Verbania, Italy - 19 April 2024

19.04 - Verbania in Italy 🇮🇹

There were a few very expensive mohos amongst us last night, including makes like Niesmann + Bischoff and Morello. We felt like the grubby poor relation in our dirty Mobilvetta!

Tintin’s parking app was on a count down, and we needed to leave by 10am. Serviced Dave, then I was driving. 

Today was like at least an hour long hazard perception test! We were driving along the coast of Lake Maggoire towards Verbania in Italy. Certainly had to concentrate - and it was fairly narrow in places - only had to reverse up once though!

We did laugh about the roads - as expected - standards have already slipped!

We were aiming for a Park4night place which had parking for 80 spaces, we drove by some - and decided they were for cars only. The pictures had showed space where we thought we could reverse Dave’s overhang onto the grass. The reality was different. Reprogrammed Co-pilot to take us to the Sosta (paid Aire). Lots of space - €12 for 24 hours - much better value including all services (and electric). 

Decided it was a bike riding kind of day. Rode down to the water edge. All looks very pretty. I stupidly broke up some biscuit to feed the swans - then had to make a hasty retreat as they kept on coming for more!

We’d obviously missed out on a market - they were clearing up straight away. 

We rode past the botanical gardens. When we arrived back at Dave, one of the volunteers showed us how we should pay and display our ticket so ‘we don’t get booked by the police’ - he also gave us a map and some more information - which I guess if we’d had before - we might have visited the gardens - heyho…

There are some stunning huge villas right on the waterfront, didn’t capture many when driving. Just imagine being able to walk down from the front of your property and go swimming as often as you want! Downside is it’s all a popular area - there’s lots of traffic now - it must come to a standstill in the summer. 

The great big buildings are a multi event theatre - which we found out after we were home! 

I did take my bathers with me, but wimped out in the end. We were wearing fleeces today, despite the sunshine, plus there was a breeze, plus I’d be the only one going, plus I’m still getting over my cold. Enough excuses?!

We sat down to look out at Stresa, which we visited in 2010 and the three Borromean islands in front - good memories 😊

Tintin conveniently stopped to look at Google maps - and as if by magic we were right by a gelato shop we’d been waiting for!

Best ice-cream so far. For €6 for both of us, you can choose two flavours - and get a wafer - lovely 😉

We cycled for about 12.5 miles. On the way back to Dave we stopped off at Lidl to stock up before returning to Switzerland. Oh the joy of cheap, or at least reasonable prices!! We couldn’t fit enough in our panniers, so dropped the food off at Dave, and went back to Lidl to stock up on water, coke etc. 

As we’re in Italy, we’ve had homemade spaghetti bolognese (again) - and now we might be a little tipsy 🥴 We bought some fizzy stuff and Aperol to make our own! 

Being here does make us question why we’re going back into Switzerland. We haven’t found many places we can actually park around Geneva - plus it’s going to be so much colder than here!