Wheels Around Europe . . . . . . .

Thursday, 4 July 2019

Cannero Lake Maggorie to Lucerne Switzerland

Thursday 4th July

We'll the rain that threatened late yesterday and evening never materialised, all we had were a few distant rumbles of thunder.

Cannero is a lovely resort, but it's time to move on and move north.

So today we head into Switzerland and to the St Gottard road tunnel through the Alps.

I think even Sue would agree it was a lovely drive, beautiful sunshine, super smooth Swiss motorway, lovely mountain scenery, no roadworks, no traffic holdups just a clear run into Lucerne.

Even Ed was purring like Cheetah chasing an Ibex, begging me to give it some more welly.

We'll, he chugged along nicely anyway, taking it all in his stride.

We arrived at our parking spot for tonight, right on the town Marina, (GPS 47.04662 8.31822) just 10 CHF which is about £8.07. A bargain when you consider the location and the view.

There is a bridge into town over the river Reuss. I think this may be a tributary off the Rhine, I'll check.

~ It is actually a tributary of the Aare, which in turn is a tributary of the Rhine.

After getting ourselves sorted out, we set off for Lucerne old town. It's about a fifteen minute walk past the train station and art museum.

The old town is absolutely packed with high end watch shops selling their expensive array of finely tuned time pieces for many, many thousands of Swiss Franks.

One after the other, next door to each other, Rolex, Omega, Tag Hauer, Phillip Pattak, how they all find enough customers to keep going I'll never know.

Me ? I just look at my phone for the time, that`s usually accurate, and that must surely be something that plays on the minds of these expensive watch makers in directors board meetings.

I'd have thought that increasingly, young people especially, would turn away from buying these watches. Don't they all centre their lives around their smartphones ?

But for now it seems there are enough punters around willing to part with enough wonga to keep them all going.

There are some lovely views in the old town, especially around the river area.

We headed up to the Lion of Lucerne. This was carved into the cliff in a former quarry following the slaughter of Swiss soldiers in France defending an insurgency against the French monarchy at the time.

It's quite moving if you read the story behind it.

The injured lion has a spear through his shoulder and is defiently protecting two shields, the French Fleur de lays and the Swiss cross.

Next door is the Glacier Garden, this area was excavated in the 19th century and reveals the sub rock beneath Lucerne from the time of the last Ice Age 20,000 years ago when all this region sat beneath 1000 metres of pack ice and glaciers.

Quite an interesting way to spend some time.

Here's a funny story, part of the exhibit is a museum and mirror maze, based on one at the Alhambra Palace in Granada Spain (I've no idea what the connection is either).

And also a climb up to an observation point.

I couldn't go in the museum with Louis but I wanted to go up to the observation point. So I said to Sue, you go in the museum and I'll climb up the hill.

Well I did that and when I got down I expected to see Sue sitting on the bench at the bottom.

But no sign of her !

I waited, and waited, and waited, eventually I sent her a text, "where are you, I need beer now ! "

Nothing !!!

Eventually she emerged, all flustered, it seems she went in the mirror maze, took a photo and got completely disoriented and couldn't find a way out !!!

We'll, I couldn't keep a straight face, it seems she spent ages bumping into mirrors ! I bet the guys in the ticket office were in stitches !

So funny !!!

After all that excitement, it was back to Ed to dine on some lasagne, sweetcorn and salad en van.

It's a really good parking spot here on the marina, I'll do some exploring later on and see what else there is around.

After exploring, there is a large park next to the Marina and there were hundreds of people chilling out in the sunshine, playing games, having barbeques, a few drinks. Lucerne is a very chilled out town.

There is also a lovely sandy beach and I couldn`t resist an evening swim in the lake.

It was an absolutely amazing experience, clear lake water, the sun shining on snow capped mountain peaks, and a view of the town across the lake, lovely. A wonderful place for a swim.

I think I may have a morning swim as well ?

Tomorrow I plan a short drive into le franc.

Lucerne Marina

Lucerne Waterfront

The Lion of Lucerne

The Glacier Garden of Lucerne

Lucerne Town

Our parking on the Marina, what a view !

Lucerne Marina

Lucerne Park

Lucerne Town Beach

Our view for this evening from Ed

Our route to Lucerne

Wednesday, 3 July 2019

Cannero Lake Maggorie – Day two

Wednesday 3rd July

One thing that has struck me in the Italian lakes is how tame and friendly the bird life is.

Most days we have had sparrows and blackbirds coming up to us in the hope of scraps of food.

Yesterday they took things a stage further by stealing Louis kibble from out of his bowl !

Flying off with a piece, then coming back for more.

I'm sure with time I could get them taking food out of my hand, but unfortunately Louis puts paid to that idea by chasing them off whenever he sees them stealing his food.

It's another glorious sunny summer day on lake Maggorie although more thunderstorms are forecast for later in the afternoon. Let's hope they pass us by.

We are parked about 30 metres from lake Maggiore and have just a short walk through some gardens to be on the beach, or stay in the gardens and be shaded by the palm trees, which is my prefered option.

So it is a lovely spot in a pretty resort.

