Today’s pictures on flickr

We spent most of the day on the train, but don’t worry, there’s still lots of interesting stuff to tell.

After waiting for two railway personnel to finish an argument on where we should put our bicycles (each favoured different ends of a very long train), we battled our bikes aboard the train and headed off on the 3 hour trip to Genova. We had an hour wait, but that did allow us to grab lunch. In one very nice streak of luck, our departing train left from the same platform as our arriving train, out of 21 platforms. Otherwise we would have had to carry our bikes and luggage up and down a flight of stairs, which is never fun.

We then had a 3.5 hour trip to Pisa. We couldn’t go to Pisa without seeing the famous tower, so we biked down to it and took some photographs in the dark.

After a very quick McDonald’s supper on the platform, we headed off on the one hour trip to Florence.

All told, the trip only cost us 40 Euros, 7 of which were tickets for the two bicycles. Say what you like about Italian trains, but they certainly are economical. It was a lucky day too; we never once had to lug our loaded bikes up and down a flight of stairs to get to the platform. In Ventimiglia we left from platform 1 on the outside, in Genova the trains used the same platform, in Pisa we had an elevator, and in Florence it was a terminus, so there weren’t any level changes required. Awesome luck.

In Florence I talked Bethany into camping once again rather than spending the money on a hotel room. She was dubious because the campground is on top of a very large hill. However, it was not near as bad as our hostel in Sète, so she doesn’t appear to be too annoyed at me. Our tent isn’t quite level, though.

The little of Florence that I’ve seen on the ride to the campground has been incredible so far. We past a very colourful cathedral, the Medici palace and another impressive church before starting the climb up the hill. On top of the hill stands David in his full nude glory, overlooking an incredible view of the city. The campgrond is right beside David. So although the tent site is not quite level, the view is incredible.

Comments

  • David on 18 Nov 08:04

    That Donatello guy did a pretty good job. In my defence, it was cold.

  • Myrna on 18 Nov 11:32

    Had to say hi! Interesting! Always nice to hear from you! Your blog tells me that I know very little history "From over there"! Take care!