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2 June 1922
Hotel d'Angleterre, Montana-sur-Sierre, Switzerland
My dear Ida,
I am at last on the balcony overlooking the same mountains. Its hot with a small wind: grasshoppers are playing their tambourines & the church bells of old Montana are ringing. How we got here I shall never know! Every single thing went wrong. The laundry didn't come back in time. We were off late. Brett was laden with large parcels which we could not pack & which she promised to store for us - until when? And only when we got to the Gare de Lyons we remembered it was Whitsun. No porters. People wheeling their own luggage. Swarms & thousands of people. Fifteen thousand young gymnasts de Provence arriving & pouring through one. Poor Jack who had my money gave away a 500 note instead of a 50. And at last arrived at the Couchettes we found ordinary lst class carriage with 3 persons a side. No washing arrangements - nothing. It was the cursed Féte de Narcisse at Montreux yesterday so conducted parties crammed the train. What a night! And the grime! At Lausanne we both looked like negroes. Then came a further rush for the Sierre train (registered luggage tickets lost) & finally two hours late we arrived at the Belle Vue, starving, as we had no food with us & there was no food on the train. But that enchanted hotel was more exquisite than ever. The people so kind and gentle, the wavy branches outside the windows, a smell of roses and lime blossom. [To Ida Baker, 4 June 1922.]