That’s my favorite tree-lined lakeside walk.  With my favorite red benches.

Those colors are amazing.  Nothing but sunshine, lake, and Lugano-ness there.  And once you’ve soaked that all in (or tried very insufficiently to do so), there’s a really nice hike to the right of what you’re seeing in this last picture–Monte San Salvatore.  If you’re Scott and not Hannah, there’s even some climbing to do.

If you’re moderately in shape (meaning not in shape at all), the hike takes between two and two and a half hours on the way up and about an hour on the way down.  If you’re in good shape, you can probably float to the top on muscles and memories of the lake.  It’s a nice hike, and you get to see this at the top:

And eat this at the bottom:

The Tourist bar was originally purchased by me as a joke for my roommate.  “Hey look, it says ‘Tourist’ in giant gold letters!”  That kind of joke.  But the Tourist bar played a joke on me instead–a delicious joke.  I opened it just to try it out on the way home from the grocery store (a 5-minute walk at the time), and I had finished the entire full-size chocolate bar before I got to the apartment.  Ha.  You win, Tourist bar.  Trust me, it’s good.

So now that you’ve enjoyed the lakeside, the mountains, and memories of chocolate, it’s time for some town goodness.

Yep, that kind of town goodness.  Sure, it’s the Louis Vuitton building, and I could never in my life think about buying anything inside of said building.  That doesn’t make it sad though.  That makes it excellent window-shopping territory.  There’s nothing sad about looking into a nice window and enjoying the incredible building around that nice window.  Check out the details:

You know what else is high-quality?  This guy:

Scott got this lovely shot by pretending to take a very close-up picture of me.  Nope.  Just capturing the Village People come to life.

So really, I can’t think of a place I love more than Lugano.  There’s natural beauty, man-made beauty, and even ridiculous people-watching.  It’s a triple threat.  We got pretty lucky with our timing, too.  There was a film festival (all in Italian) in the piazza outside of our hotel.  There’s the world’s best grocery store (Manor) with the world’s best views (both available year-round, thank goodness).  I highly recommend a visit there if you ever get a chance.

My favorite quote of the trip was sometime near the end of our full day in Lugano, when Scott said, “The only sad thing about Lugano is that we have to leave it.”  Agreed, sir.