Northern Italy in Autumn (Saturday)
Saturday – Basel
We had the 9:48 am departing train on our schedule, but as I was looking over the timetable the night before, I saw that the same routing was available at 7:48. It would be nice to get home a little earlier in the day, and with us being only a five minute walk from the station, it would be no problem to make the earlier train.
Leaving Innsbruck in the early morning light
A glorious day
The view out of the train was enjoyable, made even more enjoyable by the fact that we were heading home. It had been a great trip, but it is always nice to know that I'd be cuddling with the kitties in just a few hours. The train itself wasn't the nicest one we'd been on, but it moved along well enough – until we got to Feldkirch.
This was a known "detour" – they were doing some major track construction along the route and we had been informed that a bus would transfer us from Feldkirch (AT) to Sargans (CH). I had even known about this before we left for Italy and was a little surprised that the detour was still in effect.
At the Feldkirch train station there was some confusion: the "normal bus" that runs to Sargans was waiting in the parking lot, "SARGANS" boldly lit up on the destination sign, and some people were heading for it. Fortunately (and not too surprisingly) there were a couple of helpful employees in the lot that pointed us to the proper "Express bus" that had just shown up. We toss our bags in the luggage compartment and got the prized seats right behind the driver.
Technical driver's seat!
Our route was pleasant, crossing through Liechtenstein (don't blink!) and then into Switzerland. It was about twenty minutes and then we were at the Sargans train station for our final leg home.
Following another bus through Liechtenstein
The rest of the trip was rather unremarkable, covering a lot of Switzerland that we already knew. From the station in Basel we caught our tram and were home by 1 pm. It really is amazing to think that we could travel from Innsbruck to Basel in about five hours – and that included the re-route!
Lake Zürich
The kitties were happy to see us, and I was happy to see them. It had been a long-awaited holiday and I am incredibly glad that we went when we did. But I am also happy to say that it was good to be home.