More of Day 3. Luzerne to Lugano

The trip on the William Tell paddle steamer was excellent and the scenery stunning. Pictures will follow soon but the one here is taken from the steamer on the Lake.We were a little disappointed with the two course lunch....we were given a voucher for CHF 18.50, and most things on the menu were 24 or over, so this left little for a full meal. Luckily we had a fairly substantial breakfast so we only needed a snack. We had several beers, bottled, and at 4.90 Swiss Francs a shot it meant that if we had 3 each it would blow our meal ticket sky high. However, all was well, and although with food and drink we went a little over our allowance, the nice lady on board said we didn't need to pay any more. We will pass our comments on to the Swiss travel service so they can update their meal vouchers...perhaps.  The picture here was taken on board where we had our meal.........very nice...dating from 1929.

We are currently on the William Tell Express train on our way to Bellinzona and eventually Lugano. The weather has changed considerably for the worse. We left Lake Luzerne in brilliant hot sunshine, and now up in the mountains there is low cloud and it is raining. Perhaps it will stop by the time we need too change trains.15.09.

22:04...well another day of travel!!  No hitches, changing trains was a doddle and some of the scenery from the train was stunning once again.  The weather was still a little on the bleak side but we passed many large waterfalls tumbling from the mountains and could see lots of snow on them tha' hills!  We had no trouble finding our next hotel where we will stay tonight and also tomorrow night, giving us a free day to explore Lugano in more detail.  We took a short walk down to the lakeside and town......which is quite steep and has a cable car to get you back up again!  Looking at the times of running we made sure that our return journey would not involve a breathless walk up the side of a mountain......however.............after eating a nice Itlalian meal of pasta and pizza 'lika mumma usta maka', we discovered the cable car was closed!  Oh no!  A voice in the distance called......'over here'......it was a bus driver, sitting waiting patiently to take the abandoned passengers up the side of the hill.  So....our first cable car ride turned into a bus ride instead, but we all felt jolly lucky we didn't have to walk!