The following morning we met up at Loreto again, and took the train to the central station. When we got there, we got a free upgrade to a slightly bigger car than what we'd been promised the day before. It was quite a nice little Chlio, and it was diesel-powered, so we were promised it wouldn't use much fuel. The AVIS guy gave us detailed directions, even drew the correct route on the map, but we (I) still managed to get off on the wrong track almost immediately, by turning back into the station parking lot instead of onto the road.
After a little zen driving (some of you will be familiar with this concept - you pick a car that looks like it knows where it's going and just follow it) we were back onto the road we were supposed to be on. However, after a few minutes I spotted some signs for Como, and took off onto a highway at a much earlier point than the instructions had it. Still, I chose to trust the signposts, forgetting for a moment that I was now in Italy, not in Norway. We drove out of Milan, and the landscape soon became quite rural. It didn't take long before the first hills came into view, and the yanks became all excited even though I tried to tell them that these were not proper alps or mountains, mere hillsides.
Their excitement over the landscaped paled however when we passed a sigh that said "Diesel Outlet". I had to stop the car and turn back for fear of bodily injury, but fortunately they spent only five minutes there and didn't even buy anything. The rest of the trip was rather uneventful, as we passed through a succession of sleepy little villages. It dawned on me that we were probably on a smaller road roughly parallel to the motorway, and that this would save us the exorbitant tolls that the Italians usually charge there.
When we arrived in Como there were signs for the lake, but these ended abruptly (at least as far as I could see) somewhere in the middle of the city, and I had to rely on zen again. We drove a bit up a hillside and outside a fancy-looking restaurant we finally got a fairly decent view over the water. We did the photo thing and got back in the car to head for the Swiss border.
At the border we had to pull over, and our passports were inspected. In addition we had to buy a "vignette", a sticker proving that we had paid the annual Swiss road fee. This is a popular way for many European governments to suck money from tourists, but usually they offer short term fees at lower prices for people passing through. The Swiss, never known to give away money if they can possible help it, charges everyone 30 Euro regardless. On the plus side, the guards on duty all spoke English and were able to give us directions.
We drove on through a landscape of increasingly tall mountains, lovely little villages and silvery lakes. The sun was shining and the mood was very good. We hadn't really decided on how far into Switzerland we were going to drive, but I was hoping to convince the others that we should head for France, and drive down to Italy again through the Mont Blanc tunnel. We passed the city of Lugano since it was still a bit early for lunch, and headed initially for Bellinzona. However, I soon discovered that there were two routes - one southern and one northern - that would take us to Mont Blanc. Not knowing which one was the quickest, I stopped at a gas station to ask. When I entered, map in hand and a determined look on my face, one of the employees laughingly ducked and hid behind a shelf. The other employee was behind the counter, so I guess she didn't find a hiding place fast enough. None of them spoke much English, but they understood a little, and with the help of my horrible attempts at French, I was able to gather that one of the scenic roads up north was closed, and that if we chose this route, we'd have to spend much of our time in tunnels. I therefore decided to take the southern route and turned the car back westwards.
By now the yankees were getting restless, and wanted to get out of the car and walk a little. I put the pedal to the metal and we soon hit a lovely little town called Locarno. It was a sleepy little place with broad streets, some very nice architecture and even a small square with a fountain in the middle. Some of the buildings looked almost Spanish in style, and many of the verandas were almost overgrown with plants, vines and flowers. It all looked very pretty, peaceful and prosperous. We parked the car and walked a few hundred meters down to the shore of Lake Maggiore. Here we took a few pictures and then walked the last hundred meters or so into the centre of town.
We were all starting to feel a little hungry, so we sat down at a table outside a small lakeside restaurant. We got hold of a few menues, and I had to do a bit of translation, as they were only in Italian and German. (Switzerland, it should be noted, has no less than four official languages: German, French, Italian and Romansch, which is a more "Latin" version of Italian and is spoken by less than 1 % of the population. Everybody has to learn German, and the Germans have to learn French in addition. Most speak some English, and it is not uncommon for a Swiss to speak 3-4 languages fluently.)
I settled for a lasagne - always a safe choice, I've found - while the yanks wanted to try the pizza. There were a couple of words on the menu that I couldn't understand, and Ms S was greatly surprised when her pizza arrived... with a fried EGG on top. I should of course have remembered that "ovo" is Latin for egg, but I had forgotten. She looked at it with more than a little skepticism, but managed to eat around it and pronounced the pizza to be good. I had to wait a further 15 minutes for my lasagne, which I found both strange and rather un-Swiss in its sheer incompetence (I blamed it on the fact that this was, after all, the Italian part of the country). I found that food prices were somewhat higher than in Italy, but still not as high as in Norway. The lasagna finally arrived, and it was quite tasty. All in all, the lunch was a very pleasant experience, as we had warm sunlight, blue skies, snowy mountains and a calm, beautiful lake around us. In addition, there were lots of people walking past, so we had quite the street theatre to look at and comment upon.
