007 Travel story: Lake Maggiore (ITALY & SWITZERLAND) 2015

In order to read our Italy 007 travel story from day one, click here. 

Saturday 1 August 2015

After breakfast in Mürren, we also visited Hotel Eiger to meet the staff. We have visited there before, see our hotel introduction here.


Then 007 Travelers (Pirita, Mika and Little Agent Traveler) continued from Switzerland back to Italy.


Traveling by car

From: Stechelberg, Switzerland
To: Maccagno, Italy
Toll charges: 0,00 EUR
Road tax: 40,00 EUR (Must be payed once while driving in Switzerland) 

We had lunch in Locarno´s Ristorante Lungolago, at Via Bramantino 1. In Locarno Bond has eaten the best meals of his life, according to John Gardner´s Bond book "Nobody Lives for Ever" (1986). All quotes in this travel story are from that book.

Good food!

Beautiful, isn´t it!

Then we continued towards Maccagno.



Maccagno

About:

Maccagno con Pino e Veddasca is a comune in the province of Varese, in Lombardy, that will be formed in 25 May 2014 from fusion of the communes of Maccagno, Pino sulla Sponda del Lago Maggiore and Veddasca. A referendum to create this comune was held on 1 December 2013. The referendum was passed with 77% yes and 33% no votes.












We reached our hotel, which was really nice!

Accommodation

Hotel: Albergo Paradiso ***
Address: Via Giuseppe Verdi 5, 21010 Maccagno Superiore, Italia
Booked: Via booking.com
Price: 98,33 EUR / 1 night
City tax: 0,00 EUR / person / night
Breakfast: Included
Wi-Fi: Free
Parking: Free, reservation needed
Check-in:11.00 - 22.00
Check-out: 06.00 - 10.00
Room type: Triple room, 16m2

We got room number 10, which was on first floor. 

The room had a big and great bathroom, which we really liked!

Little Agent Traveler tested hotel´s swimming pool and enjoyed a lot.

Later during the evening we drove between Italy and Switzerland. We drove to Brissago, which is a municipality in the district of Locarno in the canton of Ticino in Switzerland. Brissago lies on the western shore of Lake Maggiore and includes the Brissago Islands.


There we took photos of Hotel Mirto au Lac where Bond stays in book "Nobody Lives For Ever" (1986) and has stayed earlier also. Hotel was closed when we visited there.
The hotel´s address is Viale Lungolago 2. 
.

Lake Maggiore (Italian: Lago Maggiore, lit. 'Greater Lake') is a large lake located on the south side of the Alps. It is the second largest lake in Italy and the largest in southern Switzerland. The lake and its shoreline are divided between the Italian regions of Piedmont and Lombardy and the Swiss canton of Ticino. Located halfway between Lake Orta and Lake Lugano, Lake Maggiore extends for about 65 kilometres (40 miles) between Locarno and Arona.

"But when the red-brown roofs of the lakeside villages came in sight, Bond began to laugh. Suddenly his gloom lifted and he recognised his own pettiness.

Though his favourite part of the country lay around Geneva, Bond also loved this corner of Switzerland that rubbed shoulders with Italy. As a young man he had lazed around the shores of Lake Maggiore, eaten some of the best meals of his life in Locarno, and once, on a hot moonlit night, with the waters off Brissago alive with lamp-lit fishing boats, in the very ordinary little hotel by the pier, had made unforgettable love to an Italian countess.

It was to this hotel, the Mirto du Lac, that he now drove. It was a simple family place, below the church with its arcade of cypresses, and near the pier where the lake steamers put in every hour.

As Bond left his room to go down to the bar in the corner of the restaurant, a black Series 3 Porsche 911 crept quietly into the forecourt and parked with its nose thrust towards the lake. Its occupant climbed out, locked the car and walked with neat little steps back the way he had driven, up towards the church.

It was some ten minutes later that the people at the tables and in the hotel bar heard the repeated piercing screams. The steady murmur of conversation faded as it became obvious the screams were not part of some lighthearted game. These were shrieks of terror. Several people in the bar started towards the door. Some men outside were already on their feet, others were looking around to see where the noise was coming from. Bond was among those who hurried outside. The first thing he saw was the Porsche. Then a woman, her face white and her hair flying, her mouth stretched wide in a continuous scream, came running down the steps from the churchyard. Her hands kept going to her face, then wringing the air, then clutching her head. She was shouting, ‘Assassinio! Assassinio!’ – Murder – as she pointed back to the churchyard."

Then we drove to Cannobio, which is is a town and comune on Lago Maggiore in Piedmont, Italy.  

There we walked on a square and had dinner in Restaurant Jello.

Of course we visited Bond places such as where Bond is supposed to pick up Bond girl Principessa Sukie Tempesta's friend Nannette "Nannie" Norrich in front of church Madonna della Pieta.

"Bond nodded, indicating that she should tell him her problem.

‘I’ve an old school friend in Cannobio, just along the coast . . .’

‘Yes, I know Cannobio, a one-horse Italian holiday resort. Picturesque in a touristy kind of way. Not far.’

‘I’m afraid I told her we’d pick her up on our way through. I was meant to meet her last night. She’s waiting at that rather lovely church on the lakeside – the Madonna della Pietà. She’ll be there from noon onwards.’

He had no wish to go into Italy at all, and from what he could recall of the centre of Cannobio, it was the perfect place for a set-up. The lakeside road and the front of the Madonna della Pietà were always busy, for Cannobio was a thriving industrial centre as well as holidaymakers’ paradise. The square in front of the church was ideal territory for one man, or a motorcycle team, to make a kill. Was Sukie, knowingly or not, putting him on the spot?

There was a lot of activity going on around the Madonna della Pietà when they arrived. Standing by a small suitcase, looking supremely elegant, was a very tall young woman with hair the colour of a moonless night, pulled back into a severe bun."

Then it was time to drive back to our hotel, and go to sleep after this wonderful and beautiful day.


The next morning we had breakfast and it was time to move on.

Our next 007 Travel story: Back to Milan! 


See more 007 TRAVEL STORIES here