My iPhone alarm began disturbing my sleep at 3am. It always has to be early, why?
The bus was going to leaving from Florence at a shockingly early 4:30am, and I needed to get ready and journey to the meeting point ASAP. Considering that live about a million miles away from the school, I had to leave even earlier.
As I arrived at the Piazza Independente, I was greeted by other students also waiting for the arrival of the buses. We ended having about 60 students in total attending.
The two buses soon arrived and we all quickly grabbed a seat and crashed out for the next few hours.
The buses were unbelievably uncomfortable and rigid. I'd have to get used to it, oh well....
We were awoken by our travel guide/teacher who announced that we would be making a pit stop for about 20 minutes.
Sluggishly, I hopped off to stretch my legs a bit and take in some of the fresh air.
After our short hiatus, we returned to our journey.
As we traveled up north, the scenery slowly began to change drastically. More natural and fresh landscapes began to blossom.
It was quite nice to see small cottages and villages sprinkled throughout the lush countryside. It came off very much like a fable.
Here's some footage I shot as we traveled through:
Italian Countryside
We soon arrived to the northern town of Tirano, where we would board the world famous Bernina Express.
The Bernina Express is a celebrated train ride that begins in northern Italy, transverses through the Swiss Alps, and ends in the classical resort of St. Moritz, located in Switzerland.
The ride is supposedly an amazing experience, traveling over amazing vistas and jaw-dropping landscapes.
We spent a small amount of time in Tirano:
Soon the time arrived to board the Bernina Express:
The architecture of the train itself reminded me of the classical locomotives, very authentic.
The Express was going to depart from Tirano and arrive at St. Moritz, located deep in the Swiss Alps. Here's a visual shot to understand the scale of things:
We started off in the lush, splendid ground level of the Italian side of the Swiss Alps:
Utterly gorgeous.
It's was like traveling through a forgotten world, fantastical world. Technology was nowhere to be seen and everything seemed fairytale like.
The amazing thing about the journey was that you conjure up a variety of fantastical scenarios. You could imagine yourself traveling on the Hogwarts Express from Harry Potter or envision yourself venturing on the exhilarating train level from Uncharted 2. Actually talking about Uncharted, the music I listened to for the duration of the journey was the Trine and Uncharted 2 Soundtrack. Quite immersive!
We passed by a phenomenal waterfall nicely crested into the Alps:
Waterfall
We also stopped by a beautiful, peaceful, and actually BLUE lake:
Lake
As we ascended, things soon began to change.
The temperature began to drop and the scenery although jaw-dropping, was extremely high and quite daunting.
Swiss Alps 1
Swiss Alps 2
Swiss Alps 3
Sticking my head out the window, I felt the strong, cool breeze of the Alps wash over me:
Quite refreshing.
It's also worth noting that the place where we started was now just a small blimp, due the incredible height we were at.
The continuous movement of the express kept the momentum going, constantly spiraling and ascending, you just never knew what jaw-dropping landscape would come around the bend.
There were also some moments when we descended into dark tunnels. We would be cloaked in utterly blackness, but as soon as we would see light at the end of the tunnel, anticipation would build for the next sight to make itself apparent. And time and time again, we would be floored by the scope, scale, and depth the Alps showcased.
While we were all taking in the once-in-a-lifetime experience, our teacher/tour guide was totally knocked out:
Wow, he was missing out...
As we transversed through the Alps and reached higher into the mountains, the temperature rapidly dropped.
I knew we were in Switzerland:
Before I knew it, the entire landscape had become fully white. It was as if I'd been teleported into a whole new world.
I saw my first Swiss local, he looked totally authentic:
The buildings were also wickedly classical:
Snow and ice were all over the deep landscape. I stuck my head out to grab some priceless footage and ended up almost freezing to death. But hey, it was in the name of the blog so it was worth it!
We came upon a fantastic iced lake that sprawled through the mountains:
Ice Lake
Soon our crescendo peaked and we began traveling through the mountains at a level pace.
Snowy Mountains 1
Snowy Mountains 2
We arrived at the snow sprinkled St.Moritz at about 3pm, where we were greeted by all things Swiss, including cheese and men with wild mustaches.
I cannot explain to you the inspiration the ride on the Bernina Express had on me. I was lost in an abyss of a fantastical world that I only thought existed in films, games, and novels. Inspiration is hard to come by in a world where technology and man make themselves apparent, but when you do find it, it tastes utterly celestial.
Here's yours truly, after the draining journey:
We met up with our buses in St.Moritz and took a very short ride to our hotel.
The rest of the day was free, with a dinner scheduled later in the evening.
We ended up just exploring the nearby surroundings which turned out to be quite spectacular.
Here's a shot of the small town of St.Moritz behind me.
Here are some striking visuals that capture the delicate quality of the flourishing countryside:
At about 7pm, we returned to the resort for an authentic Swiss dinner which actually turned out to be more Italian than anything else:
Since I'd been running on basically 3 hours of sleep, I ended up calling it a night after dinner.
We would have to be up by 8am tomorrow and travel to the acclaimed Como Lake.
No rest for the Wicked!
Unfortunately, I needed rest...
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