Europe Interrail 2004

 24/09/04 Day 83 - The Last day. Also 8 months... Our third "anniversary" in Europe got off, in my opinion, to a bad start. Aside from the constant exhaustion, my only real anticipation of going home is an end to the unrepresentative and upsetting irritableness? in our relationship. So we had our last breakfast - enjoyable despite being denied our own fruit at Bosco - and managed after a while of false starts to head for an underwear shop. This was a waste of time. So we set off in search of our picture spot, eventually found it and got a gondolier to take the photo. Unfortunately he seemed more intent on getting his gondola in. Then our plans deteriorated as I bluntly refused to wander down another street, and, slightly more influentially, the entire city began to scaring & carry and as horrible dark clouds swept in. It is interesting how the Unbroken sun gates fauna! Through the canals and streets in a furious and dust-carrying way that hurts the whole city into a freez...

  23/09/04 Day 82 (there's no point just to San Marco taking lifts) We were going to get up early first everyone in the whole world decided they wanted to have a shower at the same time as us and we ended up leaving late and getting to San Marco to find a 10 min (only a guess) wait for the basilica and the same for the tower (we'll come back later we thought. And so I wentoff on my own for my long-awaited souvenir shopping trip during which time I bought the coolest gondola-shaped pasta and got very excited about murano glass bonded which I had decided I needed but the nice ones were expensive and the cheap ones were tacky. So I gave up on all that and went to an "art gallery" instead. It was an oriental and modern art gallery like first sector consisting of funny specs and Chinese vases - not my cup of china tea. The modern art was a lot better - several paintings of Marco and other energy places well soon. I was slightly disappointed to only find two pieces of likes...

  22/09/04 Day 81 I am itching to speak generally and emotionally of this fascinating city and the people we've met - but just I must deal with chronological facts. I think Heather has gone a bit crazy, as her entries were rather terse, and she's now prancing around the room like a Victorian show-girl! We got up a little earlier than intended due to the appearance of two Columbians in our bedroom. (Yes - I had the most painful mozzy bite night so far, worse, somehow, than Vienna - I think my body has just given up - oh how I long for England). This turned out to be beneficial. A breakfast was a laughing affair, and we were graced by Chris - "I'm so arrogant I won't even accept that other people have views, let alone that they are different from mine, let alone that they might just be right" - the hippy. He proceeded to preach about how to behave in foreign countries, and was chagrinedly (?) rude to Heather, who's Italian could not be more better than his. ...

  21/09/04 Day 80 After a restless night bouncing about on a squeaky too-trunk I decided to put the stress out of our misery and jump down, which I did rather gracefully. The new flow like windows looked out over water and also San Marco and Rio Carmere. And early in the morning the mist made it really look like a piece of Turners. After finding the shower room busy with naked women I went in search of my own private bathroom, which I found of course, and pranced around naked. I joined my crazy travelling companion in the dining hall for a delicious breakfast consisting of a bread roll and cup of cocoa. We decided to not the vaporetto without a ticket(for a third time), looking at a £30 fine if we got caught. We got so scared we decided to get off a stop early. We arrived in our new home, dumped our stuff and worked on amusing no tent without a B&B, her daughter, a telephone call to some Brits and 3 old Italians. It was a bit hectic, to say the least, and eventually we managed ...

  20/09/04 Day 79 Good job we had the alarm clock as we had to wake at 6, gulp down some breakfast and run through San Gimignano in the dark but with the sky slowly lightening and lighting the ruined hills. We got the bus for free which was nice. There was a little Erin had a grunt in each machine + bus felt up. How most beautiful sunny of the quibble over which platform we were to wait at but thanks to him we got the right train. However when I suggested was we could stay on that train right to Florence rather than change at Empoli that seemed like a silly idea so we got off in Empoli, stood around for 10 mins and then got on another train to Florence where we had to stand for half an hour. In Florence train station I managed to spill water everywhere, get my bag wet and the LP soaked. On the next train to Bologna I fell asleep which hadn't happened since Greece. Bologna was a pleasant surprise - big and touristy but not crowded or smelly. We made a pleasant visit to Modena where ...

  19/04/04 Day 78 Heather: For me, we seemed like Tuscany - living on a sleepy olive tree meadow a few km out of San G., with a scrabble picnic of Greek salad, bread, cheese bean pâté, biscuits, olives, yogurt, and of course a bottle of wine. It wasn't just a little too idyllic - not a sound except for the crickets and hoarse wasps, and a perfect view over what must be one of the most picturesque areas of the world. Sleepy and dreamy is Tuscany - there's not much more to it than that. The hill top houses look shut up and asleep all day long, nobody except tourists are on the roads, and nobody seems to mind you strolling around the grapevines and olive trees which take over 80% of the grassy rolling hills. The pace takes very highly on my top 10 moments. We must have looked very strange wandering off into the wilderness with a huge backpack - purely to accommodate our picnic. We met two people on the way and there were these unsure moments where we could have general chat or som...