We had to wake on the early side today so we could get to the Siena train station too early. Yes, you read the correctly. We always get to train stations too early! I’m fine with the waiting, though, as long as I can sit somewhere.
Goodbye Siena. We loved visiting you!
Todays travel meant to trains. The first, a slower train, was quite full, but we managed to grab two seats together. A few stops later we wouldn’t have been as fortunate, so I’m glad there were only two stops before ours. That trip took us from Siena to Florence, and we had over an hour to spare before catching the next train.
Hello Florence. Or at least Firenze Santa Maria Novella train station.
One thing to note about train stations, or at least the one in Florence: continue to check to see what track you are on. The Trenetalia app may tell you one thing, and it sticks to that. But the board will post the correct one. This happened both times at that station.
Train #2 was a fast train. My fave! As before, I managed to book seats that were NOT facing each other, but instead were back-to-back. I honestly don’t know how I blew it on every train, but I did (I just checked and our final train is the same issue. Argh! That one is somewhat full, so we may have to ask someone to switch with us. We’ll see.). Thankfully the train was rather empty, and we were only going to the very next stop so we could sit together (At the last moment two men came in and I was in one of their seats, but one man was more than happy to move into mine and the other one sat across from him.) I was sort of sorry our train ride was only 35 minutes (and so much was in tunnels), but we quickly arrived at our next city.
Hello Bologna!
I’m not really prepared for this city: I did no research, I’ve read very little, and Rick Steve’s doesn’t include it in the Italy book. We just knew we wanted to return because we were here for a very brief time some years back.
We got situated in our room (never had to even see anyone: I was sent codes to get into the building and then into our fourth floor room — thankfully with a lift for this, contrary to so many places we’ve stayed this time), and puzzled over how we use a shower with some sort of remote control. Guess we’ll learn soon! (Photos below show our room, the view from a window, the lift, and the interesting front door.)
Leaving our room, we ventured out. We walked to Piazza Maggiore, which we remembered from our earlier visit and I was disappointed to see a huge screen and chairs set up for movies. It also means photographing the Basilica di San Petronio won’t be quite as easy. But so it goes. I realize for people living here movie nights are probably great fun, but I was so hoping to photograph the square, especially at night when everyone comes there to hang out. I have very good memories of seeing that before. Ah well. There is also a whole lot of construction going on in the area. Seems to be the way things are this year in a lot of cities.
Then it was time to search out lunch and we selected a place somewhat rapidly and — DRUM ROLL — we only ordered one thing (pizza) and shared it and we didn’t eat too much! Yes. Miracles do happen, even in the 21st century.
After eating on “La strada del Jazz” (there are stars with famous jazz artists’ names on the sidewalk, two of which you can see above) we wandered a little, but I think we both were kind of weary. Funny how train travel can do that … it’s not like we moved around at all while on the train! So rest time it was.
After a while Dan started to feel a bit poorly (food poisoning, perhaps?) so we hung out longer than expected in our room. Eventually I opted to go for a short walk. As I headed toward the door of our “inn” (or whatever it’s called) I saw a passport on the floor. Earlier I had heard a woman outside our door — I think she was having trouble getting inside her room or something — so I figured it was probably hers and, sure enough, it was. She was, as you might imagine, very relieved, saying that had it been taken it would have been sold on the black market. Probably so (although only people staying in this place can manage to get inside, I think). Then out on my walk I went. I thought perhaps I could find the place we ate when we were here years ago, but that was a fail. So I just rambled a bit.
(And yes, the tower in Pisa isn’t the only one that leans.)
And now I’m back in our room. It’s a dinner-less night. That’s probably good, since I’ve been eating far too much! I just hope Dan feels better tomorrow.
Ciao for now!