First game of 2012 - Ticket to Ride: Switzerland - and I win!

Happy New Year!!! After the previous nights festivities, we decided to mark the start of 2012 by playing a game of Ticket to Ride: Switzerland. This latest incarnation of this great game is printed on the back of the India map in the 2nd of the recent map packs released. Representing Switzerland and the surrounding countries of Germany, France, Austria and Italy, the map is chock FULL of tunnels - no surprise in that Switzerland is nestled in the Alps. The rules are fairly standard except that Train wild cards can ONLY be used in tunnels and that means that you can pick up two train cards from the pile of 5 instead of the normal 1 in other versions of the game.

Also the tickets sometimes point from a specific country to a city instead of a a city to a city. The ticket will display a starting point (Germany) and will indicate three destinations - a close, medium and long distance location, each winning successfully more points depending on the distance of the destination.

This version of this classic game was a lot more tricky to handle, with links to countries limited and so winning routes could be easily snapped shut by the other player. Ticket to Ride Switzerland turned out to be a high stakes and high scoring game - with me winning by 1 point, even though I had lost 7 points by making a new fatal mistake by not completing a ticket when I thought I had!!

End of the Game, but as the tickets are counted up, who will win?

I did by 1 point!!

Ticket to Ride India/Switzerland arrives! Just in time to celebrate Anita passing her driving test!

Wow! Unlike real trains, just when you want a new map to turn up, two do almost together! A little unexpectedly the new Ticket to Ride India/Switzerland map turned up on Andys "Released and in store" list! Yay! I asked for him to put one aside to collect later which he dutifully did. Then I got a call from Anita to say she had passed her driving test!!! Yay!! So I thought getting the new map would be a nice present. Different but nice. I collected it from Andy and we've had a look but not played it yet. The India map is fantastic - it even has the major city in Gujurat where Anitas mum is from! The Swiss map is full of mountains and tunnels and connections to surrounding countries - like Germany, Austria, France and Italy. Can't wait to play - and congrats again to Anita for passing!