On the Gotthard, just before we arrived at the Hotel Schweizerhof,
some of us had decided that we were up to a grand evening out and decided to
meet in the lobby and take in a restaurant and a few libations.
The original plan was to head over to a Rosti Café that I
had spotted on our first evening in Luzern, not the one Patsy and I eventually
ate at, but another in the Old Town district. The plan fell to pieces as soon
as others started to show up in the hotel lobby. Everybody seemed to have a
newer idea based on some fact that someone else had told them later in the day.
Jerry Leininger even took the effort to have the desk clerk to call the place
that Kevin and Becky Raabe had mentioned to them earlier. The place turned out
to be fully booked and we went back to my original suggestion until the next
strap hanging group showed their faces. We changed our ninds again.
After some waiting on several others, four couples of us
headed for the Brew Pub that we all had noticed earlier in the day on our
walking tour. As we passed the street that lead to my original idea’s café, I
alerted the others that I would walk up that street and check out the café and
the other club that Jerry had checked on just to see if we were getting the
straight poop from those assisting us. I told them I would meet them on the
river front street or at the pub, whichever I or they reached first.
Hot footing it up the street, I located the café and
counted the empty tables to insure availability and then headed across the
square to check on the club. A sheet of paper sign on the door stated that
there was no more room at the inn even though I could plainly see plenty of
empty tables through the door.
I walked on down the alley toward the water front and as
I crested a hill and started down, I see the group of Aggies at the bottom
waiting for me. They noticed me just about the same time as I noticed them—both they and I broke
out laughing at the same instant. I didn’t find out until I joined them that
Patsy had just said that “if I was smart, I would cut through that alley and
catch up to them right here.” Well, to every body’s surprise, that’s exactly
what I had done. They all got a jolly chuckle at my expense!
We found the brewery house and I walked into the seating
area to check out the availability of tables. There were several under cover
that looked just right. I walked back out to gather the guys and during my
absence two couples of young adults took one of the longer tables just as we
were about to slide two of them together. Someone on that end of our group ask
them if they would mind moving to the smaller table and they graciously did so.
We slammed the tables together and awaited the wait staff.
Finally, a guy comes up to take our drink order. When he
got to me, I made him understand that I wanted to buy a round for the group of
young adults at the table next to us. He finally understood and ask them if it
was OK if I bought them a round and, again, they graciously conceded. At this
time the remainder of the table understood what I was about and each couple
under rote one fourth of our new friend’s bar tab—there are good people everywhere, you just have to
put forward that first step and they will literally crawl out of the woodwork,
concrete, plaster, etc…
Soon we had our beers and somebody proposed a toast. As
we raised our glasses, clinked them together and just maybe made a boisterous toast;
the brewery manager came running out of the back angrily waving his arms about and
pointing his very vicious looking finger at us as he warned us to be quite or be
evicted, we quieted down—for
the moment, at least.
I turned to our new friends behind us and ask if they
would take a group picture of us and they, again, very graciously complied.
Surrounding the table left to right: Howard and Patsy
Hatfield,
Jerry & Ginger Leninger, Lee & Joanne Billingsley,
and
Christine and Stan (Class of ’71) Key from Graham, Texas
Our waiter soon reappeared and took our food order. He
just shook his head—whether
his head shaking indicated our activity or the manager’s activity, I am not
entirely sure. It mattered not to one sole surrounding our table—the possibility of our incarceration
plus the care and feeding of eight Texas Aggies, I am sure was not in the best
interest of neither the Luzern Police nor the Swiss Government.
As I remember, each of us pretty much ordered something
different but I think Joanne was the only one who ended up with sour kraut, the
only sour kraut eaten on the entire trip through Switzerland and the portion of
Germany we were to visit—hard
to believe.
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