After lunch we decided to take a little stroll around town, chiefly to look for Swiss chocolate. Now, I do think the Swiss make excellent chocolate, but I'm not all that impressed by it, since I find much of the Norwegian products every bit as good. But in the US, the Swiss stuff has an almost mythical status. Ms S had entertained us with a story of how she once managed to eat herself drunk on Brandy chocolate, and she was almost desperate to find some to bring home. We first tried to ask the waiter, but his knowledge of local merchandise seemed as lacking as his speed in serving lasagne, so we started to ramble randomly around the streets. The girls asked one of the locals on the street, but he hardly spoke a word of English. Still, being Italian, he was able to keep the conversation going for several minutes, gesticulating and laughing all the time.
Suddenly, Ms K turned and started walking the other way from us. I don't know if it was sheer luck, or if she'd caught a scent of something, but she soon located a fair size store selling nothing but chocolate. We went inside, and I think this was the closest the yanks had been to heaven - the only thing missing was shoes. We spent some time in there, browsing and marvelling at all the different varieties and flavors on display. I settled for a couple of good old white toblerones - my favorite chocolate - while the yanks bought lord knows how many types. Most of them seemed to hold some kind of liquor...
We drove out of lovely Locarno and after wasting five minutes on a wrong turn, kept going southwest along Lake Maggiore. The road was quite narrow and windy, more like what you'd expect in rural Alabama than in Switzerland. The scenery was still stunning - blue skies, snowy mountains and the lake to our left was scattered with little sailing boats and the occasional small island with maybe a castle (or the ruins thereof) or a big wooden house on. There were also plenty of houses pressed up against the mountainside to our right, and even quite large villas high up in the hillsides. Driving up there is probably difficult in the winter, but the view must surely be fantastic year round.
After a little while we entered Italy again, but the landscape and the roads didn't change any - the only significant change was that the signposts became significantly more confusing. We spent some time around a traffic circle where none of the place names given before entry matched any of the names on the exit signs inside the circle, quite a feat even by Italian standards. We eventually ended up on a road going towards the Swiss border again, and with the occasional signposts for the right places, but I still think we were probably going on a smaller road parallel to a much faster highway.
By now, Ms K had fallen asleep, and was providing Ms S and me with some entertaining snores. We were climbing higher and higher into the Alps, the mountains becoming craggier by the minute. We passed loads of quarries, some producing granite; some even seemed to have marble. After some time we hit a proper highway again, but closer to the border it narrowed into a pitiful rural route. There seemed to be some road construction going on, so hopefully they're doing something about it. The landscape was by now very alpine, with narrow passes and deep valleys where snow still clung to the hillsides, and some of the smaller waterfalls were still frozen. We passed into Switzerland again, and after just a couple of minutes, the roads improved considerably. The Swiss are master engineers, and we were highly impressed at how they'd blasted tunnels and built galleries into the mountainsides - broad, safe roads that enabled us to go fast, yet gave us an incredible view of the surroundings. Many places, ice taps several meters in length were hanging down on the outside.
After a series of tunnels and galleries, we came to a longer stretch of bare road. By now, we were pretty much at the top of some of the mountains, and there was snow all around us. We stopped at a restaurant/gas station to take some pictures (Ms K promising to name her firstborn after me if I would only please, please pull over), and the yanks went berserk with their cameras. Even a blasé Norwegian like yours truly found the view to be great, though mountains and snow pretty much run in my blood.
The road now went steeply downhill, and we crossed over bridges spanning horrifyingly deep valleys and canyons, and the view was just one series of breathtaking vista after another. The terrain eventually evened out a bit, and we passed through most of the Valais area on relatively flat roads, but always with the mountains in clear view around us. By now, it was getting darker, and I was pushing hard to try and reach Mount Blanc before nightfall.
As we drove towards the French border, the view in front of me was like some science fiction painting from a different planet. The sun was going down almost straight ahead of us - in fact, had already sunk behind the snow-covered mountains, and these were glowing in a reddish, almost pink color. The sky was still a dark blue, and several airplanes were making their way across it, leaving stark white trails of vapor.
At Martigny, the road climbed sharply up into the mountains again. To me, the narrow roads and sharp curves were quite familiar terrain - this is what much of Norway looks like, and the road standard wasn't any worse than in most rural areas at home. My two passengers, on the other hand were totally unaccustomed to this kind of landscape and seemed quite nervous, especially Ms K. I got what was later described to me as "the sista treatment" a couple of times, so I tried to slow down a bit, which led to a queue of about half a dozen cars forming behind us. After a while, the road went downhill again, and the yanks became even more terrified. It was probably for the better that it was by now almost wholly dark, so they couldn't see too much of our no doubt very steep and forbidding surroundings. Needless to say, I brought us all down safely and effectively, despite the whimpers from the sissy Americans.
