Lugano

Happily, we survived our second weekend away, this time to Lugano. As expected, it basically combined elements of Italy and the rest of Switzerland--Italian language, food, energy, high heels (women) and pointy shoes (men); Swiss cleanliness, efficient transport, prices and tourists (it's really popular with Swiss Germans). Kids were running around all over the place, which you wouldn't necessarily see here, and at one point an entire family surrounded Munchkin to ooh and ah at her while saying "complimenti!", which we think meant "congratulations". (And can I just say how much I love hearing Italian? The most mundane conversation sounds like people are either going to kiss each other or punch each other when they're through.) Overall I still prefer the real thing (Italy, that is...I kind of enjoy the chaos) to the Swiss version, but it was nevertheless really nice. Other than the incredible gelato (why is it so hard to find good ice cream here when we're so close to Italy?), probably the highlight was the lake. We walked along the lakeshore...





...and took a boat across the lake to the charming little town of Morcote, with papa and Munchkin getting a little goofy along the way...





...and we even tried some new fashion options to protect Munchkin from the sun, neither of which seemed to thrill her.





So now that we've tried two weekends away, in a couple of weeks we'll have the ultimate test: our first flight. Since we didn't take a vacation this summer (funny how childbirth does that), we've decided to take a week in September and go to one of our favorite places: Spain. Can we survive a week of flights, riding trains around Andalucia, sightseeing in the hot weather, seeing if babies are welcome in tapas bars, etc? We shall see...