Blogs from Tuscany, Italy, Europe - page 334

Working on... read more

Working on... read more

Chapter 9 “Where’s Florence?” said Zebedee Rise and shine! Well they arose but the sun wasn’t exactly shining. They were off to Florence today. (both of them had been looking forward to seeing Florence). They caught the bus to the station and managed to catch the 10.59am direct train to Florence. However in the rush, they had both forgotten to validate their tickets, a common practice in Europe, having to validate rather than forgetting to. The guard gave them a very Italian telling off but fortunately felt enough compassion not to fine them. Martin had finally managed to reach the point where he was up to date in his journal, a task more difficult to achieve than at first thought. His brother Steve turned 35 today, making him reflect on how quick their lives were passing ... read more

Chapter 7 Siena: Into the Tuscan Hills They waved goodbye to Pisa after some cure for Maya’s hangover by means of grapefruit and caught the 11.18am to Siena via Empoli. Pisa had been interesting enough to visit but they both had a feeling that better was to come. At Empoli, the train was delayed for ten minutes as a local football derby had spewed out all the hooligans onto the station, fortunately none of them boarded our intrepid twosome’s train. There seemed very little difference in both appearance and behaviour between Italian football fans and English football fans, the only real notable difference were the hand gestures, though the meanings of them were pretty universal. After the brief delay, the road or rather the railroad to Siena lay ahead. From the train, the Tuscan hills rolled ... read more

Chapter 5 Leaning on a tower Breakfast and left Rome on the 9.46am IC train to Pisa. The train was delayed by 10 minutes,having swapped seats once, they ended up in a compartment with a family (very sweet, well behaved kids and friendly parents). The train took them through Rome’s suburbs, heading north along the Mediterranean, past Cievativiechhia, Cerosetto, Livorno and 3 hours later, they arrived at Pisa Centrale. Maya had been here before and knew a cheap hostel right by the tower, so they headed through the pretty streets, over the bridge and after Martin had changed his shoes, they arrived at the Piazza di Miraculi. First the hostel, Albergo Gronchi (H: a very plain, very decrepit, but very cheap hotel that stays full, with a great view of the Tower. The weak springed beds ... read more