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The Italian-speaking canton of Ticino ( Tessin in German and French; www.tourism-ticino.ch ) occupies the balmy, lake-laced southern foothills of the Alps. It's radically different from the rest of the country in almost every way: culture, food, architecture, attitude and driving style owe more to Milan than Zurich, and the glamour of the place - its lushly wooded hills, azure lakes and date palms - often seems to blind outsiders with romance. The German Swiss in particular fall head over heels for the Latin paradise on their doorstep: it takes just three hours from the grey streets of suburban Zurich to the fragrant subtropical gardens of Lugano, and you'll find throughout the canton that printed information tends to be in Italian and German, sidelining English. Switzerland has controlled the area since the early 1500s, when it moved to secure the southern approaches of the St Gotthard Pass against the dukes of Milan. It's a cruel irony that the determinedly patriotic Ticinesi now suffer the country's highest unemployment rates, even while the region's service industries thrive, staffed by Italian guest-workers and paid for by thousands of Swiss-German tourists and second-home-owners. The main attractions are the lakeside resorts of Locarno and Lugano , where mountain scenery merges with the subtropical flora encouraged by the warm climate. The area is also known for its old churches, many containing medieval frescoes and most featuring huge external murals of St Christopher, patron saint of travellers. Unless you approach from Italy, there's only one train line in - through the 16km Gotthard Tunnel . The track's spiralling contortions on the approach climb south of Lake Luzern are famous: trains pass the onion-domed church at Wassen three times, first far above you, then on a level, and finally far below, before entering blackness at Goschenen and emerging at Airolo for the descent to Ticino's capital, Bellinzona .
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