The wedding had been so organised and run with such military precision that we were back at Peggy by 2pm. We found a campsite near the small town and arranged to meet the wedding team for dinner before they set off back to Italy that night.

As we parked Peggy next to a field full of cows we noticed an enormous bull eying us ferociously and heading towards us looking like he was on a mission. I dont know whether he thought Peggy was another bull but he was not keen on us at all!!

A huge storm rolled in as we met with Andrea and Max to eat and we gave it up as a bad job and wished them safe travels on the road back, the rain was torrential and showed no sign of stopping so we battened down Peggys hatches and spent the evening watching movies in bed and planning our onward journey.

The next day we hit the gorgeous road to Switzerland. We decided to take the back roads and make the most of the drive through the stunning scenery. We watched in awe as Ski paths sliced their way through the trees like stripes of shaved hair, the air fresh and clean and the villages pristine, layered with flowered balconies. Mountains jut from behind endless green rolling hills and I found myself jealous of the blue crystal clear water rushing through the gorgeous landscape.

We drove until almost dark and found a secret spot to park up for the night at the edge of the river in a logging station. Piles and piles of huge tree trunks were stacked in the open space so we pulled up and joined them by the peacefully gurgling Lake.

We were up bright and breezy and really excited as we were due to arrive at our next wedding location that afternoon and we could not wait!

Robert who was helping us plan our 57th wedding was the very first person to ever contact us with an offer of help the very day we arrived in Canada! This wedding was a long time coming and the saddest thing was that we weren’t even going to get to meet him, our timing was so bad and robert was working in America for the entire time we were due to be in Switzerland!

We arrived in the beautiful serene Lugano at around 2pm, it had seemed to take FOREVER to get there, the winding roads were riddled with road works, winding troll ladders and our breaks spent most of the journey sending plumes of black smoke out behind us BUT we had made it and forgot about it immediately as we pulled up outside the Swiss Diamond hotel!

Two uniformed men came running over to Peggy from the hotel and opened the doors to let us out. I rarely use my passenger door and normally get out of the back door which meant that the poor man was scared to death (and I embarrassed to death) as books, pens and shoes fell out of the door and onto the path around his feet. We hadn’t expected such a welcome so I had on a pair of pyjama shorts and Alex had on his jogging bottoms. We looked like gypsies…which, I suppose we are really. Anyway we laughed and the doormen insisted on taking Peggy’s keys to park her…alongside the Porsches, Bentleys and other fancy cars.

She was so big that there wasn’t room to get in the side doors so in our PJ’s we had to climb in the back door and clamber over the bed to get in to collect our things. The ever helpful staff waited patiently to carry our bags, we had to explain to them that we hadn’t even packed them yet!

You would think we would be more organised by now wouldn’t you but in our defence we didn’t expect such an amazing welcome!

The concierge checked us in when we had finished messing about and showed us to our incredible room overlooking the lakes, mountains and gorgeous little villages. We dropped our 10 carrier bags and were taken on the grand tour around the beautiful spa, pools and restaurant and just made so incredibly welcome!

We went immediately into the spa and relaxed in the steam room until we could take no more, we swam in the pool which we had all to ourselves and lounged in the serene space on the cosy loungers, it was AMAZING and just what we needed, even after our few days relaxing in Peggy!

Another huge storm blew in in the afternoon so we ate in the fabulous restaurant and watched the lightning bounce along the skies while we ate and felt literally like royalty. I still can’t quite believe that I had the audacity to ask if the menu price was for two people or just one. It was for one but totally worth it! We totally spoiled ourselves rotten, it only seemed fair as the hotel were spoling us rotten too!

We spent the next day wandering the gorgeous little streets of Morcote along the lake enjoying the sun on our backs, we relaxed some more in the spa and risked the storm on the evening to walk the kilometer to the next village for pizza and wine, we ate and drank plenty and actually fell over drunk walking back to the hotel! Alex decided to give me a piggy back and when my shoe fell off instead of putting me down to pick it up he bent over and we became a little top heavy and fell over hahahaaa!!

We really truly relaxed for those two days and even though it had only been 6 days since wedding 56, we were ready to get married for the 57th time the very next day!

Images as watermarked (ie…all the good ones) by Milo Zaneccia