Tuesday 11th

Currently on the train to Tours for one night and then home tomorrow.  But flying home. I have had issues with booking the Eurostar back to London. I’ll chat to you about that if you want to hear it when I see you.

Well Bordeaux was a bit of a wash-out, feeling ill for a couple days and then it started raining yesterday and again today. So I have not seen much of it and certainly not found any of Rick Stein’s restaurants from his series of weekend visits, one ambition for being here.  I have also passed thru Bordeaux a couple time on previous cycling trips but never seen it properly. Oh well!  I’ll just have to come back!

Well apart from getting home and back to reality tomorrow, this is the start of the end of the trip. 

How do I feel about it?

It’s been interesting.  Organising travel and accommodation every couple of days is time consuming, (A) with figuring out EUrail and Interrail.  (B) hotels or rooms wherever you end up.

Interrail:

is not easy.  I thought I had it cracked before leaving. As I had booked the first 3 days of train journeys through the Interrail web site, and had reservation emailed to me vey quickly and with no issues. But, since those first 3, I have not been able to complete any reservations via the internet.  I complete all the pages and it has not accepted any payments at the last step.  Interrail passes are accepted at stations when book in person and SNCF even have a button for it on the self-service terminals.

Trains:

Currently doing around 180 mph and it is wonderfully smooth.  I have also done a number of very long trips at a lot lower pace.  But, I have enjoyed them all

Accommodation:

A bit mixed. I could have done it at less cost if I had been prepared to use dormitory hostels.  But I have used a variety of private hostel rooms, Booking.com, and direct booking.  On the whole I am not sure which is the best way.  I have always tried to use city centre, close to the rail stations, so this limits choice and increases prices, and to a certain extent I also thinks it reduces quality.  I’ll leave it at that.

Friday 7th Oct

Just had a day and half in Rome. This maybe a theme for me but it was crowds, crowds and more crowds.  There does not seem to be any letup in the continual stream of people that visit these ancient sites. I can only assume it is 365 days a year, apart from certain “holidays”.  I am not one standing in queues and much prefer to be moving.  So the only queuing I allowed my self was in a guided tour of the Vatican, it’s museum and the Sistine Chapel. Of course had to pay extra for it but we did walk past the queues lined up for the day tickets and we did have ‘Rudi’ to feed us information all the way round.  

We started the tour at 9 AM and even at that time it was busy or should I say packed. If you have never been inside the public area of the Vatican I would say do it you are ever in Rome. It really is very splendid, but at the same time very over indulgent, given the majesty of it all.

Rome is a lot easier to get about than Florence was. Florence is just completely narrow roads a bit like old parts of London.  There are very few cycling lanes that I could see loads of toad side parking that compresses the moving lanes again and a mess of one way streets, still I suppose it is what you get use to.

Rome felt a lot better and I used the Metro network the most. As it goes to, or close to most of the major sites that I had time for

 Hi all it’s Monday 10th Oct 

Been a bit ill with a tummy bug the last couple of days so not finished some commentary I started on the trains. I will get to it thru today.

Regards Chris 

 Tuesday 4th Oct

The train time just disappeared yesterday!  Arriving in Florence is the same as any other big city you don’t know. Just a bit confusing to start with. It also doesn’t help when you walk to the street and corner of where your accommodation is and there is no sign of it. You begin to think this is a scam!  The bar owner on the corner knew exactly when I asked if he knew of the name of the place, he very kindle smiled and showed to a hotel 50 m away, who’s name doesn’t bare any resemblance to the place I was looking for. Turns out I have a small room in an apartment block.   Basic, old, but clean. 

Going back to yesterday’s ramblings. To finish Sunday’s story.

As St. Marks square was rammed as was every other street in the area, I headed for a vaporetto stop and caught the first that came along which was to the Lido.  Good move, I thought I hadn’t been here before but remembered it when I started walking down quiet streets that Janice and I had been when we came in the early 2000’s.  It was much nicer than the main island, away from the vaporetto stop and surrounding restaurants it becomes quieter quickly and nice strolling. 

I walked a loop to the beach and back, gelato and coffee along the way then time to head back to the main island to meet up with a couple of friends from MaccAstro who had arrived that afternoon for a holiday. We had dinner together, got bitten by mosquitoes together!  Then I headed off to the tram, got lost in the little streets (I was going to say “back streets” but they are all back streets) and unintentionally found a vaporetto stop that took me (slowly) to the bus/tram location along the Grand Canal.  After that it was the tram and bus back to the hotel. 

Back to Florence, yesterday. After getting sorted out at the room I headed for the Galileo Museum and passed the Cathedral, queues to get in, queues to get the tickets to get in, sold out for next 2 days. I don’t think I as too bothered about that.  In comparison the Galileo Museum was quiet no que no crowd. 

I think I was bit in awe when I came out. A lot of the pieces involved skills quiet remarkable for periods they were made in, not just the telescopes I was obviously going to be interested, as there weren’t that many, but all manner of instruments. I have loads of photos …….   To bore you with😀

It’s become warm here at the moment, very sunny, mid 20’s.  So just walked about for the remainder of the day.

This morning walking about and found the market. I wish had these in the UK.  I had to spend time getting my rail tickets sorted out as the Interrail web site was not letting me book my next trains on it for Saturday when I am going from Rome to Nice.  The ticket office at the rail station booked it for me, with no issues and friendly as well.

