Vom Bergen Alle Montagnas

In a reversal of recent fates, what was likely going to be a stressful and busy day actually turned into a super chill time broken up by an incredibly nice drive in the middle. In one day we spent time in the first 2 new countries of the trip: Lichtenstein and Italy.

We started the day with a short-ish walk up the hill in Vaduz, the capital of Lichtenstein, to the schloss which turned out to be closed to visitors since it was occupied by the current, only semi-constitutional, royal family.

Treating ourselves, we popped into Liechtenstein's best, but also only, McDonald's. What they lacked in vegan options they made up for in mountain views

After what ended up only being a couple hour visit into Vaduz we set back out on the road down to Italy! After 1,000 miles and 2 weeks travelling we were finally going to make it to our first big destination. Moira has been, touch wood, very reliable so far with limited technical hiccups

After just over an hour driving through snow-crested peaks, ginormous waterfalls, and one very precarious looking rope bridge, we decided to take a quick stop in the mountains to take in some of the snow and put our wellies to good use. We even had the fortune of a small snow storm to accompany some snow angels, snow balls, and falling into huge snow drifts

Danni. Possibly dead.

Miraculously Danni survived and we made it out of the mountains but took a quick stop off at Locarno to shower in what was undoubtedly the best pool so far, featuring an outdoor thermal pool with mountain views which drifted into sunset then stars. One of the best parts of this trip is accidentally popping into historical places, and the significance of the Locarno Treaties being signed here was not lost on me, although I'm not sure Danni cared all that much...

Quick one hour hop over the mountains, completed with horrifyingly curved mountain roads, incomprehensible road works, and ~1 million roundabouts, we made it to lake Como for a well deserved rest day tomorrow.

Rob's fact of the day: there was a point on the drive from Vaduz to Locarno where we were over 300m above the peak of Ben Nevis

 Danni's fact of the day: we were so high up in the mountains that the boiling point of water was reduced to 98°C