Ascona

This morning was cloudy and warm, but not as hot as I was expecting it to be. We went for a short run with Xena along the lakeside and back again. There was a wonderful selection of food for breakfast, delicious fruits and all sorts of things to order. Somehow it was spoilt by another smoker sitting next to us and puffing away all through our breakfast - I have noticed that there are a lot of smokers here, and no one seems to have converted to e-cigarettes. 

After breakfast we went and booked ferry tickets to Isole di Brissago, which is only 15 minutes away. It is a tiny island that was once privately owned by an Anglo-Irishman, Richard Fleming, whose wife developed a botanical garden with plants from all around the world. It eventually was sold by the next owner, Emden, to the municipality of Ascona and Brissago and it opened to the public as a botanical garden in 1950. There are numerous exotic plants there but sadly we were a bit late in the season and many flowers had died off already, like the proteas. By now it was extremely hot, the sun had broken through the clouds and we had bright blue skies. We stupidly did not read the ferry timetable properly so we missed the ferry back to Ascona and had a long wait until the next one. We found a shady part of the garden and sat and waited. We each had a scoop of delicious Movenpick ice cream - definitely mango sorbet for me and not ice cream - and some home made lemonade while we waited. The extra is of Ascona as we were leaving on the ferry this morning.

We did not feel like lunch so once Xena was back in the air conditioned hotel room to cool down and rest, we went down to the hotel pool for a while. It was just so hot even sitting in the shade. Much later when it was slightly cooler, at about 6pm, we went for another long walk where I took this photo of the yachts in Porto Patriziale Ascona. Xena enjoyed having. little swim in the lake, she is not usually a swimmer but I think she was so hot that she found it quite appealing.

Talking about yachts we are finding the sinking of the super yacht Bayesian slightly suspicious. So sad that one person died and six people are still missing, what a tragedy. If you know the background of the owner it is a bit puzzling.

We have been invited to a celebration of life service for our dear friend who died nearly 2 weeks ago. However it is quite soon and in Los Angeles so we have some decisions to make.