Today we left Italy and headed for Lucerne, Switzerland. Lucerne is the city I was most looking forward to on the trip. Once we got there, I immediately knew it would be somewhere I’d have to return to eventually. The city is sparkling clean, the river clear and just gorgeous. The tour bus dropped us off by the Lion Monument, and then we had free time to explore before the optional excursion. The Lion Monument had a mirror that allowed us to take a “self-portrait” with the monument in it. We managed to get Barry in the picture too…  Then we set off for the old part of the town. We walked across the Koppelbridge and strolled around, marveling at the beauty and cleanliness of the city.

 

 

Then we tried to find a place for lunch. We had run out of cash the day before, so we had to find someplace that took credit cards for lunch. It took awhile to find a place, and we chose a nice Italian restaurant. It was very expensive, 17 Swiss franks each (about 12 euro, or about $14) for Marc’s bowl of pasta and my lasagne, but they were huge, DELICIOUS portions! It was twice as good as any of the pasta we had in Italy (go figure). It was well worth the money.<p>

 

After lunch we wandered back to our meeting place on the lake and headed out on our happy hour cruise of Lake Lucerne. The scenery was phenomenal and the weather was dry but a bit cloudy. Barry was our bartender and we got free drinks (beer for Marc and wine for me).

The cruise lasted 45 min. and brought us to the base of Mount Pilatus, which has the steepest cogwheel railway in the world. It took only 30 min. to ascend 7000 feet. Unfortunately at the top of the mountain it was so foggy we couldn’t see 10 feet in front of us, let alone the views! It was terribly disappointing. I’d been looking forward to the view for months. I bought a few presents and souvenirs. The trip down was via four-person gondolas.<p>

 

After Mount Pilatus, we were taken to our hotel, a family-run pensione located in a quiet neighborhood. Our room is very small and quaint with huge fluffy down pillows and duvets and very soft sheets. The dining room was small and intimate. Our dinner was ho-hum, a plain wild rice soup, some white rice and a chicken dumpling with sauce similar to what we had in Amsterdam. Dessert was a few slices of fruit. After dinner, I felt like a walk, so Marc and Dan and I went for a stroll. When we got back to the hotel, we heard the sound of a piano. Some of the girls were playing it in the bar, and one of them accompanied me on chopsticks (I played the bass part).

Later, Marc and I watched a French gameshow in our room. I was able to translate some of the questions. The gameshow consisted of one contestant strapped to a chair in the middle of a stage. He had a heart monitor on, and if his heart rate rose above a certain level, he couldn’t answer until it dropped back down. They had a “lifeline” contact whose purpose was to try and calm them down if they were in “Le Zone Rouge,” which was the name of the show. It was very silly. Tomorrow we would arrive in Paris and I could hardly wait!!

 

Go on the next part of the journey!