Day 6 – Switzerland

Some peculiarities I’m noticing about Europe: they have no concept of queen- and king-sized beds. Everywhere we have stayed beds come in two flavors. Either you get two single beds separated by furniture or two single beds shoved up together. And apparently this is so for everyone, not just the hotel industry. I keep wondering how it never occurs to them to adopt our style of beds which seem so much more spacious and comfortable.

Then there is the issue of drinks. I drink a lot of juice and other refreshments and in the states we can buy drinks just about anywhere and often we’re tussling (well me at least) to make sure they don’t give us a cup full of ice with a little of the drink filling the spaces between the cubes. In Europe ice for drinks is simply unknown. Ask for ice in your glass and you might be stared at like you had just asked to buy an ounce of plutonium. The drinks they do serve barely register on the chilly side of lukewarm.

Anyway, we woke up and I was still feeling awful. I wanted to just stay in that kid-sized bed and do absolutely nothing. I was also thirsty and because breakfast came included Dana went to the breakfast bar and loaded up on juice. I wasn’t hungry, just thirsty. I drank about 5 glasses of juice and with all the effort of the world dragged my ass into the car for the day’s drive.

We had a really convoluted course to follow today, crossing no less than four countries. Dana drove most of the way because I was getting worse. Unfortunately she wound up getting a speeding ticket at a border crossing from Austria into Switzerland. We noted this must have been a dirty little revenue-raising plan of theirs since it was right AT the border. Fuckers.

We went to tiny Liechtenstein which is one of the world’s smallest countries. Basically a town a couple miles in any direction. Beautiful setting for a town with the Alps all around. Not so beautiful prices for their chocolates and everything else. A $45 T-shirt? $10 chocolate bars? Are you kidding me? We just figured this must be a getaway village for the wealthy. Given the setting I can see why.

We drove past Zurich looking for a bed and breakfast and we must have gone to ten different places looking for a place to stay but all were full. It was getting late and we were worrying that we wouldn’t be able to sleep in a bed that night. At the last place we inquired they told us they were full too and we shook our heads in disbelief. Chatting up the receptionist suddenly she remembered that a guest had canceled or something (all this in my so-so German). It was a room up four flights of stairs. Like an attic almost. A cool $100 a night without the breakfast option (which would have been another $20). But by now we didn’t care and within 30 minutes of taking the key we were snoring away.

Day 7