Part II
When we awoke the following morning it was like waking up to fairyland. Everywhere there were high snow clad mountains and even the valleys had a dusting of snow. We were in Switzerland. We had to wait for our steward to come to lower our beds and return the cabin to its former configuration. The train manager visited me followed by the chief steward, Francesco who redid my bandage for me and prescribed Champagne as medicine.
Almost immediately a whole bottle of Tattinger arrived at the cabin. Our steward brought us breakfast, which consisted of finely chopped fruit, bread, pastries and preserves. We were offered tea and coffee, but were soon happily imbibing the champagne.
We continued to pass through the mostly beautiful scenic countryside with dramatic mountains on both sides.
Eventually, after a series of long tunnels, the scenery began to change. The snow was still on the tops of the mountains, but not in the valleys.
As happened the previous night, the Maitre’d visited us and assigned us a dining================= car for lunch. We were to dine in the “Etoile du Nord”. When lunch was announced we made our way to our restaurant. I was delighted to find that this was run by Giussepe, my saviour from the night before.
Even the menus feature the individual names of the restaurant cars along with the beautiful menu.
Again the food was exquisite and it was lovely being served by Giussepe and his team of Mirko and Massimo. I chose a bottle of French wine to go with the meal based on my many visits to France with Brian.
Susie, who didn’t like duck was able to change it for something else.
As with the beef the previous night the lamb simply melted in your mouth.
The lovely thing about the meals is that it is so beautifully presented and the quantity is just perfect. The cheesecake for dessert was equally beautiful.
While we were having lunch we crossed into Italy and began to see the lakes. We eventually came to Lake Como, which is just stunning.
After the beautiful scenery of Lake Como the countryside gradually flattened out and wasn’t quite as scenic. It was time to make sure we had all our belongings and our cabin bags packed before we arrived in Venice. Due to a number of factors we were two hours late arriving, but I was happy to spend more time on such a beautiful train as the Orient Express. We had been served afternoon tea in our cabin so there was no danger of going hungry. The tea set is also beautifully engraved.
All too soon we arrived at Santa Lucia station where we were met by a representative of Venice Simplon and transferred to our hotel by shared water taxi, which in itself was an experience.