The DadLadTour (Now Actually In Switzerland)

Day 1 (Part 1) – Manchester to Zürich

9th July 2025

The alarm I set on my phone goes off.

At 0430…Even though half asleep, I slap the screen silencing whatever ghastly tune I set for it to play. Well, the track is one from my iPhone and is one I like so it’s actually an incredibly great tune but, at 0430, everything sounds absolutely ghastly.

“Why on earth did I set such an early alarm?” I groan.

Moments later I remember.

IT’S SHOWTIME!!

I’m out off bed, dressed and downstairs with my teeny-tiny backpack and smaller “day” bag. I’m ready to rock. Although at my age it’s more of a slow shamble.

I’m outside #SonInLawNo1’s door at 0530.

Should I ring the bell? I’m torn. I don’t want to wake #GrandDaughterNo1. As I’m deciding, Liam opens the door. We’re on the road minutes later.

Patchy fog on the M62. Not the most evocative title for a song, Lindisfarne said it better in 1971, but it’s accurate. The mist burns away as we drop down from the UK motorway network’s highest point. Lancashire is bathed in sunlight before us. It usually rains when I visit Manchester so it’s nice that this early morning it isn’t.

We arrive at T2. I choose to go “up” and leave the van on the top (second) level of a short-term park area. It seems to be made of Meccano and rattles and “pings” alarmingly as we traverse over it. I assume it is safe.

A 10 minute walk negotiating roundabouts outside the airport before we decide on using an elevated travel-way. Much safer.

Into “Giraffe” for a fry-up and a coffee. Thankfully it’s not bad – it may be the last meal we can afford on our trip.

Our flight is delayed a little as the inbound aircraft was late. Our estimated departure time moves from 0850 to 0911.

We play “spot the Lioness fan”. Some are easy, the England shirts are a reasonably good clue. Other passengers look like they could be football fans going out for the game but they’re not displaying any colours.

We spot one of our Man United (MUWFC) “pals” from LSV. We chat with Michaela as we wait to board. She’s going out for 15 days and has tickets for tonight’s match, the Wales game and a dearth of post-group matches. I again ponder if it’s possible to stay for England’s final group match on Sunday. Liam says Sarah would kill me. He’s not wrong.

On the plane and after a little wait for everyone to get onboard, our Airbus A321 is towed from the stand. We’re on our way!!

Then as we wait to taxi, we’re told that a fellow passenger is unwell and wants to disembark the plane. Wants to! We’re going back to stand 907. Boo!

Mr. Poorly is off – red-carded – and at 1007 we’re told we have a departure slot. But have to wait for three planes to land; another 5 or so minutes pass by.

Then….we’re off. Again.

I chat with the young woman to my left. She flying out for the game too. But she’s one of those travelling incognito. She has the window seat, Liam has the aisle and I’m piggy in the middle.

Her name is Katie and she tells us she is half Dutch and half English so, whatever tonight’s result, she can’t really lose. She’s also an Arsenal fan and seems quite chipper about some silverware they won recently. This subject pops up several times during the flight. Champions League winners…pah!

Half-Dutch Katie is staying out in Switzerland and is travelling all over the country. For a staggering three weeks! Jealous…? Much…? Not! She reckons the trip – flights, accommodation, travel card (£500!) – will set her back around £4,500. Ouch.

It’s a relatively quick flight and before we know it we land at Zürich. Peeping through the aircraft windows we failed to spot any mountains. I expected mountains everywhere but the countryside I can see looks quite flat. Probably not the best idea to build an airport too close to mountains we decide.

Michaela reappears as I wait outside the loos. Not that I’m the type of chap to usually wait outside toilets but Liam has popped in to the gents. I wish her a good trip and, #SonInLawNo1 refreshed, The DadLadTour team head off to find a tram.

After several minutes of peering at departure boards and deciphering route numbers, we decide we’d most likely have better luck locating the tram service we need if we are at a stop for trams and not one for buses.

The trams here are quick, clean and quite quiet. And very punctual – good time keeping is something we expected and we are not disappointed in this or any time during the days to come.

Four stops later we alight at Glattbruch and walk in search of tonight’s hotel/apartments. It’s an interesting neighbourhood. Very quiet, little traffic and obviously residential. Soon we arrive – Liam is quite an accomplished traveler and a more than useful travelling companion. Handy to have around. Well, he had to have some good points. He leads us to the hotel door and then downloads an app and enters a code taken from his booking. The code reveals a digital key to access firstly the hotel and then our individual rooms.

Liam touches his phone to the sensor. Nothing. He tries again. A green light flashes and he turns the handle. Nothing. He does this several times with the same result. He instructs me to get the app and enter a second code – we have separate rooms and need our own digi-keys.

I try to access the hotel. Several times. This is going well. We decide that the codes probably don’t work until nearer our check-in time. This is 90 minutes hence. As we make one final attempt to persuade the door to open – Aladdin like – a woman inside the hotel gestures at us through the glass. She’s beckoning us to go around the side of hotel.

We do this and discover the hotel entrance. We’d just spent ten minutes at the rear door. Wrong tram stop, wrong hotel door – a pattern is developing.

Our rooms are not ready. We anticipated this and ask if we can leave our bags safely in reception. We’re shown to a small alcove that has no door. We don’t want to risk our bags – they literally contain all our possessions – and ask if we can get in early. No. We charm her and, eventually, wear her down. She makes a call – to housekeeping? – and is told we can have one room now. Excellent! We dump our gear and, after changing into fresh England shirts – the new white Lioness ones – we head out.

This time the trams aren’t as elusive to find. On the way we fall into conversation with a man walking his dog. It’s a nice dog, shaggy furred, and I can’t tell what breed it is. I’m told she is a Corgi and I’m surprised as I didn’t know you got long-haired Corgis. She has wonderfully weird eyes – one is the palest blue, the other brown. We’re told that she is “part good, part wicked” and are asked if we can tell which eye is which part of her character. Yep…that mesmerising blue eye is definitely the dodgy side. Seeing our shirts, the man says the dog is our good luck charm for our game. I ask the man the mutt’s name. It’s Mary Poppins. Of course it is!

#LuckyOmenNo1

At the first stop our tram makes, four England fans board. Two wear “Moorhouse 13” shirts – though they aren’t the goalie kits. Mary Earps would go mental!

The other two, like I do, wear “Kelly 18” shirts. They move to the rear of the tram. Liam passes me his phone to look at.

“That’s Kelly’s dad,” he tells me. Sure enough, the picture is of the chap that just got on. Liam pesters me to approach Chloe’s Dad and I agree – I’m certain it was his idea – so we move down the tram and chat with him. He’s very nice about it. Yes, he is her dad. No, he doesn’t know if she is starting tonight. Yes, he’s out here for as long as the team is. We only harass him for a few minutes. Any longer would be rude.

#LuckyOmenNo2