Day 4 - Lugano to Basel - May 13

Today we leave the beautiful city of Lugano. I doubt I'll ever be back and am so very thankful to have had a chance to revisit and relive some of my most fondest memories. When I left Lugano in 1987 I had with me this poster - Lugano city of my heart. 

I certainly didn't know then just how much Lugano and the experience at TASIS had imprinted on me. And could never have known that for the rest of my life a little bit of my heart lives in Lugano and TASIS. I often look back with amazement at just how lucky - and fortunate - I was to have had an opportunity to go to a boarding school and experience all I had by the time I was 18. My parents were the instigators of that and I love them every day for giving me that opportunity. 

We went down to have our last breakfast at the Bellavista and ran into a gentleman we had met on the first day. Let me back up a bit. 

The first breakfast at Bellavista there was an older gentleman dressed in a button down shirt and looked very business like. We didn't greet him or really say anything to him. Later that day while standing in line to get our visitor passes at TASIS he ambles up behind us. We turn and a bit of shock were like. "Hey...we saw you at breakfast." Turns out he's a former headmaster, Mr. Riggs, who is now on the TASIS board and visits quarterly. Delightful man with a smile that is so very comforting and a little bit of mischief. We stood and chatted with him a bit and he asked about my time at TASIS, etc. 

So the last morning at breakfast he was there and was hoping he'd run into us. He gave me a book his wife had written and thought I'd enjoy it. Such a sweet man. 

We finished breakfast and drug our suitcases to the bus stop to get to the train station. It amused us that we felt so comfortable with the bus and it's schedule now. That just shows how easy the Swiss really make it. 

Found our train platform immediately and sat and waited about 30 minutes. The train was, as expected, right on time. We drug our suitcases aboard and sat in our first class section. I specifically bought the first class so we'd have better views on the train. Turned out to be mostly useless since a large portion of the trip was through tunnels. The tunnels aside, there was some beautiful country we got to see. 

The train trip was uneventful and we arrived in Basel right on time. Outside the train station was total chaos though. I wish I had taken a photo. Outside the train station was also a hub for the tram system they have. There were trams everywhere. We were laughing because crossing the street meant you had to look both ways, watch for cars, bikes and TRAMS. 

Our hotel was just across the street and down a little ways. We found it very quickly. Thankfully the room was ready and we were able to take our luggage upstairs and take a quick little breather. My legs were still so sore from the crazy first day in Lugano. 

We stayed at the GAIA hotel (gee yah) and loved it. They are a GREEN hotel and everything they do is in an attempt to reduce their carbon foot print. I think that's a place I'd be happy to give my money to. 

It was lunch time so we asked the front desk for recommendations. Turned out there was a little, family owned restaurant just outside the hotel door. Steinbeck. I knew immediately when I got the menu that schnitzel would be my lunch. I di d not anticipate the size of the schnitzel though. It was delicious and I was sufficiently stuffed after. 

We decided to walk off lunch and headed toward the old town of Basel. We had stopped here in 1987 and I have very few memories of Basel from that time. Honestly, the only memories I have are from photos I have. 

We found the Basel Munster (aka big ass church). It's a beautiful church. We couldn't go inside, but spent some time walking around it and the square it watches over. 

The Basel Munster is a pretty standard gothic cathedral - or church rather. They were catholic but are now protestant. Built between 1019 and 1500. The original was mostly destroyed in a huge earthquake in 1356 and was later rebuilt. The red sandstone architecture is amazing to me. With every church/cathedral I see that was built in the 14th, 15th 16th, 17th, etc century I'm always amazed at how they could build such a structure without the benefit of our modern technology. 

We slowly walked our way back to the hotel for a little rest. We have a walking tour scheduled for tomorrow so we didn't want to spoil that tour be seeing everything first. 

On our way back we found this little bistro attached to a hotel and we thought the menu looked good so we sat down for dinner. More schnitzel!

You may wonder why I'm focused on schnitzel so much. Besides that fact it's a fried food and I'm a big fan of anything fried, I never have schnitzel at home. It's not something I ever see on menus at home. It's very traditional for this part of the world. And I figured, when in Rome. This particular dinner we got to pick a side. I choose Rösti, which is basically hash browns with onions in it. Delicious. 

We did have some dinner entertainment though. Next to us sat an older couple...like grandparents older. They were clearly there celebrating what we assumed to be an anniversary. Champagne was delivered immediately upon them sitting down. All seemed fine. 

Then suddenly the man got very agitated. He started talking, loudly, in German to the server. Hand gestures all over the place. He ripped our his hearing aide. Whipped out his wallet and was acting like he was going to pay for the drinks they had. Meanwhile the server appeared to us like she was explaining to him that there were other guests in the place. At any rate, the woman of the couple looked somewhat embarrassed and was trying to calm him down. All of this happening in German, none of it could I understand. We surmised that he was perhaps angry that the server hadn't come to take their order immediately. It was just one server and about 6 tables in the restaurant. I felt kinda bad for her actually. Suddenly wine appeared and all seemed back to normal. It was rather amusing. Especially the part where we made up the story of what was happening since we didn't really understand. 

Total steps for today was 9780. In case you're curious, that's about 8780 more than I do on average at home. I really need to walk more at home. This trip so far has been a bit exhausting from the stand point of going from almost no walking to walking MILES every day and from cool, wet weather to HOT humid weather. It's just been a little much.