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Quick stop in Bern

Writer's picture: Zanna WhiteZanna White

19 January 1977 - Wednesday

We were up early this morning and got breakfast at the hotel. It was not included in the price of the hotel. Susanna wanted something different from our rolls, Alice asked for Corn Flakes, and the waitress ran out to a store somewhere and bought a middle-size box (200 grams). We weren’t able to take the leftover part with us.


A taxi got us to the Stazione Centrale at 9:00 for a 9:50 train. We found ours and got on, even though it was still pretty cold in the compartment. From Milan to Bern we had our compartment, and virtually the whole train, to ourselves.


The scenery was the best we’ve had. We passed alongside Lake Maggiore and into the high mountains. We got over the Simplon Pass via a long tunnel which took over 10 minutes of high speed travel, and then another tunnel almost as long.

To get through Swiss customs, we had to show passports to two or three different men, but none did much more than take a quick look at mine and didn’t even look at Alice’s or Susanna’s. After losing ten or 15 minutes on the Italian line, we arrived in Bern on schedule when the Swiss took it over.

We got hotel and train information, including the information Bern’s only two laundromats were closed on Wednesday. The attendant at the tourist desk made our reservations (for 2 frames); we got a taxi to the Hotel Volkshaus in the center of town.

Our main activities in Bern were walking around the business district, all very compact, and visiting a large toy store. Susanna enjoyed this. They have a curvy wooden sliding board from the ground floor to the basement; after Susanna got up the nerve, she went down it several times. We found a restaurant and had a very good meal.


The bath and shower room in the Volkshaus were on the 5th floor-- we were on the 4th. We had baths and got to bed between 9 and 10 o’clock.

We didn’t see much of Bern and can’t say much about it. The weather was bad again, with snow and sleet, and the streets were slushy.


 

19 January 2022 - Wednesday

There's not much to report for the trip from Milan to Bern. I can confirm that I still enjoy a big toy store, and while I don't remember it, I can see loving the big slide. A Trip Advisor search indicates that the store we were at was a Franz Carl Weber store. Other than the store has the type of slide described by my Dad, I haven't found much else about it. It appears the main store and toy museum is in Zurich, Switzerland.

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