We wake after a very nice, very hard 10+ hour sleep, to find a partly cloudy and very cold and windy day.  Our original itinerary was to explore the Graubunden canton, but the weather forecast has dampened (literally) those plans, so we are pivoting and instead we are going South in search of the sun.  Even though it would be a lovely 10-minute walk over to the Rageths this morning, it is freezing cold with a wind, thus we are chauffeured by Sigis back to their flat for breakfast, chez Gaby.  A lovely spread of bread, cheese, meats and eggs sates us completely as we catch up with Matthias, who will be joining us for our adventures today.  Finishing breakfast, the skies are relatively clear and you can see the mountains from their balcony – covered with snow part-way up.  The snow has just appeared within the last few days, Gaby tells us, and they never saw snow at all last year.  It was that warm all winter long.  Talk about climate change!

After our full breakfast, we hop in the car, with Matthias driving, and head out toward the Autobahn, passing a gathering in the square in Domat/Ems.  This is the beginning of the Carnival celebration – for some reason no one seems to know, Domat/Ems starts Carnival on 11/11 at 11:11am.  A marching band is getting ready to begin playing and a crowd is forming as we drive past on our way out to the highway and toward the Italian border.  The mountains are gorgeous, we love gazing out at the snow covered peaks as we get closer to the San Bernadino pass where everyone says we will pass through into better weather.

And, voila!  We do!  On one side of the pass it is cloudy and rainy, on the other?  Sunshine and warmer temps.  They call this area the sunny living room of Switzerland, and we can see why! Surprisingly, we easily find a parking space then head out into the town to stroll the little cobblestone streets of this picturesque town.  This being the “Italian” part of Switzerland (we are only 40 km or so from the border), everything is in Italian here:  The spoken language, the signs, the writing on the police and ambulance vehicles, the architecture.  It is really quite interesting how “Italian” everyone is here in this area of Switzerland! 

Meandering through a weekend market in the streets, we make our way up to the Castle perched atop the town to take in the beautiful vistas.  It is gorgeous up here, sunny and bright with incredible views across the now snow peaked Alps.  Everything is so gorgeous and green.  An absolutely perfect place to spend our early afternoon in the lovely weather.

We stop for a drink at an outdoor café, then walk back through the pretty little town to the car, heading to the train station to drop off Matthias who is going straight back to Zurich from here.  Hugs and heartfelt farewells with promises to see each other soon ensue, then off he goes to the train and us to the car for our stunning ride back through the Alps, complete with snowcapped mountains, waterfalls and castles in the distant hills.

The Rageths drop us off at our apartment for a little rest, then, come back to pick us up for dinner. We were going to walk to the apartment, but it is far too cold and windy.  From the apartment though, we do walk over to the Hotel Sternen where we have our dinner reservations.  There we have a delightful dinner starting with Capuns – a Graubunden special made of meat wrapped in a spinach leaf with a delicious sauce and fried beetroot on top.  Oh my!  It is the best!  For the mains, we get schnitzel, of course!  Sigis has stew with spatzle and Gaby has fried fish (I think – I can’t remember!!).  We all enjoy a lovely meal and are stuffed at the end – but of course Sigis must have dessert!!!  We let him partake in a monstrous sundae all by himself, while we finish off our beer and wine.

The weather seems to have held, no rain yet, so we walk from the hotel to the apartment – passing on the way the 11/11 celebration still in full swing, complete with costumes and another band.  We stand and watch a bit, before continuing our walk through the quieter part of Domat/Ems – ending up at the lane for our apartment. 

Another lovely day and evening with the Rageths!  Tomorrow….boo hoo…is our last.