We got up at 5:30 to start our drive to Varenna, 6 hours away. We wanted to get on the road before it got clogged up with tourists on Assumption Day, Italy's biggest holiday. We found a McDonald's at one of the oases on the Autostrade! They were wonderful oases, serving delicious espresso in china cups and with fabulous Italian products.
We have the best room in the house at Hotel Monaco, with a big terrace overlooking the lake. Our bed is one, not twins, we are very happy. The room as a huge terrace overlooking the lake (and the restaurant).
We had lunch in a little sidewalk restaurant a few steps from our hotel, and then we tried to walk around but it was too hot. So we came back to our room and had a nap and then hung out in our beautiful room.
We had dinner at 8:30 at the hotel restaurant, our table for two was at the very edge of the outside deck.
We watched boats go by, the lights in Menaggio across the lake come on, and we planned our day tomorrow.
So Varenna is even hotter than Tuscany, probably because it is more humid, the hotel is in a village and there is no swimming pool. So we figured we'd get cool by going out on the water. We took this passenger ferry over to Menaggio, where we caught the slow boat to Como.
This is Bellagio, one of the stops on the way to Como. It was a great two hour trip, but when we got there, it was 100 and we couldn't get on the fast boat. Hot hot hot. We had lunch at an oudoor restaurant and then stood under the shade trees and waited in a crowd for the slow boat. It was not as nice as the boat going to Como -- it didn't have an open stern area with shade, so there was no way to get cool.
The next day, we decided to drive to Switzerland, straight up into the mountains to cool off. All along the roads, very narrow roads with cars going very fast, were these extremely fit bicyclists going very fast also. Amazing.
We cooled off right away when we got into the mountains, it was so great to open the windows. Here is Hawk at the Grand Hotel restaurant in St. Moritz, where we had the most expensive meal of our trip: lunch on their deck.
The view from our table at lunch. So cool and refreshing. We were so happy.
Here's our dessert plate. We had two espressos with it. At $10 each. Seriously.
After lunch, we walked around in St. Moritz. It's a little like Rodeo Drive. Full of stores you can't afford. But at least it was cool enough to window shop.
We drove a little out of town and found this great lake with a walking trail around it, so we went for a long walk.
And Then we sat at a roadside tavern by another lake and sipped wine and waited for it to get late enough to return to Varenna (e.g., after sunset).
The next day we need to get to Florence, where we had booked a 4-star hotel next to the airport, since our flight home was at 6:30 am. I think they awarded the stars to themselves. We left and went downtown to the Westin Excelsior, this is our room there. Very cool and very beautiful with a view of the Arno and the square. Hawk had a Bellini and I had a Gibson in the bar, so nice to drink gin again after all that grappa and wine. A great last night.