Tuesday morning, June 29th, we had breakfast at the hotel, checked out and crossed the street to the railroad station. The 9:52 Bernina Express train arrived, a few minutes late, and we went looking for our car, car 13: 17, 16, 15, 14, 11! No 13! I boarded car 11 and was met by a pleasant conductor, who asked if I had a reservation. Yes, I said, but for car 13, and I couldn’t find it. She got off the train, looked at the next car, and came back smiling. No problem. We could stay in this car. So we went to our seats, 45 and 46, and they were already occupied. However, the older couple there asked if we had a reservation, and moved across the aisle when we said that we did. Then, an announcement came over the intercom that this was a special train, with reserved seats and that anyone without reservations should wait for the regional train. So the other couple quickly got off.
The Bernina Express train has large picture windows (in first class they are panorama windows, curving up over), an intercom narration in German and English as to passing sights, and a
booklet with maps and descriptions. The train part of the trip ends in Tirano, Italy, where you then pick up a bus back into Switzerland, to Lugano. Both legs are covered by our Swiss Saver Pass, but we had to buy reservations, separately, for each. I had paid for and printed out a reservation for the train online from home, but all I could get for the bus was a confirmation number, which I had used to buy the reservation card itself at the railroad station in Interlaken.
The route, with wonderful scenery, takes you up to the Bernina Pass, the highest non-tunnel crossing in Europe (2253 meters or 7391 feet) and the border between the Danube and Adriatic watersheds, as well as between the Romansh-speaking Engadine and the Italian-speaking Poschiavo Valley. Then there is a precipitous drop, involving many switchbacks, to the town of Poschiavo (1014 meters or around 5300 feet). Farther on is the most famous engineering marvel of this rail line, the Brusio Viaduct, where the train goes in a complete circle—a long enough train could theoretically pass under itself! Our enjoyment of the trip was marred a little by the fact that a group of young Germans in our car was making so much noise that it was sometimes difficult to hear the narration.
A little after noon we crossed the Italian border and arrived in Tirano, on the Adda River in Italy’s wine-producing Valtellina Valley, which had been part of the Graubuenden (and thus of Switzerland) until Napoleon had taken it away in 1797. We had more than two hours until the bus left, so we took our luggage to a nearby restaurant, Ristorante-Pizzeria Sale e Pepe, and had lunch on the terrace, next to a table of nine Japanese. It was indeed “Sunny Italy”: all the temperature readouts we saw were either 34 or 35 degrees Celsius (93 to 95 Fahrenheit). I scouted out the restaurant WC. There was one room marked “Toilette,” with two cabinets. I went to the one on the left: it was a “Turkish” toilet with no bowl. You had to squat over a facility set in the floor. Also, there was no lock on the door. As I came out, though, I saw that the other cabinet had a bowl toilet and could be locked, so I went back and told Mary Joy.
We tried to do a little walk into the center of town, but in that heat, loaded down as we were, we didn’t get very far, but went back to the fountain in the piazza before the station. I sat there with the luggage, while Mary Joy went off to see what she could see. Every so often the fountain would go on, spraying me a little in the back, but in that heat I didn’t mind it.
Then one of the Japanese came by, waving a wallet and asking if it were mine. Indeed it was. I had left it at the restaurant. All there was in it was some walking-around money and a card with my parents’ phone number. I carry anything really important (passport, credit cards, plane tickets, large amounts of cash) in a money belt under my clothes. That had saved us a lot of trouble when we ran into a gang of pickpockets at the bus station in Torremolinos, Spain in 2005.
I had just checked the bus reservation card to make sure of the time of departure. Now I decided to take it out to keep in my pocket until we left. It wasn’t in either pocket of my money belt. Not in my wallet or pockets. Not in my daypack. I started to panic. When Mary Joy got back, I ran back to the restaurant and asked if they’d found it. No.
Going back to the fountain, I felt the card in my underwear or shirt. I had been distracted when last putting it back in the money belt, and it hadn’t gotten in somehow.
So we went to the bus, a Swiss Post-Bus marked “Bernina Express.” When we got on, we discovered that our reserved seats were on the far rear bench, in the right corner (scenery would mostly be on the left side of the bus). At least, there was no one assigned to the middle seat of the five. The last row had only one air-conditioning vent, which was inadequate, though much better than nothing. The first hour of the 2½-hour trip was a boring drive down the Adda, through industrial villages overlooked by vineyarded hillsides. When we got to Lake Como, the drive along the north shore was somewhat scenic, but not exciting. The excitement came when we left the lakeshore and headed up the hillside, with the bus honking loudly as it handled narrow hairpin turns. We then headed west, reaching the north shore of Lake Lugano. We drove through the narrow, winding streets of old lakeshore towns, often honking away, then reached the Swiss border and were waved through by customs. Suddenly, the road was wider.
