Well today was a day of travelling. I got up and had breakfast in my hotel in St Moritz. The breakfast room overlooked the lake. It was a lovely morning and the lake looked stunning as I sat eating a croissant. After breakfast I checked out and headed down the hill to the train station. As the title of today's blog indicates, it was a day of train travel. I was heading to Milan for two nights, as my friends wedding was fast approaching. Unfortunately, I could not get a direct train to Milan, so I had to go via Zurich. I left St Moritz at about 11am, and relaxed as the train slowly wound it's way across the beautiful Switzerland to Zurich. I lost count of the amount of mountains, rivers and villages we passed. This was such a beautiful country, I am seriously considering for my next holiday going backpacking across Switzerland as there is so much to see.
As the train ambled across Switzerland I was thinking that it is the little things that make you smile. As I was saying above there are lots of little villages, some with very small train stations, some are just huts (seriously!!). Now most of the trains don't stop at every station. However, you can request the train to stop at whatever station you want and just get off and go for a walk, climb a mountain/hill or walk along one of the many beautiful rivers, criss crossing the country.
Anyway, I finally arrived in Zurich at 2:30pm and had a quick bite to eat before getting the train to Milan, I would be coming back to Zurich later in my Journey for a couple of nights. The train journey from Zurich to Milan took approximately 4 hours. I must admit trains really are so much better in Europe, but that is no surprise. A train tends to arrive 20 minutes before departure, but you can get on straight away and just relax, I wish that could be said of the UK. Anyway, the highlight of the journey from Zurich to Milan was when the train travelled along the shore of lake Lugano. It was beautiful.
Finally arrived in Milan and got a taxi to my hotel. The hotel was fairly basic, but I guess I had been spoilt in Zermatt and St Moritz. I checked in and got changed and asked the receptionist if there were any good restaurants nearby. He recommended a couple, so I set off to find them. The first one had a queue outside the door, so I moved on to the next one, which had a table free so in I went. Now a proper Italian meal consists of several courses, so I thought, as I was starving, I would give it a go. I ordered a bottle of red wine and had a Caprese salad for starter, or anti-pasta as it is called. Then I had penne pasta with a fresh spicy tomato sauce for my first course. Then you have a meat course which was, pounded and grilled chicken breast with olive oil.
Now I must confess to finding this a bit bizarre as for the meat course, you just get the grilled chicken breast with nothing else, it is seasoned and drizzled with olive oil, but that is it. Now I don't know about you, but I think the chef could have saved himself so much time by just chopping it into small pieces and putting in my penne pasta spicy tomato sauce dish. He could have saved himself so much time and killed two birds with one stone. Only joking, I know it's tradition!!!!
The next course is then desert, which I decided not to have, because I could not fit anymore in, and finally the last course is coffee, oh and I think you can have cheese's and fruits, but I can't remember were they fit. Anyway, I had none of them, I just had the three courses and then paid up and rolled out the restaurant. I must admit it was very nice though. I then headed back to my hotel, had a couple of beers in the bar and went to bed. Tomorrow it was time for the sites of Milan.
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