The signposting in France wasn't much better than in Italy, so when we finally came to a small strip of hotels and restaurants, we weren't quite sure where we were. We parked the car and went to look for a decent meal, but the first place looked like shit and the entrance smelled, and the second place was full. In addition, Ms K felt she'd been unwelcome when she'd tried to enter an art gallery next to this last place, and was eager to get out of there altogether. We got back in the car and drove on for a while until we came to the famous ski resort of Chamonix, at the foot of Mont Blanc. On the outskirts was a traffic circle with highly confusing signs, so we weren't sure about the road. Fortunately, there was a hotel with a restaurant next to the circle, so I was sent on a mission to get directions and possibly scavenge for food.
I went inside the hotel bar, a warm, snug room with an open fireplace and a door leading to the dining room. The bartender spoke perfect English and was able to give good directions, and he assured me that our party of three would be more than welcome to dine there, even though we weren't guests. Soon we were all placed at a window table, perusing a mouth-watering menu. The hotel was named Eden, and to us it really became paradise. We were tired and hungry, and this place exceeded our expectations in every way. It was a bit pricey for us budget tourists, but not unreasonably so compared to the quality of the products and service we got.
The staff were all polite, attentive and friendly. Our main waitress for the evening turned out to be Swedish, so I had the opportunity to speak a little Norwegian with her (the yanks had been on me the day before, urging me to "say something in Norwegian!"). While we were studying the menus, she came out with bread and butter for us and drinks were served quickly. Ms S was mightily impressed with the bread - she pronounced she had a "thing" for such food, and the experience was further heightened when they brought out a plate with small pieces of toast and something that tasted like a creamy shrimp (possibly crab) salad for us to munch on while we were waiting for our food. We never saw this item on the bill.
I ordered a Beef Tournedos, and it was heavenly - tender and tasty. I joked that I could still taste the grass the animal had eaten. The pepper sauce, the potatoes, the vegetables... it was all just perfect. The ladies had starters and dinners, and were oohing and ahhing while they were still on their salads, so I gather they were happy too.
Since I hadn't had starters, I had room for desert (as if stomach capacity would have been a problem anyway) and settled on a lemon cake. It was pure perfection - a slice of lemon cake with lemon sorbet on top and the plate was liberally sprinkled with two strawberries halves and numerous raspberries and blueberries, plus a little chocolate sauce. It was topped off by a crispy biscuit thingy shaped like a spoon. It both looked and tasted heavenly. Meanwhile the ladies were having coffee, and were served various sweets - again on the house.
All in all our evening at Hotel Eden was in many ways the highlight of the vacation. The conversation flowed easy, there was a lot of laughter all round, and we were on the receiving end of some of the best food and service I've ever encountered - and I've stuffed food in my face in more than thirty countries! When the time came to move on we tipped lavishly and said our fond farewells to the staff, wowing that should we ever happen to be in Chamonix again, this would be our first destination.
From Chamonix, the road climbs steeply up into the mountains. I'd been here once before, in 1993, but had then approached from the Geneva direction, and in broad daylight. The view then had been stunning, but now it was too dark to see much. However, there was the hint of snowy mountain edges above us, and the stars were out, so it was still quite nice. After a brief detour (I seem to have a talent for them), we came to the tunnel entrance. Here, an exorbitant amount of Euros changed hands before we were allowed entry into the tunnel, which stretches for several kilometres through the whole mountain and ends inside Italy.
The rest of our 3-hour drive into Milan was spent in what could politely be called a sing-along, but which for the most part was really a sing-against, since we usually didn't know the same songs. When it comes to music, indeed culture in general, I am white. Pale white. My two favorite forms of music are opera and bluegrass, while I mostly detest jazz, rap, R&B and hip-hop. We whiled away the hours with humming, singing, playful banter and politically incorrect comments, and I think it's safe to say that fun was had all round.
We hit a couple of wrong turns once inside Milan, but considering the size of that city and the fact that the streets and signposts were made by Italians, I thought I did pretty well for myself. Ms K & Ms S were dropped off at their hotel at around 1AM, and I tried to negotiate the streets to get back to my own place. The problem was of course that the only thing worse than the traffic in Italy is the parking. In the evenings, all sidewalks of any width become parking lots. Not knowing the local rules, I drove around the block several times to find a seemingly safe place to park.
Finally, at almost 2AM, I pulled in at a bus stop, stunning myself by making a perfect parallel parking in the process. The fading yellow lines that marked the bus stop contained space enough for at least three cars, and there was a car in the middle, so I pulled in behind it, leaving the space directly in front of the bus sign open. I figured the car in front wouldn't have parked there if there was an immediate risk of being towed, but I was still a bit nervous about the whole thing. Unfortunately, the hotel receptionist on duty spoke no English, and was a complete moron to boot, so I couldn't get any local assessment as to the dangers of my parking.
To be on the safe side I walked back out to the car and put a note in the window explaining where I stayed and that I had only parked there because someone else had done so before me (ever the defense of little boys) and would they please, please contact me before towing my car away. Feeling marginally safer, I set the alarm for 8AM and finally went to bed.
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