switzerland is a marvelous place. the trains are always on time. everything seems so clean and well maintained. when we traveled from milan to st gallen, the italian train broke down so we had to switch trains and ended up arrived 10 mins late. we had a 3-minute connection that we missed so it took us another hour before we were able to meet up with brianna in st gallen. oh well. at least we made it, right? back to zürich... it was great, martin met us at the train station right as we arrived. he also helped us get our bus tickets and guided us back to their place. thao came home shortly after we were able to settle in for a bit.
we spent the weekend chez thao & martin. i personally had a fabulous time getting to know the couple and look forward to seeing them again either by returning for another visit or hanging out when they are in the states. on saturday, we explored zürich (out and about for gifts). unfortunately, it rained most of the day. the sun decided to show itself on sunday. thao & martin took us to the swiss alps in lucerne. it was a truly wondrous experience. You can find some photos here. we hung out in old town lucerne afterwards. it's interesting how nothing is open on sunday. so we couldn't do much. luckily, the businesses at the train station were open (packed actually) and we were able to pick up food there. lisa and i flew out the next morning back to london for half a day, equipped with enough swiss chocolate to last a year, or so.after which, we spent a few hours at harrod's and shopping. funny how after shopping in zürich, london seemed cheap. and the next day, it took us over 20 hours to get home between layovers and delays.