To Unterseen

Early on Monday, June 26^th, we caught the train for Interlaken West, via Zurich, Bern and Spiez.  This took about 2½ hours.  Since the apartment we normally stay at in Unterseen wasn’t available, we went instead to Sunny Days, a B&B run by a young American woman and her German husband.  Quarters were tight but comfortable, and, as we discovered, the breakfast was good (always important in a B&B).

We had dinner that evening with Eva’s father Albert at the Golfclub Interlaken-Unterseen.  At first we were outside under the canopy, but a thunderstorm came up, with heavy winds that drove us inside.  It was very nice to see Albert again.  He is now in his nineties, but lives on his own and gets around pretty well—the previous month he had gone to Vienna for his grandson’s graduation.

A New Mass Setting and Pizza

On Sunday, June 25^th, more choral music.  The village choir in which Eva and Andreas sing was celebrating the parish’s patronal feast by singing, for the second time, a mass that had been commissioned in celebration of the parish’s 150^th anniversary, the year before.  The composer was a young Swiss.  It was surprisingly good: complex but tonal and moving.

Afterwards, we had coffee and pastries with the choir in the parish hall.

After resting some that afternoon, we walked down the hill to the lake, where we met Eva’s sister Sylvia and her husband Kurt.  We had pizza and wine and salad outdoors, by the Zugersee.  Later, Sylvia and Kurt’s daughter Francisca showed up.  She had wanted to meet us.  We had a very, very pleasant time.

Switzerland

On Saturday, June 24^th, we said goodbye to Malta.  It was interesting and different, but not really our sort of place.  I don’t think that we’ll ever go back.

We flew on Air Malta to Zurich, then took the train to Zug, where we were picked up at the station by Mary Joy’s cousin-in-law, Andreas.  After freshening up at his and Eva’s apartment, we drove to a concert with a choir (including Eva) and big band, performing Duke Ellington’s Sacred Concert (as arranged by a pair of Danes from his three Sacred Concerts).  Both the choir and band were amazingly good with this great, very American music.  There was such a long standing ovation at the end that the performers encored the rousing finale.

We went back up the hill to the apartment and Andreas put together a simple pasta dish for a late dinner.

That evening there was a fireworks display below, over the Zugersee.

Around the Island

On Friday, June 23^rd, at 9:a.m. sharp we met our private guide and driver in front of the Stock Exchange, for a day out and around Malta.

First we drove to Mdina (which our guide said was pronounced not “muh DEEN uh” but “mm DEEN uh”).  The Maltese language is derived mostly from Arabic, with a lot of Italian, French and Spanish loan words.  While English is also an official language in Malta, the Maltese are very proud of their language and speak it to one another as a matter of course—it is not dying out.  They speak English with a distinct, non-British, “foreign” accent.

We looked around Mdina, the old capital, and stopped for a snack of the typical Maltese dish called pastizzi, a pastry stuffed with either ricotta or mashed peas.

Then we went down to the coast, to the overlook above the Blue Grotto.  Next, we visited the (very) ancient (3600 to 3400 B.C.) temple complex at Hagar Qim.

It was now lunch time, so we drove to the picturesque fishing port of Marsaxlokk (“Scirocco Harbor”), where we ate out by the water, at La Nostra Padrona.  Good.

Then we went to Birgu, since the Great Siege officially known as Vittoriosa, but still called by the locals by its original name.  This was where the Knights originally had their headquarters.

Our tour having ended, we went to the National Archeological Museum, to see the artifacts from Hagar Qim and also a special exhibition of the jeweled dagger that La Vallette had received from Spanish King Philip II after the Great Siege.

After finding various other restaurants not open and waiting in their associated wine bar for half an hour, we got into Trabuxu and had a very good dinner.