Tomorrow we're leaving here and heading north through the St Gotthard Tunnel and the Alps.

Our planned destination is Lucerne in Switzerland where there is a beautiful lake and lovely mountain views.

I've also found a Glacier Garden and exhibition which looks good so we'll go there if we tire of the old town.

Late afternoon and just a few rumbles of thunder in the distance !

thinking about it.......

here goes then ......

got it .....

and away ......

Tuesday, 2 July 2019

Orta San Guilio Lake Orta to Cannero Lake Maggorie

Tuesday 2nd July

I`ve added photos for yesterday at Orta San Guilio now I have decent internet. Take a look it`s a lovely town :)

This morning saw a rethink and a change of plans, my brain must have been working overtime last night !

Lake Orta is a beautiful place and one I will definitely return to at some point in the future to explore more of this region.

Sometimes you just feel comfortable in a place, it just seems natural to be there, well that was Orta for me.

Despite the thunder storm cutting short our visit it was still an enjoyable day.

The rain lasted into the night but we awoke to a beautiful sunny morning.

Today we were originally going to take the Simplon Pass into Switzerland, and getting north of the Alps would definately felt like the home leg.

But having given it some thought, I hatched a cunning plan and decided to head to Lake Maggorie and a little town called Cannero, and I'm so glad we did.

With the prospect of a little bit more Italian lake secenery, I just couldn't resist it.

I've booked our channel tunnel return crossing for Wednesday 10th July so calculated we could have two nights here and still have a fairly leisurely drive back to Calais.

Cannero is quite a smart little resort town on the west bank of the lake, quite close to the Swiss border.

We are parked up at Camping Lido Cannero Riviera which is right on the lake with a blue flag beach.

We've had a walk along the waterfront where there is a lovely magnolia tree lined walk with elegant 19th century villas which are now mostly chic hotels.

There is also a very pretty old harbour where amongst the wild life you'd expect to see, there was a turtle sitting on a rock sunbathing !

This afternoon has been spent relaxing on the grassed area in front of the lake and working out our route to Calais and how many nights we can spend here, two nights was the conclusion I came to and the St Gotthard road tunnel will be the route over / through the Alps.

This is the route we used last year and is quite a good route if you manage to avoid the traffic congestion that can build up at times.

I don't want to make it into a panicked dash to Calais, so I'm happy we've given ourselves enough time.

I`ve had a wander around Cannero this evening and it really is a lovely little town with a nice laid back feeling.

There are some waterfalls and the church has the most amazing grotto where it looks like they hold outdoor services.

And of course lovely scenery with the tree covered mountains decending into the lake. A lovely scene.

I`m very happy here !

Views around Cannero

Cannero Old Harbour

Cannero Old Harbour resident, non native I suspect

Views around Cannero

These stone chairs were so comfortable I nearly fell asleep !

Views around Cannero

Views around Cannero - Grotto at the church

Views around Cannero - waterfalls

Views around Cannero

Our route to Cannero

Monday, 1 July 2019

Bellagio Lake Como to Orta San Guilio Lake Orta

Monday 1st July

Our camper stop at Piazza Ghisallo Magreglio in the mountains turned out to be a great choice.

Once the tourist traffic and bikers had left it was very peaceful and we slept well after the days exertions.

We'd enjoyed our time in Bellagio, but it was time to move on.

My research for our next destination brought up Orta San Guilio which is a small town on Lake Orta in our general direction of travel.

It sounded like an interesting and very scenic place, so the sat nav was duly set.

It was only about an hour and a half as we mixed with morning traffic heading into Milan.

Orta San Giulio sits on a peninsula surrounded on three sides by the clear waters of the lake.

There are two camper stops provided by the town, one of which is opposite the stop for the tourist train which carries people down the hill onto the town, so that's the one we selected.

If we thought Bellagio had a lot of picturesque cobbled streets and alleyways then Orta San Giulio runs it a very close second.

The main difference is that Orta San Giulio feels a more authentic Italian town without the global recognition as a tourist destination that Bellagio enjoys.

And it is all the better for it.

Some of the buildings are amazing and have clearly been very grand residences and palaces with frescos and stucco masonary walls with ancient stones, decorative wrought iron railings, balconies and and bannisters.

Of course there is plenty for the tourists, bags of multi coloured pasta (who buys that stuff) and bags of dried porcini mushrooms for 23 euros !!!

But the tourist stuff is not at the expense of the appeal of the beautiful surroundings.

The centre of the town is Piazza Motta "the square lounge" overlooking lake Orta and Isola Di San Giulio, the small island that is a few hundred meters out into the lake.

All picture perfect stuff, so I'll let the photographs do the talking.

Suffice to say I'm very pleased we found this place and we thoroughly enjoyed our time in the town.

Unfortunately it was cut short by a thunderstorm, so we headed back to Ed with the help of the tourist train chugging us up the hill through the downpour.

The rest of the afternoon was spent drying Louis, drying us and drying Ed out, yes we went out leaving the roof vents open so in came the rain !

It's surprising how quickly things dry out here though, thankfully

I think the internet connection is going to be too slow to load the photos so I`ll do it when I can