Nov. 19 (Monday, going home) I allowed us an hour to get to the airport and return the car, even though the hotel was fairly close. It’s a good thing I did, because we couldn’t figure out how to cross the Autstrata without getting on it. We got off at the next exit and drove down tiny streets in a little town following signs to the airport through the maze and somehow got there. The disturbing part was the roundabout with no other information other than “Malpensa Terminal 1” down one street and “Malpensa Terminal 2” down another. We took…
Lap of Luxury We’ve arrived in the lap of luxury. Berck reserved us a room at a “four star” hotel near the airport when we had a wireless connection in Lugano, Switzerland. We’re paying 69 Euro, but the regular cost is 118, this being November. The bathroom has a bidet and little packets of everything you might need, including toothbrushes. There’s a flatscreen TV, a HUGE bed (queen sized), a closet you can lock and take the key with you, a safe you can program, and a minibar that includes old fashioneds and martini glasses. After sleeping in dorm beds…
Nov. 18 (Sunday) Getting to Milano Our night apart sleeping dorm style in Bergamo at the “Nazi, communist” HI hostel (as Berck calls it) was terrible. A couple of Italian women chattered loudly as the rest of us girls in the room tried to relax. When enough of us had turned over in our bunks to sleep, they started chattering in stage whispers. I drifted in and out of consciousness until at some point I awoke a little and realized it was both dark and quiet in the room. I was going to charge the laptop in the bathroom, the…
From Lugano to Bergamo I took advantage of the Lugano hostel’s free wireless (if you held the laptop in the air just right) to do a little reserach on places to stay that night. The website of one of the campgrounds in Switzerland that Berck had found said they offered caravans to rent for a night. So I found the hostel’s public phone and inserted my credit card to call them. A woman answered in German. “Do you speak English?” “Nien!” “Are you open?” “Nien!” She tried to tell me something else and then handed the phone to a male.…
We’re staying in a hostel in Lugano, Switzerland, just inside the border. It has free wireless, if we hold the laptop just right in the air. I posted everything we’d written so far, but there are gaps that have to be filled in. Check back for them. The dollar has no value; things are very expensive.