Tocino: Locarno Long Week-End

 We argued like cats & dogs all morning and missed the 10:42, after agreeing the 8:42 & 9:42 were too early. 😡😡😡😡😡😡😡

Just as well it was raining when we arrived and we basically walked through most of the Old Town before dinner. 😀😀😀😀😀😀😀😀😀😀

Dinner at hotel: Hotel La Palma Au Lac

Spaghetti with clam sauce (in Tocino served with light RED sauce)

Took a funicular 1st, then cable car, 3rd ski lift to Cimetta

See that island on the right?  Its Isle de Brissago -- Boats go there (botanical garden to visit) but we were there ahead of season it wasn't open yet 😔

Funicular and cable cars to Madonna del Sasso (the church pictured above ) Caidada, Cimetta.  

We went to the bike store hoping to rent bikes for the rest of the afternoon but the guy said it’s not worth it to pay 40 Francs (whole day rate) for just 2 hours.  We think they just didn’t want to clean the bikes last minute when we returned at 5. They wanted to go home. 

Took bus to Ascona and it was somewhat of an ugly ride which surprised me as riding bikes there is the thing to do. We wandered down to the lake through the Old Town and had the best spaghetti carbonara and steak!!!! We watched the world go by with singers along the lake. Life is good. Boy am I going to miss Switzerland. 

Rented e-bikes from the hotel the next day and rode along the lake which was beautiful. It ended just 15 minutes after we started out, no path takes you all the way around the lake so we turned around and found the bike path to the Ascona bridge. Along the way we rode a bumpy path along a dry river. Was so much fun. Crossed the bridge and came back. A full morning and worth every penny of our 40 Franc rental!

We were going to take the bus up to the dam where Pierce Brosnan, aka James Bond in Golden Eye jumped off the dam but the train/bus schedules weren’t on our side. Plus it was raining so we got on the train to Lugano where we discovered it is asparagus season. Yay!

We forgot we were in Switzerland on a Sunday and everything was closed in the old town. We found a few open restaurants and enjoyed spaghetti with asparagus and asparagus ravioli and then took the funicular then train right back to the hotel.

We were tired from our adventurous day and the change to daylight savings time so went to sleep early. 

We are glad we stayed in the quieter Locarno vs Lugano and enjoyed everything the lake had to offer.