Today was a brilliant sunny day so we headed to the place we were most excited about visiting. Morcote is a small village on the lake that is supposed to be the most beautiful in the area.
Our Tichino pass gives access to all public transport in the Canton. We took advantage of it today to get to Morcote. The trip involved 2 trains and a bus, and took about an hour and a half including waits at the transfers.
The bus dropped us at the Piazza Grande in Morcote. We got a giggle when we saw the Grand Plaza as it was about 50 by 50 feet. Grand can be in the eye of the beholder.
Our first stop was the church in town because the views were supposed to be spectacular. You got to the top by climbing a series of narrow staircases between buildings. It was only a few hundred yards to the church, but you gained about 400 feet in elevation so it was a good workout to get there.
The climb was strenuous but the views from the church were worth it. We sat on a bench and enjoyed the views from the church for a few minutes before heading into the church itself.
The interior of the church was nice. There were several older frescoes very similar in style to the ones we saw in Lugano yesterday.
We took a different route down which was labeled a road, but was just a slightly more gentle trail, with less steps. On the way down we came upon a beautiful building with a great view of the lake, we were speculating about the building when we saw a sign that it was the elementary school for the town. The kids that go there probably don’t realize that they have to be attending one of the most beautiful schools in the world.
The trail entered an arch that passed under the elementary school. The arch led to a grotto like room that had a small chapel with a painting depicting purgatory. It was interesting art, but the location under the town elementary school had us perplexed a bit.
When we got to the bottom we headed to a botanical garden in the town. After several false starts we eventually located the entrance to the gardens. The gardens worked themselves up the same hill the church was on so we got to re-climb the hill as we worked our way thru the plants. The gardens were very nice, but not spectacular.
After scaling the steep hill above Morcote twice we decided to head back to Lugano on the bus. When we arrived in Lugano we had to jump off the bus a couple of stops early as a race had just finished up along the main street of town.
What a difference a day makes, the sun was out, and so were the people of Lugano. It is Saturday today and the race had just ended so the downtown was full of people. Ton had read about a little hole in the wall wine bar on a side street, so we headed there with a thought of purchasing a glass of wine, when we got there the “hole in the wall” Ton had read about was a giant cafe with about 30 tables so we passed once again on eating out.
This time we were able to find the little train which saved us another 300 foot elevation climb. On the way back to the campground we again did a little tourism grocery shopping.
While we were gone the campground had filled to near capacity. We went for a walk at sunset and were struck by how few non-Swiss are staying here. Besides our French plate, we saw a single German plate, and all of the rest were Swiss from all over the country. My guess is that all of the foreigners looking for an overnight stop drive the extra 1/2 hour to Italy to avoid Swiss prices.