#10: [06-Aug-24]

#9: [14-Jul-17]

#8: [29-Oct-15]

#7: [22-Nov-08]

#6: [19-Jul-07]

#5: [14-Aug-05]

#3: [21-Apr-01]

#2: [29-Dec-00] (incomplete)

#1: [12-Oct-99] (incomplete)

29-Apr-2001 -- It was on a gloomy Sunday afternoon in the Tessin (southern Switzerland) when it was too cold for climbing, too grey for hiking, but not bad enough to spend the day in bed, that we decided to go and take a look at confluence point N46°E9°. We knew from the description of the attempted visit before and from the map that it was out in the lake of Lugano.

We were nursing our second cappuccinos in the little town of Gandria, when after a thorough consultation of the map, the GPS, the possible routing of the ferry boats we confidently thought, that by taking the ferry to either the smugglers museum on the other side of the lake or to Castagnola further down the lake we could visit the confluence point very easily and comfortably.

Feeling quite smug we boarded the ferry. To the amazement of all other passengers and the crew we not only stood outside on deck but instead of admiring the scenery we huddled over our GPS giving our surroundings hardly a glance. We cruised the lake for about an hour, came several times within 300m of the confluence but we couldn‘t let that count of course!

Frankly disappointed we got off at Lugano and punished ourselves with a big cold ice cream. Just beside the ice-cream stall there was a little sign saying: Boat of hire no permit required. Hmmm... Swiss people are known to be quite stubborn. Swiss people are quite stubborn. We found the boatsman and paid a hilarious price in order to rent a tiny little boat. We braved wind and weather and went out into the lake with our powerless little motorboat. After hours and hours (about 36 minutes) the GPS told us we had to be on/in/at the confluence point. Taking the pictures proving our success turned out to be quite difficult. The boat just wouldn't keep still! The screen of the GPS simply turned out as a greyish slob on the pictures. Sorry you will have to believe us anyway! We had a great day out and it we will include confluence point hunting on the to-do-list of all our future holidays.

In the Lago di Lugano.