Ticino

My husband was going to give you a lovely guest post today on the awesome birthday dinner he made himself this weekend – Asian marinated steaks with mushrooms (maybe that makes up for all of the French fries he ate while I was gone? ha – he really can cook, just chose not to…).  I think it rather amusing that lately we’ve been making our own meals on our birthdays…but it works – you can make exactly what you feel like, exactly the way you want it – because when you are celebrating cooking is not a chore, it becomes part of the festivities.  But you will have to wait a bit, because unfortunately he is crazy sick and not doing any writing at the moment.

So while he is lying in bed recovering, I thought I would do a bit more show & tell from my recent trip to Ticino, the Italian-speaking canton in Switzerland.  The train ride from French-speaking Suisse Romande was a bit longer than you’d guess for such a small country – over five hours!  But beautiful.  East out to Brig on the edge of the Alps, and then another train ride under the Alps to Italy, and then across on a very slow but beautiful panoramic ride over to Locarno, one of the main cities in Ticino.  I had some fun wandering around the edge of Lago Maggiore, which surprisingly reminded me a lot of Montreux on Lac Léman – beautiful promenades along the lakeside, yummy cold gelato stands, lots of children running around, and boats parading out on the calm waters.

I love the Italian-style architecture and all the palm trees (which unfortunately I didn’t get many pics of )!!  I think maybe I should come back over the Winter holidays, where I can be in a warm sunny place without ever having to leave Suisse.

Ok, I will stop blabbing.  You can see for yourself the beauty of this area, it’s really hard to take a bad picture in a place that radiates beauty out of every inch of its pores – the hills rising up from the lake edge are stunning, and now I want to learn some Italian!

So there was my Ticino experience.  It definitely won’t be my last, for sure my husband wants to visit too now – well, as soon as he gets better Stay tuned next time for his upcoming guest post!