Honeymoon - Part IV

Day 11- Friday, July 11, 2008
We rode a fast train from Venice (hot, humid, crowded) to Stresa on Lake Maggiore (green, cool, mountain and lake vistas) this morning. What a climate shock! It was raining when we arrived and we spent a large portion of the afternoon in our hotel avoiding the precipitation. The rest of the time we wandered into town and enjoyed window shopping along the tiny and charming streets. Dinner was INCREDIBLE. We had been depressed over the horrid food of Venice and sad to end the Italy portion of our trip on a bad culinary note, but all of that was erased by tonight's meal. Dave had a spaghetti dish with fresh tomatoes, zucchini, and peppers and I had a penne dish with an arrabiatta sauce, spicy tomato. We ate ourselves silly and then wandered into the main town square for an evening capuccino (decafinato :) and headed for bed.

Day 12, Saturday, July 12, 2008
OK it's my turn to blog now, says Dave.
After breakfast, we caught the boat to Isola Bella, an island about 1/4 mile off the coast from Stresa. The island is entirely owned by the Borromeo family, and is made up of a tiny strip of shops and apartments, and the rest is a giant palace and beautiful terraced gardens. We took the tour of the palace and gardens, learning all sorts of fun facts about world leaders who have stayed here, i.e. Napoleon, Mussolini, and Princess Di. Our favorite part was enjoying the 10 all-white peacocks that freely roamed throughout the gardens.
We walked out of the exit and straight into an open air cafe for a cup of cappucino and a sandwich just as some threatening clouds began to pepper rain on us. As we sat, the sky seemed to burst wide open as if on cue that we were 'safely' covered. The rain poured so hard that we were soon sitting in the middle of a several inch deep river-lake, and bracing ourselves as the lightning began lighting up the dark sky. I was in one of my personal heavens, especially once lightning hit the island just tens of yards away from us. Twice more, the island was struck, but soon enough it began to let up and we were able to make a break for the ferry back to the mainland. We went to the hotel to dry off and take a break, but later resumed shopping around Stresa. After another wonderful dinner at the same place (D: gnocchi with mushrooms, C: same as last night - yum yum!). As we were getting ready for bed, another monumental storm began, lighting up the sky with copius amounts of lightning which we enjoyed in chairs just inside the hotel room balcony. We went to bed to the soundtrack of noisy and possibly intoxicated Germans watching loud TV, and after a few hours of fitful sleep, we were rudely awoken by yet another fearsome storm. After semi-enjoying it, we went back to sleep and were awoken by our fourth storm just hours later. These last two were different in that the flashes were literally a second or two apart, and the thunder was a constant ebb and flow that never fully ceased.

Day 13 - Sunday, July 13, 2008
Alright...it's Cami again. Thanks Dave for adding your first blog experience. Hooray! This morning was goodbye Italy, hello Switzerland via the most incredible mountain vistas out our train window. Picture two of the world's happiest tourists with their faces and cameras plastered to the window. Ahhh....so great. We arrived at our hotel in the town of Täsch around 2pm. After a quick stop to drop off our bags and to laugh at the two twin beds with violent whilrpool toilet flushing action, we were off on a short train ride to Zermatt. The town is quintessential Swiss Alps with chalets and people wearing mountain gear. We LOVED shopping here, especially our olympic effort to acquire as much chocolate as humanly possible. Mission: accomplished.
We were a bit bummed that we couldn't see the world famous Matterhorn from the town because of poor weather and even more bummed that the forecast is awful for our time on the expensive Glacier Express tomorrow. We are doing our best to keep our spirits high and enjoy every bit of this experience regardless of the weather.