We arrived at Lugano a little after 5:00 and walked up the hill behind the train station to our hotel, the Montarina.
The Bernina Express train has large picture windows (in first class they are panorama windows, curving up over), an intercom narration in German and English as to passing sights, and a
booklet with maps and descriptions. The train part of the trip ends in Tirano, Italy, where you then pick up a bus back into Switzerland, to Lugano. Both legs are covered by our Swiss Saver Pass, but we had to buy reservations, separately, for each. I had paid for and printed out a reservation for the train online from home, but all I could get for the bus was a confirmation number, which I had used to buy the reservation card itself at the railroad station in Interlaken.The route, with wonderful scenery, takes you up to the Bernina Pass, the highest non-tunnel crossing in Europe (2253 meters or 7391 feet) and the border between the Danube and Adriatic watersheds, as well as between the Romansh-speaking Engadine and the Italian-speaking Poschiavo Valley. Then there is a precipitous drop, involving many switchbacks, to the town of Poschiavo (1014 meters or around 5300 feet). Farther on is the most famous engineering marvel of this rail line, the Brusio Viaduct, where the train goes in a complete circle—a long enough train could theoretically pass under itself! Our enjoyment of the trip was marred a little by the fact that a group of young Germans in our car was making so much noise that it was sometimes difficult to hear the narration.
A little after noon we crossed the Italian border and arrived in Tirano, on the Adda River in Italy’s wine-producing Valtellina Valley, which had been part of the Graubuenden (and thus of Switzerland) until Napoleon had taken it away in 1797. We had more than two hours until the bus left, so we took our luggage to a nearby restaurant, Ristorante-Pizzeria Sale e Pepe, and had lunch on the terrace, next to a table of nine Japanese. It was indeed “Sunny Italy”: all the temperature readouts we saw were either 34 or 35 degrees Celsius (93 to 95 Fahrenheit). I scouted out the restaurant WC. There was one room marked “Toilette,” with two cabinets. I went to the one on the left: it was a “Turkish” toilet with no bowl. You had to squat over a facility set in the floor. Also, there was no lock on the door. As I came out, though, I saw that the other cabinet had a bowl toilet and could be locked, so I went back and told Mary Joy.
We tried to do a little walk into the center of town, but in that heat, loaded down as we were, we didn’t get very far, but went back to the fountain in the piazza before the station. I sat there with the luggage, while Mary Joy went off to see what she could see. Every so often the fountain would go on, spraying me a little in the back, but in that heat I didn’t mind it.
Then one of the Japanese came by, waving a wallet and asking if it were mine. Indeed it was. I had left it at the restaurant. All there was in it was some walking-around money and a card with my parents’ phone number. I carry anything really important (passport, credit cards, plane tickets, large amounts of cash) in a money belt under my clothes. That had saved us a lot of trouble when we ran into a gang of pickpockets at the bus station in Torremolinos, Spain in 2005.
I had just checked the bus reservation card to make sure of the time of departure. Now I decided to take it out to keep in my pocket until we left. It wasn’t in either pocket of my money belt. Not in my wallet or pockets. Not in my daypack. I started to panic. When Mary Joy got back, I ran back to the restaurant and asked if they’d found it. No.
Going back to the fountain, I felt the card in my underwear or shirt. I had been distracted when last putting it back in the money belt, and it hadn’t gotten in somehow.
So we went to the bus, a Swiss Post-Bus marked “Bernina Express.” When we got on, we discovered that our reserved seats were on the far rear bench, in the right corner (scenery would mostly be on the left side of the bus). At least, there was no one assigned to the middle seat of the five. The last row had only one air-conditioning vent, which was inadequate, though much better than nothing. The first hour of the 2½-hour trip was a boring drive down the Adda, through industrial villages overlooked by vineyarded hillsides. When we got to Lake Como, the drive along the north shore was somewhat scenic, but not exciting. The excitement came when we left the lakeshore and headed up the hillside, with the bus honking loudly as it handled narrow hairpin turns. We then headed west, reaching the north shore of Lake Lugano. We drove through the narrow, winding streets of old lakeshore towns, often honking away, then reached the Swiss border and were waved through by customs. Suddenly, the road was wider.
We arrived at Lugano a little after 5:00 and walked up the hill behind the train station to our hotel, the Montarina.
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