Milan to Bern
If It’s Sunday…
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| Great Swiss Rail System |
There's
nothing like the smell of chocolate croissants and a baby's full diaper in
the morning. Our flight to Milan went smoothly and we managed to sleep about
three hours. By the time they fed us dinner at 11:00 PM & woke us at 3:00
AM that's all the naptime we had.
We boarded the train at the airport for a half hour trip to Central Station. Of course, we found people from the Twin Cities across the aisle. He was wearing a Boundary Waters t-shirt, which was the conversation starter. I think I fell asleep.
We had reserved seats on the train from Milan to Bern, but needed to get tickets. Our instructions were to go to a ticket person rather than use the ticketing kiosk. There was a line to get a number to wait in line until we were called.This process took an hour. We were told when we booked the tickets that we could check our bags until we boarded the train. No one seemed to know what we were talking about, so we schlepped them around the station. Fortunately we only have three small carry-ons with wheels and a bag that hooks onto one of the carry-ons.
We found a free bathroom since we didn't have change for the turnstile to the main pay toilet. Actually, I used a coded bathroom in a restaurant. I just knocked on the door until someone came out & I walked in.
We were ravenous and Burger King was one of few places with both food, tables, and chairs. What a cop out. Uh oh! We needed a potty again. Since David charged lunch we appealed to the soft heart of a woman in a money changing office. We looked old enough, desperate enough, and dumb enough that she broke a twenty Euro bill for us at no charge. Now we had change.
There was a sense of symmetry when we approached the toilet turnstile. Bottled water we'd consumed cost EU 1 and so did the use of the facilities.
Somewhere in our wanderings, it clicked that "deposito bagagli (left baggage)" doesn't mean "lost baggage." It's the baggage storage area. There was another line. While waiting, we realized we only had two hours until we had to re-claim the bags and decided it wasn't worth it at EU 6 a pop.
The reason I haven't written about buying David a belt and jacket is that we hadn't gotten to that yet. David left his warm jacket hanging on the railing at home and his belt fell apart after taking it off for security. I left David with the bags and walked out of the station to ask where we could find those items and approached a tourist kiosk. I demonstrated what I needed "for a man" and they agreed that the best place was at Boggi, a store in the station. We found it. They had belts. It was an Armani store. We walked on.
Understand, the entire station smells like an ashtray. Smoking isn't allowed but the place reeks. We plowed through the stench to a tobacco shop, of all places. There a saleswoman helped David select a belt, insisted he put it through the loops to try it on, and cut off the tags. Great service. Good price. Still no jacket.
We pushed through rush hour crowds and made our train to Bern...just. We had an altercation with a water bottle dispensing machine. We couldn't figure out how to pay with coins and it didn't like our credit card this time. We watched another couple figure out the cash thing so we followed suit.
The trip to Bern took three hours. Evidently we booked the milk train route. It stopped at least six times. But before sunset we cruised by Lago Maggiore and the lovely town of Stresa. Hills rose into the dark and we watched their blackened silhouettes disappear as they grew into mountains.
We arrived in Bern at 9:30 PM, got help finding the tram, and a lovely university student from Zimbabwe helped us find our stop. A woman who got off at the same place directed us to our hotel, the Arrabelle. It will be an easy walk to the train for our daily jaunts, and the bus is around the corner. Thanks to Sam and Patty Baumgartner we're settling into a very clean, basic, but comfy room. Sam is from Bern and hand picked our hotel
Pleasant dreams.
Toby
We boarded the train at the airport for a half hour trip to Central Station. Of course, we found people from the Twin Cities across the aisle. He was wearing a Boundary Waters t-shirt, which was the conversation starter. I think I fell asleep.
We had reserved seats on the train from Milan to Bern, but needed to get tickets. Our instructions were to go to a ticket person rather than use the ticketing kiosk. There was a line to get a number to wait in line until we were called.This process took an hour. We were told when we booked the tickets that we could check our bags until we boarded the train. No one seemed to know what we were talking about, so we schlepped them around the station. Fortunately we only have three small carry-ons with wheels and a bag that hooks onto one of the carry-ons.
We found a free bathroom since we didn't have change for the turnstile to the main pay toilet. Actually, I used a coded bathroom in a restaurant. I just knocked on the door until someone came out & I walked in.
We were ravenous and Burger King was one of few places with both food, tables, and chairs. What a cop out. Uh oh! We needed a potty again. Since David charged lunch we appealed to the soft heart of a woman in a money changing office. We looked old enough, desperate enough, and dumb enough that she broke a twenty Euro bill for us at no charge. Now we had change.
There was a sense of symmetry when we approached the toilet turnstile. Bottled water we'd consumed cost EU 1 and so did the use of the facilities.
Somewhere in our wanderings, it clicked that "deposito bagagli (left baggage)" doesn't mean "lost baggage." It's the baggage storage area. There was another line. While waiting, we realized we only had two hours until we had to re-claim the bags and decided it wasn't worth it at EU 6 a pop.
The reason I haven't written about buying David a belt and jacket is that we hadn't gotten to that yet. David left his warm jacket hanging on the railing at home and his belt fell apart after taking it off for security. I left David with the bags and walked out of the station to ask where we could find those items and approached a tourist kiosk. I demonstrated what I needed "for a man" and they agreed that the best place was at Boggi, a store in the station. We found it. They had belts. It was an Armani store. We walked on.
Understand, the entire station smells like an ashtray. Smoking isn't allowed but the place reeks. We plowed through the stench to a tobacco shop, of all places. There a saleswoman helped David select a belt, insisted he put it through the loops to try it on, and cut off the tags. Great service. Good price. Still no jacket.
We pushed through rush hour crowds and made our train to Bern...just. We had an altercation with a water bottle dispensing machine. We couldn't figure out how to pay with coins and it didn't like our credit card this time. We watched another couple figure out the cash thing so we followed suit.
The trip to Bern took three hours. Evidently we booked the milk train route. It stopped at least six times. But before sunset we cruised by Lago Maggiore and the lovely town of Stresa. Hills rose into the dark and we watched their blackened silhouettes disappear as they grew into mountains.
We arrived in Bern at 9:30 PM, got help finding the tram, and a lovely university student from Zimbabwe helped us find our stop. A woman who got off at the same place directed us to our hotel, the Arrabelle. It will be an easy walk to the train for our daily jaunts, and the bus is around the corner. Thanks to Sam and Patty Baumgartner we're settling into a very clean, basic, but comfy room. Sam is from Bern and hand picked our hotel
Pleasant dreams.
Toby
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