La Perla Lugano

... good for what you pay!! And awesome for a backpacker!!
Went for drinks at Frank's Bar which Patrick who owns the hotel recommended. Turned out to be a pretty trendy cocktail joint
where you pay for your drink at 1 place then get it at another. 10 Euro for a beverage no matter what you had so naturally I ordered a long island ice tea!!!

When I finally found Lake Como (after a train, then a bus, then a ferry and then a very confusing walk) I was surprised that it was so empty. It was raining (I think the rain is following me around Europe) and there was no one about so I was able to do my exploring easily. Lake Como is a very small place with not too many things to ...

... ciao" to this kid and that was the extent of our knowledge of one another, but I was too tired to care, and I've come to expect random things here. Plus, it was butt-suckin cold there, so all I wanted was to huddle under my blankets and sleep.

Usually on Sundays the family goes to church then heads over to the grandparents apartment in Borgo for lunch, where all the aunts, uncles and cousins come too. But the dad, Caesar (pronounced Chezz-ah-ray)(how ...

... quaint with beautiful villas. We walked the gardens of the Melza Villa. The canons in the photos are not toys....they are from the Napoleonic period...used to defeat Milan. The keys are to the city of Milan from the 1700's.

The food here is terrific. We travel back to Milan tomorrow to pick up our friends and head to the villa in Montanione. Forecast is for thunderstorms...yeah!

Love,
R ich and Kara

... near the airport. Because we changed the plans the hotel put us in another room... a suite. They were nice enough not to charge us the usuall price for this magnificent space. Although we have to wake up at 5am, we will sleep in this luxurious suite.
Looking foward to being home and seeing our friends and family. Love, Laura

... br>
Sue

We transferred from the bus to a boat to do the tour of the Lake. They pointed out the particular houses of royalty and film stars - and how many millions their houses were worth. The views were spectacular, the houses really like castles, and they would have no trouble having privacy, that's for sure! Another wonderfully pleasant surprise! Some have their own cable-cars to get down to the water's edge. (Funicular)

... Italian. Eventually I did return to reality, but not until after we visited Swiss Miniatur and San Salvatore. Swiss Miniatur is more or less self-explanatory, but I will say it was really cool to visit as a Swiss resident. It gave me and my friend some great ideas for future trips in the country. There are so many castles we never even knew existed! They really captured the great sites and monuments of Switzerland, including mountain ...

... l crossed the Italian border twice and was checked neither times- thank goodness because lam not sure what would have happened and as nice as the Italian ticket controllers are l don't think any amount of batting eyelids would have gotten me out of a rather tricky situation! I might have had my dream afterwards- and gotten to live in Italy permanently! Arriving in Lugano after a rather stressful train trip where l was worried about passport control and had to endure two American ...

... were in the Italian part of Switzerland. I’m continually amazed at the diversity within such a small country, so much so that I really don’t know how the 26 largely autonomous Cantons, each distinctly parochial, influenced in part in food and customs by their nearest bordering countries and divided by the use four official national languages, has ever been able to function effectively as a unified confederation since the original Cantons first joined together in 1291 ...

... and Doug, thank you and I love you for all of your help and support) and now it is happening and its so much better than I could have ever expected. Another funny thing is that because after Oktoberfest in Munich, we have about 10 days before we need to get back to London to fly out and we were planning on going back to a few places that we had visited up until that point, but right now, I have interest in revisiting almost every town we have seen so ...