Tim: The next day, our last in Florence followed by a night train to Paris, was really pretty ordinary - probably the worst of the whole trip. We got a bus to the distant station our train was to leave from that night, but they - despite hosting at least two night trains every day of the year - had gotten rid of their baggage office. So we needed to wait 50 mins and get a train to another station, one really quite close to the hotel we just left.
I'm not necessarily saying it's their fault, but we got on the wrong train (there was a last minute platform change). We stopped at a station for 30 minutes, then got going again, picking up speed and passing by snow-capped mountains. This isn't a local train... We got off at the next stop, waited 30 minutes, then got the train back to distant Florence. At times like this Polly correctly reminds me of our travel mantra, which begins "it's all ..." and ends either as a) "... part of the adventure" or b) "...your fault", depending.
After a late lunch, I went to an exhibition on Leonardo's machines (which I missed when it toured Melbourne last year), then we both went to the museum of Serial Killers and The Criminal Mind. Ok, very low brow but I wasn't in the mood for Raphael. It was pretty interesting but ultimately distasteful and way too much. The best part of the day was a wander through Florence at night. Even in the heart of the old town, in the Piazza of the Signora at 7:30 there was hardly anyone around. We took in a meal, then went to the station.
Polly: Just when I thought I was totally prepared for just how fucking horrible overnight trains could be, we left for France. The first night train was from Napoli to Siracusa. A four person compartment, I slept on the bottom opposite a friendly Italian man. He and the other passenger alighted early the next morning, leaving Tim and I comfortable and spread out for the rest of our journey. I arrived tired and stiff, but chipper. It was all part of the adventure.
Our next night train was from Palermo to Rome. We had been unable to book bottom bunks - a minor inconvenience - or so I thought. With tendonitis raging through my left arm, getting up the flimsy ladder was a major production. Once I managed to lie in my bunk I had 2 mms to spare on each side of my fat butt. And not much room for error when rolling over. Did I mention that I'm someone who generally tosses and turns all night? You get the picture. The Japanese man we were sharing with snored all night - I know - I was awake.
And so to the Paris train. After what had been a difficult day, we sat on the station for an hour (train delayed, of course) in the coldest weather we had yet experienced. This time we had learned our lesson and insisted on bottom bunks. Then we got on the train. This time, instead of 4 to a cabin there were 6 bunks. And when setting them up, the bottom one consisted of the train seat being lowered. The backrest then slid up and out to form the middle bunk. This meant that the moulded arm rests then formed the roof of the bottom bunk. It was like my own expensive reservation at the catacombs. Once I managed to crawl in I could barely move. I decided that avoidance was the best strategy and headed for the dining car. In the old days I might have helped myself to sleep with a comforting bottle of wine (how exotic on the Paris train). The new clean living me was driven out of the restaurant car an hour later by the waiter watching Saving Private Ryan with the volume on eleven as he sat under a no smoking sign working his way (quickly) through a packet of cigarettes. He laughed in the face of those authorities wishing to fine him between 27.50 and 275 Euros.
So I returned to our compartment and climbed into my grave. At least it felt familiar - along with the continual beeping of someone's low battery mobile phone, there was the regular thundering snoring from the man above me. It was just like sharing a bedroom with my mum again, only this time I had no sock drawer next to me from which to extract "wake-up" missiles.
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