Day 24 - Welcome to Florence

The night train has pros and cons. On the pro side, it's less expensive than almost any hotel: $21. On the con side, it's totally tiny. Those beds and I did not agree. I did like my traveling companions, though. There was the spanish family: mom, the ten year old, and the six year old. They were very friendly and mom was always cracking jokes. (I probably understood one in four. :) And there was a professor of music in Vienna, also a spanish speaker, in our car. He was a class act, translating in perfect english when the family and I couldn't understand each other and securing our door really well by both locking it and blocking it with the ladder used to reach the top bunks, when we went to "sleep".

The Zurich train station was... a train station. I walked outside, snapped a few pictures, and got on the train to Florence. I also picked up a box of chocolates which has already started to evaporate, so I don't think any will be making it home. Oops. I do have another full memory card, though. An Aussie named Marc mentioned you can find places here that will burn your files to CD, so I may start sending photos home that way instead. It's certainly less tempting for a thief than a memory card. Who wants to buy CDs of other people's photos?

I think I made the right choice coming here now. It's already ridiculously crowded. Marc says Rome isn't a bad, but he still had to wait for hours to see the Sistene chapel (and he showed up at 9:30AM on a Monday). Anyway, I'm about out of internet time, so I'll be heading to the top of a nearby hill to get the lay of the land, then trying to find some dinner, I suspect much easier in Rome with pasta in abundance. Someone asked me at about the French brassieries (or however the heck you spell it). The one I tried to eat at had one vegetarian item on the menu, and they were out of it. Think Ranch Cafe with an attitude. Heh.