Florence, Venice, and Nice

Sorry I haven’t updated all week, things have been crazy busy with all the traveling. We haven’t spent more than a night anywhere since Rome. Already we are done with two countries (Italy and France) and now moving onto our third, Spain. I am writing this entry while we are on the train from Nice, France to Barcelona Spain…So here’s a quick recap of Florence, Venice, and Nice…

Florence
We got to Florence around 11:30pm Sunday night and headed towards our hostel, or at least tried to. Very few people that we met on the street had ever heard of our hostel or where it was located. Eventually we walked into a nice, four star hotel and asked the concierge there for directions. He too had no idea where to send us but was nice enough to take the time and look up directions on Google for us. Once we got to our hostel we checked in and then started making plans for the rest of the week (like how long we would spend in certain places and train times).

On Monday we woke up fairly early and went out to explore the city. Unlike Rome, it was a bit chilly and rainy in Florence, but it wasn’t too bad. Our first stop was tourist information to figure out exactly what we should see in one day. The guy there didn’t seem too interested in actually helping us though. He talked like Speedy Gonzalez! He just kept pointing at the map and saying “Thisissoandsogohereandthenthere. Okay? Goodbye.” After that we just sat and looked at what he circled and tried to figure out where to begin. Our first stop was the Saint Maria Cathedral, this huge and beautiful cathedral in Florence that was built in the 18th century. After that we wandered around to Michelangelo’s tomb then headed up to a monument dedicated to him that supposedly has the best sites of the city, and it did seem to. From there you really could see all of Florence, it was much more crowded than I would have expected.

After that we checked out places closer to our hostel, like Ponte Vecchio, the Old Bridge of Florence that now has a lot of touristy shops and cafes. Then we walked through the entryway to a museum that is dedicated to famous Italian scientists and philosophers. Then we went back to the hostel to make some lunch before going to a Galileo exhibition at a museum. We expected the exhibition to be solely about Galileo, but it wasn’t. it was more about the history of astronomy in general and the last two rooms were about Galileo and his impact on modern day astronomy. It was very interesting, but I was hoping to learn more about Galileo’s life, there wasn’t much about any of his discoveries outside of astronomy, and even that was a bit limited. Once we finished the museum exhibition we just walked around the town a bit more before catching the train to Venice.

Venice
Again, we got into Venice around 11pm or so. And then had no idea where to go. Venice is divided into sections, not by streets, so you have to walk to the right section and eventually you will find the correct address. I have no idea how any one can find there way around, the signs are awful and there are so many bridges that its difficult to remember if you walked over one before or not. Throughout our time in Venice everywhere we went we saw people standing in the street holding maps looking very confused. In fact, we stopped to ask two police officers where our hostel was and they didn’t even know. They argued with each other as to where to send us and then took us in the wrong direction so they stopped to ask two other locals where we should go. The directions they gave us were still wrong. Eventually we did find the hostel though, making it even harder though was the fact that hostels aren’t allowed to put signs up, so we had to find the right number.

This hostel was very interesting compared to everywhere else we have stayed so far. Apparently the woman who actually runs the hostel was at her boyfriend’s or something and she has left two 18 year olds from England in charge for the summer. But they went out for the night, so two guests checked us in and had no idea what to do with us. It was hilarious. Even though it made no sense, it was probably the best hostel we stayed at because everyone was our age and all just going on and on about how ridiculous Venice is in general.

On Tuesday we woke up, had breakfast with everyone, and then left the hostel. Our first stop was the train station to buy our tickets from Venice to Nice. That was again confusing, we kept getting sent back and forth between the two ticket agencies. Finally we booked our train for 11:30pm that night, arriving in Nice at 4pm on Wednesday. Then we went to check our luggage at the train station so we could walk around, but the line was so long that we decided it would be better to just carry it around and check it later. Little did we know that not only is Venice the city of water, but it is also the city of stairs. Every single bridge in Venice has stairs, and not just two or three, but the entire freaking bridge! It was awful! And then because we didn’t have a map we ended up getting lost and somehow leaving Venice, thankfully it wasn’t for too long and we walked back in, which is a pretty cool thing to say if I must say. I mean how many people enter Venice twice in less than 24 hours, once by train and once by foot?

After that excursion we were too tired to walk all the way from the border of the city and decided to take a boat bus, which is really the best way to see the city. We took the boat bus to San Marco Square, which is the main square of Venice. We ended up being able to check our bags with a four star hotel and then headed out to join in the festivities because June 2 is a national holiday in Italy. Unfortunately, there wasn’t as much going on in the evening as there apparently was in the morning. But we did see a couple of people playing music and whatnot.

Nice
We got on our train to Nice at 11:30pm that was an adventure. There weren’t normal seats on the train, but instead different cars for six people to sit in facing each other. Needless to say, it was very crowded and uncomfortable. Before we got on the train we realized that there was an earlier train from one of our stops between Venice and Nice, so we decided to change our tickets to get in around noon instead of four in the afternoon. We had three stops between Venice and Nice. One at 2:30am until almost 4am, another at 5am until 7:15am, and then a twenty minute one from 11:25 until 11:45. The entire train experience was very confusing and hectic. But we survived and met other people along the way who were having even more difficulty than us.

When we got to Nice we checked into a nice little hostel and then headed straight to the beach. That’s basically all we did in Nice. It was very relaxing and beautiful. The water was so blue, and you could literally see it turn from navy to teal with the waves. One odd thing though was that there was no sand, just rocks on the beach. But it wasn’t too uncomfortable and it was nice to leave and not be covered in sand.

On Thursday we checked out of the hostel and left our bags there before going to the train station to book our train from Nice to Barcelona. Then we walked around the city a little bit before heading to the beach again in the afternoon. Then around 9pm we got on our train to Barcelona. Thankfully it wasn’t nearly as bad as the train to Nice. Nicer train, actual seats, and again a couple of stops but not at crazy hours of the night.

I’ll write about Barcelona as soon as I can.

Love and miss you!
Home: 13 days

P.S. Pictures can be found at: http://picasaweb.google.com/sineadorade since I have run out of memory here. See you soon!

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