Milano and the Swiss Hospital System

Next day we headed into Milan. We managed to find our way through the city to our flat and the caretaker had our key ready. Even better, the flat was bright and pleasant inside and in an interesting and convenient spot. It had been hard to choose one via email so we were relieved to find it was a good place. The only catch is that it is on the fifth floor with no lift (very common in Europe). So we spent the next hour or two running up and down the stairs unloading all our stuff.Settled in we went off to try and solve where to park. Apparently resident parking permits are hard to come by so we couldn’t park in our street. Luckily the landlady told us about a nearby parking amnesty the next week. For the moment we purchased some scratch off parking tickets and eventually worked out what all the signs and road markings meant. We left the car that night out on a nearby road and were relieved to find it survived its first night alone in a big city.Next day we looked around town a little and then on Sunday headed north for a ride in the Swiss Alps. In an hour and half we were in the mountains and getting the bikes off the roof. Although expensive the motorways certainly let you get around quickly. The ride looped through some small villages, went up a monster bitumen climb and the rewarded us with some nice singletrack along a forested ridge. Dropping back into the town where we left the car I tried a jump off a road onto some singletrack and landed in a rut. The bike kicked left and I hit a chainlink fence, slid along it and collected the steel girder used as a fence post. After a few moments of reflection I struggled up and contemplated my sore jaw, wrists and shoulder. Everything still seemed to work so I rolled on to catch up to Kath. Back at the car my right wrist didn’t seem so good so we dropped into Lugarno hospital on our way out. They expertly diagnosed a sprain and sent me on my way.Tuesday on the phone I mentioned the crash to Martin and described where my wrist hurt. Alicia then said that was exactly where a scafoid break would hurt and that I needed an x-ray because untreated these breaks could cause part of the bone to die off. I headed off to the hospital and after an exciting 5 hour stay which tested both my patience and my Italian I got a cast on my broken wrist. It was the scafoid but fortunately it was a clean break and no immediate operation was required. So much for my stereotypes about the precise nature of Swiss people providing a competent hospital system.