Tag Archives: Locarno

Day 15 – Locarno and Lugano

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Today is our last full day in the Ticino region of Switzerland. We began our day with breakfast in our suite before heading down to Locarno. Here are some photos from our explorations.

We looked around the Piazza Grande, which is a popular spot for outdoor concerts.

Heading back to the waterfront, we did a typical touristic thing, by taking this “train” tour of the city.

With the skies still very grey, we decided to hop on a train to the nearby town of Lugano, which is another popular town in the Italian part of Switzerland. As luck would have it, the weather was a bit sunnier over there.

Lugano is a bit larger than Locarno, but has a lot of similarities. The architecture appears similar, they both have a nice waterfront (although on different lakes), and are surrounded by similar geography.

They were having an outdoor concert near the waterfront. Here’s a panoramic video of the area.

Lugano has a water jet similar (but much smaller) to that of Geneva.

After looking around Lugano for a couple of hours, we returned to the train station to head back to Locarno for dinner.

Day 14 – Exploring Locarno

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We had no specific plans today, so set out to look around the towns of Locarno and Ascona. Upon walking out of the hotel, I noticed this nice Rolls with Monaco plates parked right outside. That’s a bit nicer than the rental we got from Hertz!

Walking down the street to the funicular station, I took this photo of one of the cars heading down to Locarno.

At the funicular station, there is also a cable car you can take to go further up the mountain, which we will probably do at some point during our stay here, but for today, we will head down to explore the old town and the waterfront areas. The day was mostly overcast, but it wasn’t raining, and still pleasant for walking around.

After looking around Locarno, we went over to Ascona, where we looked around and had some ice cream by the waterfront.

After looking around the towns, we returned to the hotel to relax in the spa, and later went down to Locarno again for a late dinner.

Day 13 – Driving to Orselina

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It was once again time to move on to our next destination. After breakfast at the hotel, we took the train to Interlaken where we would pick up a rental car for the next few days. The plan was to drive to Orselina, near Locarno, in the Italian speaking region of Ticino.

Our route would take us across three different mountain passes, which we had hoped would provide for a scenic and leisurely drive.

Unfortunately, the weather today is mostly cloudy and with some heavy rain at times. During one of the rare sunny breaks, we stopped for a picnic lunch at the side of the road.

Here are some more photos from along the drive, where we have a few relatively clear weather breaks.

The drive took us through what appeared to be some stunning scenery, but it’s unfortunate that it poured rain throughout most of it.

We arrived in Locarno, and then wound our way up a series of switchbacks to the town of Orselina, and arrived at our hotel, Villa Orselina. After a welcome glass of Champagne on the terrace by reception, we were shown to our suite.

We had a lot more space than I was expecting, with a full kitchen and dining room, in addition to a large living room, bedroom, large washroom and a separate powder room off the main entrance.

The large balcony has a lovely view over Locarno, Ascona and Lake Maggiore.

While our hotel may seem a bit isolated being way up on the hill, just down the street is a funicular station that takes us right down into Locarno by the waterfront in about 5 minutes, so it’s actually very convenient. After getting settled in our room, we headed out in search of dinner.