The day began early at 3 am when I was awakened by rain and thunder but resulted in welcome, cooler temperatures in contrast to the hot and sticky days we’ve experienced since we’ve been here. Still, even though I woke up at 12:35 am and during the rainstorm, I was able to go back to sleep until 6:24 am, which is the first time on this trip that I’ve felt somewhat rested.

The morning was taken up with a boat trip to Rapperswil-Jona, a charming town known as the “town of roses” on Lake Zurich. Vreni Griffifth kept apologizing for the lack of blue skies but it was of little importance to us —just being on the boat was refreshing enough.

We arrived in Rapperswil and found a restaurant called Paia Poke, featuring Hawaiian food. Keeping with the Hawaiian theme, there was a store named “Lilo” next door.

Next we toured the Parish Church of St. John, which we found to be in immaculate condition, and of course, there was a pipe organ in the balcony.

The Rapperswil Castle was built in the 13th century and home to the Polish Museum. However, apparently there is some controversy surrounding this as evidenced by this statement from Wikipedia:

In 2008 some Rapperswil residents petitioned local authorities to evict the Polish Museum from its home in the castle, as two historical museum locations (Stadtmuseum and Polish Museum) estimated to be too expensive. The museum was conducting a petition campaign to retain the Museum in the castle, but although the Stadtmuseum (museum of local history was kept respectively renewed at its location at the nearby Breny house at Herrenberg in 2012/13,^[6] indeed, the future of the Polish Museum remains unsure.

We walked around the town a bit before deciding to eat lunch at a bakery which Vreni had patronized over the last 30 years. Bill Potter and Vreni had a green salad which included sauerkraut as well as corn, and I had a “tarte salmon” which looked like a pizza except for having a very crispy and thin crust.

In the evening we attended a concert of lighthearted music at the Christkatholisch Church called “OrgelStimmHorn,” which featured a woman yodeler and singer, a horn player who played horns of all sizes, and an organist who played a chamber organ as well as a full-size instrument: Franziska Wigger, Hanspeter Wigger and André Briel. It was the first time I had seen or heard the different sizes of alphorns and bugles. Even though the music of Bach, Scarlatti, Franck and Jeremiah Clarke (listed incorrectly as Joseph Haydn) was played, the rest of the program consisted of Swiss yodeling and other light music, even a rendition of “Amazing Grace.” As Vreni said, the best thing about the concert was that it was short, less than an hour.

Of course, after the concert, we were in the mood for ice cream so we indulged ourselves! Tomorrow we’ll change hotels and rest up before joining our tour in Lucerne.