t think I would want to drive in Europe without a GPS. It has been wonderful in otherwise very confusing situations.

Wine Country, Italian Style

Wine Country, Italian Style

Our original plan was to travel east after leaving the Valle Maggia eventually ending up in Slovenia which had been so highly recommended by our friends John and Barbara Boyle. It turns out that there were winter weather issues throughout the Alps which included our intended path of travel. On the way from Interlaken we suffered a two hour backtrack due to a closed pass. The GPS tried to get us to go the long way around but I asserted my superior directional instinct. We finally turned “the Bitch” off (our pet name for the voice in the GPS due to her naggy tone). We climbed up a beautiful valley south of Interlaken passing through quaint Swiss villages with surprisingly light traffic. After about an hour of driving we passed through one village and as we came out the uphill side there was a gate across our side of the road with a lengthy sign in German You would have enjoyed watching us sit there wondering what the $%^&* was going on. Jamie finally found an English speaker in the Inn who brightly advised her that the pass should be open by June 1^st. I know I’m a better person for having gone through my trials and tribulations, but……………..damn, I could have done without that. The Bitch was right.....I hate when that happens. We did however learn what that "closed in winter" symbol on the map was trying to tell us and decided to head for the warmth of the Mediterranean.

Tonight we are in the Piemonte region of North Western Italy. I followed the directions from the Bitch faithfully and she got us to a very remote location flawlessly. It is rolling hills wine country. Our Inn is on a hill way off the beaten path with a view across two directions of vineyard valleys. I took a long walk this afternoon through the vines while Jamie took a nap. We are waiting for the Restaurante’ to open at 7:30. They open early as a concession to guests but generally distain people that don’t wait until ten or eleven to start dinner. It’s pretty interesting when we understand none of the menu and they understand nothing that we are saying. We know it’s our problem being mono-linguistic Americans but it is interesting none the less. So far we’ve had wonderful meals despite our ignorance.

We’ve had very little television on this trip. Jamie is having American Idol withdraw. You haven’t lived until you’ve watched Bay Watch in Italian. It is either that or the 1988 rerun of the world Cup Soccer championship game. I think that was the last time Italy won. We are catching up on our reading and listening. It’s been so long since I’ve actually read a book. I’ve been a good listener on my bike and walks but have no time to sit down and read. I picked up one of the books that Scott finished in Murren and have been enjoying a chance to read again. Another goal for retirement.

The Kids were able to trade a couple of update texts with us today. The are having a great hike. The trek is everything they imagined. Lots of history, wonderful weather and great food. all is well with generation X.

Another exciting adventure is about to take place. The room is equipped with a bidet and I’m determined to take the plunge when the time is right. This trip could make me more sophisticated, more European, although I have trouble visualizing James bond and a bidet. I’m sort of thinking that the worst that could happen is that I’d like it. I'll let you know.

Here are some pictures for the day

Crossing Footprints

Some times in life you are able to close a circle with your past. The challenge is not always finding and closing the circle, but trying to understand, comprehend and appreciate the totality of the experience. Maybe a partial appreciation is all we can hope for after all.

Some time about a hundred and twenty years ago, a nineteen year old Swiss-Italian packed a bag and walked out of the Valle Maggia, high in the mountains of Switzerland close to the Italian boarder where he had grown up in a village that raised cattle and cut granite. Hard times had come to the valley and many of the community had to immigrate or starve. Innocente Giacomazzi made his way by foot, cart, ship and train to the west coast of America and joined his brother in the Salinas Valley of California to start a new life. Today his great granddaughter visited the same valley and crossed his footsteps, touched his rock house, visited his church and, walked through the cemetery that contained their common ancestors. I’m not sure that Innocente took the road less traveled by, but it certainly has made all the difference for his great granddaughter.

We are staying at a Bed and Breakfast run by Alexa, a distant relative to Jamie, actually the ex-wife of a distant cousin . She and her family have been delightful hosts, even opening the B&B early in the season to accommodate our trip. Her son Lorenzo and his American wife Jamie (also) spent the evening and some very nice local wine with us last night and shared so much information about the family and the area. We are taking them to dinner tonight to a local restauranta.

Today we took a drive another twenty K up the valley to see the Foroglio waterfall which is a very nice site but to us, an afterthought compared to the architecture and cultural interests. It’s really hard to describe how stunning the area is for a newcomer. The valley is less than a mile across edged with very steep mountains of pine trees and granite. About every mile or two there is a village built into the hillside. They are really a cluster of perhaps thirty or forty homes, with little or no separation and mostly made out of the granite from the area, stacked in every way imaginable. Even the roofs are thin granite tiles. I’m sure the construction dates vary but each village seems hundreds of years old. Many of the homes have a ground level that is really a barn. This allows protection for the animals and heat for the family above. The house is often built on granite pedestals with one flat rock much larger in diameter than the pillar and flat on the bottom so that the rodents can’t get into the main house or the grain storage area. Many of the stone houses have been updated with electricity and modern windows and doors but the basic houses are straight out of history. In my usual articulate style I must have said “Wow, look at that” a hundred times. I would have loved to tour the interior of some of the homes.

It is pre tourist season so when we walked through the villages we were clearly outsiders. I’ve always teased that you are an outsider in Chico if you have only been there twenty or thirty years but here, you are an outsider if your family has not been here for two or three hundred years. They have added tourists to their economy during the season but the valley still produces primarily cattle and granite. We watched a group of men in a granite quarry hand cutting the slabs with hammer and chisels, sitting on small wooden crates and moving the granite slabs by hand. College never looked so good. What a wonderful skill and heritage that is being preserved. I know that I can’t really communicate all of this with words or even pictures. I wish that all of you could share the experience with us.

Share some of our Pictures.