| LUGANO, Switzerland So our Spring Break this year we decided to go road-trip style. Our first stop was Lugano, Switzerland...although it's right on the border of Italy so it seems more Italian than Switzerland. We spent two nights here and we had a good time exploring the city and nearby towns. Some of the highlights would have to be hiking down Monte Bre which destroyed all of our leg muscles (minus Jake's...) for the next four days. None of us could even come close to standing on our tip-toes, climbing stairs without a limp, and [my fav] getting out of the car and being able to walk properly. As I recall, one of the stops we made after travelling in the car a ways mom tried to get out of the car and she could barely hold herself up, haha. Thankfully our legs did not hurt for the main hiking in the Cinque Terre :) (I should also mention that our hike landed us at the most beautiful little fishing town that was full of character..definitely worth the hike). Another highlight was going to a chocolate factory...particurally the part where we could taste-test all those different kinds..yum! So other than exploring the city, going for a boat ride and sleeping in a hotel that was ride beside the train station, that was pretty much the Lugano-part of the trip.  
^ This picture speaks for itself :) ^ Connor in front of the chocolate factory  
^ On top of Monte Bre after eating lunch here ^ Jacob making walking sticks on the hike down  
^ A beautiful site on the boatride back to the city of Lugano ^ Some weird random head in the city of Lugano CINQUE TERRE, Italy Here is where we spent the majority of our time. We didn't actually stay in one of the five villages, but a super super small town up on a hill, called Caste. When we got there we were greeted by a really sweet old lady who just kept talking to us in Italian and asking us questions. We all wished really bad we could understand what she was saying, lol. She was one of those old ladies that had so much character and you could tell she spoke what was on her mind, haha. Anyways, on the first day we got boat tickets that allowed us to travel to and from each town. It was really nice going on the boat because then you got to see each village from the view that the postcards all show..just beautiful!! Portovenere. This town wasn't one of the five villages either, but it should be, lol. This one was my favorite. It had  a castle and a unique church that overlooked the ocean and big cliffs. On our last night we decided to come back for supper, so we got to see the most gorgeous sunset ever! Here we tried the local food called Farimata (at least I think that's what it was called) and we somehow managed to climb up to the castle and go all the way down (the steep step way) with our terribbly sore legs, haha. The day we went was on one of the Italian holidays and so there were cars parked miles up the hill before this town. We couldn't believe that people would actually walk all the way down and back up...in their super high heels and uncomfortable clothes, lol. Another town we tried to get to that day had a policeman miles up the road blocking any more traffic coming into the town because the town was way to full. Crazy  
^ Jake 'fooling' Mother Nature (a statue of 'mother nature' that overlooked the ocean)  < The beautiful stone church
Riomaggiore. This town was/is connected to one of the other towns, Manarola, by the famous walkway "Via dell'Amore" It's an interesting walk along the coast and everywhere there are initials etched into things. There's one place in particular that's a tunnel and that has 'graffiti' all over it and in the middle there is a statue-thing that has a bunch of ribbons attached which have the names of couples. And all the cacti along the walkway are all full of initials. Anyways, I found that interesting and it seemed the one appropiate place for grafitti :)  
< Via dell'Amore Manarola. So I don't really remember anything about this town...When looking back at pictures you kind of forget which town is which because they all start to blend together, haha.  
Monterosso. This town is the most popular for its beach. We found that most of the Italians (on that holiday) came to this town. So we spent the rest of the day exploring this place and when we were done we caught the train back to La Spezia (the main city near Caste). Now this was no ordinary train ride... We get to the platform and it is packed with tons of people. We all pile into the train and I think I can say that it could classify as 'full'. Then, as we're waiting for the train to leave, an official sort of train woman (I don't know what else to call her, haha) and a couple come in just yelling, almost screaming, at eachother and it they went hard at it for a long time. Whatever they were arguing caught the attention of a bunch of other people in the train and it turned into a group argument. And from my point of view it seemed they were all ganging up on the train lady, lol. She finally threatened to get the police (that part was the only part we could understand, haha) and stormed out of the train. Anyways, that was begining of the train ride. When the train finally started and came to the second stop, there were just as many people wanting to get on as the last place...and so it continued at each of the next four stops. This train was unbelievably packed! Some lady was nearly gasping because she didn't have enough space, people we actually pushing people out of the train when it came to the stops, and when it finally came to the city there were people crying when they got off and the train officials were dealing with some big thing that happened...man, it was crazy! This was one moment I was thankful that I was tall because I was bigger than most of the Italians, and so I could keep my ground and keep people from filling in our cabin, haha. Anyways, that was one culture experience. Oh, and the next day (the non-holiday day) the train was normally full/empty, haha. Okay, that was way too long of a story...sorry.  
< So this doesn't even come close to showing how full it was. I found it interesting that even the Italians were taking pic's of how full it was, haha. Vernazza. This town was simply gorgeous, definitely my second favorite. From here we hiked to the last town Corniglia.  < Vernazza 
< Corniglia PISA, Italy Since we were so close to Pisa, we decided to take one of the days to drive down there and see the leaning  tower. We ended up getting stuck off the main highway and onto a 50km/h road that was often backed-up, haha. So to take a break from the long trip we decided to go to the coast. We ended up finding the most beautiful huge empty white-sand beach. And here is where we ate our lunch and then we continued onto Pisa. We only spent about an hour there, but we saw the famous tower :)   
VADUZ, Leichtenstein On our way home we chose the route that went through the 4th smallest country in the world, Leichtenstein. We had a fun time finding a hotel that was open, exploring the mountainside, eating speciality Roesti, and enjoying a picnic lunch on a windy mountain that had an excellent view :) Oh, and seeing a bit of road rage along the way...  A semi driver and car driver both stopped their vehicles right before the Swiss boarder and got out and were pushing eachother. Once the semi driver realized he was half the size of the other guy, he ran back to his truck and got a crowbar! Thankfully he didn't end up using it, and both men exchanged words and symbols and got back into their vehicless...haha, I have never ever seen road rage go that far, lol...so that was the one interesting thing that happened during one of the many traffic jams we sat through. 
So I realize that this is a forever long post, and hope those three or so people that actually read it enjoyed it, haha. As you can see, I mostly keep this site as a travel diary kind of thing for myself..hence the tons of writing and pics. And if you want to see a billion more pictures I will be posting them on facebook (when I do I'll post the link here) |
< The three ladies who are taking on Europe (in the Rothaus in Basel)
