Where to Switzerland - Day 10
The day we left Appenzell and drive to Italy for the next three nights! So technically, isn’t it now “Where to Italy”? This particular post will only cover the first night.
After breakfast at the guesthouse, we hit the road for Italy, stopping once over the border into Austria, which is surprisingly close to Appenzell, to purchase a particular toll-tag that we had read about for our upcoming journey. Does this mean I can officially cross Austria off the list?
We also stopped at a CoOp grocery store down the street to grab some snacks, including fresh pretzels, Starbucks Discoveries to-go coffee and special edition Red Bull’s that I have never seen in the States.
It was four and a half hours on the road before we arrived (around 2:30pm) at our stay for the next three nights: the dreamy Forestis, a boutique wellness hotel in Brixen. Since staying here, they have actually received two Michelin-keys, a new rating by Michelin specifically for hotels.
We checked in, receiving complimentary drinks while our luggage was brought upstairs. Once given our key, we headed straight up to the room, soaking in the breathtaking views of the Dolomites.
We toured our room, then we decided to wander around the beautiful property. After seeing the majority of it, we returned to our room to switch into swimsuits to enjoy the pool and many different saunas. The pool was mostly indoor but with a sliding door to reach the outdoor portion. We couldn’t get over the views!
Back in our room before dinner, we fixed cups of tea from the beverage station, went out onto our balcony and lounged on the chaise (that we ended up sleeping on one night!), drinking our tea with the sunning view as the sun started to set.
Dinner was spectacular. They switch the menu daily and use fresh ingredients from the region. This is something we constantly daydream about to this day, that’s how great it was and we are so glad the we chose the half-board option when booking our stay, which meant our dinners were included in the price, anything we added on at dinner would just be additional.
We had alpine beef tartare, a cream soup with Jerusalem artichokes, risotto with mountain pine and mountain trout, a homemade potato ravioli, deer saddle with black cabbage and Kaiser pear, a filet of alpine beef, and South Tyrolean apple with soya yogurt, stone pine and rosemary for dessert. It was the best dinner I think we had ever had.
After dinner, perhaps a bit buzzed off the bottle of Dom we ordered, I sat down to edit some photos while Austin passed out in the plush bed.
Everything about this place was a dream. And we thought the Backstage Apartment in Zermatt was our favorite! We have been dreaming about our return ever since. And this was only the start of day one!
