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Published: November 12th 2006
I landed in Frankfurt Thursday evening and checked into the hostel near the train station. Just so happens to be in the middle of the Red Light District, just a coinsidence I guess (cough...)Anyway, the hostel itself was spot on, stayed in the same dorm as 2 aussies, Doug and Georgi. Doug used to work at George IV in Chiswick, I've probably seen the lad a load of times whilst having a cheeky pint or 2 during my 7 months working down there. Funny how you always seem to be bump into certain people everywhere you go! Didn't get much sleep that night though, there was a debate about punk music between Aussie Doug and this American bloke debating the origin and genre of punk music into the early hours. I couldn't really be arsed to wade in so I tried to get some kip amongst the noise. Just a quick recommendation as well, I had a few bottles of some German ale called Altenmunster, got to say I would have drunk the stuff all night except for the fact I had to get up at the crack of dawn for the train to Switzerland.
We arrived at Basel lunch
Mount Pilatus
View from the toptime the next day and had a hour or so to kill before our train to Luzern. Ideal time to sample the Swiss cuisine. Burger King proved a big hit and the hamburger itself was cooked to perfection....as Alan Partridge would say, 'Back of the net.....'. Luzern itself is a very picturesque place. It's completely surrounded by mountain ranges and the city itself has allsorts of interesting arcitechture to peruse round including an English boozer called Mr Pickwick. I had to practically sell my Liver for a pint there, although they had the Blackburn v Man Utd game on so I was happy enough. We spent the majority of the day up Mount Pilatus. There's a cable car that runs from a nearby village all the way to the top, some 7000ft if I remember correctly. The view from up there is unbelievable, you can see the snow covered alps in the background with lake Lucerne spanning across the landscape. I'd whip a few pics on this blog but you can't attach any hardware to the PC, hopefully I'll be able to include a few for later blogs. The Kappelbrucke or 'Chapel Bridge', Lion Moment and the Old Town were
Swiss horn
Tricky to play all also highlights during my time there.
I arrived in Florence this morning at 7am and was f@cking shattered!....pardon my french. The night train ride from Arth Goldau was a nightmare, I didn't get a wink all night as I was kipping on some poxy bench they call a bed. Anyway, I spent the majority of the day looking around the city and taking in the views. We had a mosey up the Tower, all 414 steps! and took a few panoramic views of the city. Later on we headed for the Uffizi Museum that houses everything from Da Vinci to Carravagio art work. There's a few famous pieces in there so it was good seeing these classic paintings even though my legs were killing by the end of it! The 'Duamo' at the side of tower is impressive stuff, appantly it took around 170 years to get it to it's final state as you see it today. As I might say back home....it's the dogs bollocks!
The hostel here is spot on, it's kind of weird as they've intentionally let visitors graffiti all over the walls....leading up the staircase, corridors etc. It's something different I'll give em
that! The sweet thing here is that I've got unlimited access to the internet. They tell you that you get 30 mins free when you book in, the numpties have only got and stuck 30 hours on instead. Proper pissing myself over that one!
Anyway, hope everyone's having fun back home, keep the comments coming in and I'll keep you posted on how things are going
Ciao
JP
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Abart time n'all
I was beginning to think that you'd sprained your typing hand lad. Nice turn of phrase there young 'un - pleased I've brought you up well. Been on Beechie's blog and he'd written loads before I've just found this so was wondering what tha was playing at. Liverpool lost 3-0 to Arsenal today - they were garbage. Went racing to Wetherby yesterday - I had one horse that came in at 10/1 - trouble was, the rest came in at half past 12 boom boom. As I said to Tim - you can do Pisa in half a day because apart from the Garden of Miracles there's not a great deal to see. Worth going though because the lines on the buildings play tricks with your brain. They've tried to correct the flaws as the buildings have sunk and it sends you boz-eyed. Sienna is totally different to Florence - it's a walled Mediaeival town that just seems to be stuck in time. Cracking place to visit. Just looked at the weather for Rome - iut's sunny and 18C for the next 5 days so you'll be glad to feel a bit warmer. Keep writing son - we're enjoying the read but are missing you back home. Papa.