Travel Tales
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| Europeans love their bicycles — and their cycling events. |
Every month we feature funny, cautionary, or inspiring anecdotes from travelers. If you have a true (short) travel tale to share, send it to stories@ricksteves.com. If you have a photo that illustrates it, please attach it. And don't forget to tell us your first name and the city where you live. We'd love to hear from you!
A Swiss Near-Miss
My wife and I were taking several weeks off while staying with our daughter, a classical singer in Italy.
As we drove through the Swiss mountain valleys we were hungry and in need of restrooms. We saw, in the distance, a huge parking lot filled with cars. It looked like some type of fair (we had no idea what type) but everyone was turning off the road and parking.
We asked ourselves, "What would Rick Steves do in this situation?" We turned in and parked, assuming with all these cars there must be food and restrooms.
We bought entry tickets and walked in, noticing lots of people riding all kinds of bikes. Next we saw a football field covered in real snow — in late June — where people were racing back and forth on cross-country skis. Sure enough, we found restrooms and Swiss food venders. Milk was the big seller. But we still wondered what we were attending. Finally as we walked toward the main stage — where the biggest crowd was — we heard, over loud speakers, the name "Jan Ulrich." We were at a bike race.
In fact, we had stumbled on the final stage of the Tour de Swiss bike race. We spent the rest of the afternoon watching the race with thousands on a 50-foot TV screen, and the final several miles of the race down the valley in sight at the finish line.
We had so much fun watching and interacting with fans, many of whom spoke English. When it was over, we experienced Swiss efficiency at its finest, as the parking lot emptied quickly. We hopped in the car and drove away, no problems.
Enthused by our unplanned experience — something a less flexible traveler would have missed — we spent another two weeks following the next big race: the Tour de France and Lance Armstrong's 6th win.
Thank you to everyone at Rick Steves' Europe for helping us to get more out of our vacations.
— Richard in East Lyme, CT
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