 Friday 30th & 1st Oct

Travelling to Florence, via a night stop in Geneva.

Why Geneva?  I worked on a project for Swissair many years ago and spent a lot time in Zurich and Geneva airports  over 2 years. So rather than spend even longer on a train in one day I broke the journey.

Well apart from the prices the centre of Geneva hasn’t changed much. The fountain is still going and much of the buildings are the same in the centre.

The train on the second day wound it’s way through the mountain until coming out the other side in Italy. The weather was bit poor so not much of a view but I was surprised by the number vines we went past, the wine industry must be getting quite big, although I don’t seem to see much Swiss wine in the shops.

I was not staying the centre of Venice, but off the island in Mestre. Once I had worked out how to use the buses and trams and vaporetto, dropped bags at the hotel I got myself on the island of Venice. Then walked around thru less crowded areas to the north-west side until sunset. As did a lot of other people!  I had just had two 7 hour days on trains so I started to head back for the tram off the island after sunset. But it was obvious from the number of people going the same way that it was going to be busy so picked a restaurant and plate of spaghetti alle vongole (Rick Stein influence), then got the tram and bus back to hotel. 

Saturday 2nd Oct

Bit of a slower start and did not get to Venice until about 10 am. Then got a vaporetto (water bus) to Murano, the glass island. Wondered around on there for the rest of the morning looked at a bit of glass work going on then moved away from the main tourist routes and kept to the back streets. I was quite surprised to find of allotments, some looking as if they had been well cared for and producing a lot crops.  

Used the vaporetto back to Venice and landed close to St Marks square, it was busy. Loads of groups and being Sunday a lot of people had come to island for the day. So went down side streets which was not much better and eventually settled down in a restaurant for lunch. Most people want to sit outside so the insides (which tend to be small) are a lot quieter. 

Trying to stay to the side streets I still ended up coming into St Marks square, it was as bad as being outside a premier football ground when the match has finished. 

Just arrived in Florence I’ll add more later

 28th September Wilmslow to Euston; St Pancras to Brussels

Florence The trains to Brussels were no problem.  The checkin at St Pancras was more like being at an airport, as it took 50 minutes to get thru the queue, but after that it was fine and the train was on time in getting to Brussels. Found my hostel for the next 2 nights and immediately went out for a walk to market square and the cathedral. There are a major road works going on in front of the hostel so getting round them and thru them was a bit of a trial. It will be nice when finished. 

On the way to the Cathedral (St Michael and St Gudula) I passed thru an arcade area which was lined by about 90% chocolate shops. Any choc-o-holics amongst you would either have a real problem walking thru it or really loved it. Despite being in Brussels many times for work meetings I had never seen any of this and the market square (Grand Place de Brussels) with gilded decorations is quite spectacular (more so with a bit of sunshine).  After that the cathedral which is grand affair, was made more atmospheric by a small choir practicing various pieces.

They do love ornate pulpits here, the three I have seen so far are very elaborate based on trees with intertwining branches.  I’ll add a photo!

Thursday 29th 

I used the Belgium trains to go Bruges, then back stopping a Ghent as well. One observation on the trains and tickets, their is none of our UK system when you book a train fare you are restricted to a set train and time. You buy a ticket and it seems to be valid all day.  On the way back from Bruges I just stopped off at Ghent then picked up a later train to get back to Brussels.  In theory I could have got another train back to Bruges later and then returned later again. 

This day out from Brussels was bit inspired by the movie, “The Monuments Men”, I have always thought about seeing the Bruges Madonna & Child and the Ghent Altarpiece (Adoration of the Mystic Lamb). So that was the intention for the day and walking to each church. Bruges was fairly easy as it is not far from the station, so I could see a very high church tower and headed for it. Turned out to be the wrong church, but the tower was nearly as high as the Church of Our Lady Bruges where, the Madonna is kept.  The 2 churches are within 200 metres of each other and nearly as big as each other. The other church is Sint-Salvatorskathedraal.

Waking about the old part of Bruges was very pleasant, most of the buildings are very well kept only a single upper floor for the most with different shades of brick red and brown. Narrow, cobbled streets that are traffic quiet at 9 am.

The Church of Our Lady is quite different from others I went to, it is bright inside with white painted plastered walls, which gives a lovely feel to the place. This is in stark contrast to Brussels cathedral and Ghent, which are considerably darker either through grey granite or old dirt never restored.  Bruges definitely had a small town feeling. 

Ghent was back to big city feeling, trams and lots of traffic. The walk to church was nearly an hour, but enjoyable as it mostly along side the tram route which seems to keep vehicle traffic down, though shared space. 

Out of the 3 cities I liked Bruges the best and if coming again I would chose to stay there rather than Brussels, although I haven’t looked the accommodation there.

I had to get a ticket to see the Ghent Altarpiece but you can only get them on the web so I had bowl of carrot soup at a restaurant next to the church entrance while waiting for the email.  I wasn’t sure what to expect as I said earlier the church is quite dark and dull inside and cloud outside didn’t help. But the Altar Piece is just brilliantly bright but only lit by low level lighting. It’s colours are just vibrant.  Not what a thought I was going see given all the other paintings are un-restored and dark with age.  You just have to sit and take it in for a while.

After taking my time in the remainder of the cathedral, I walked around the area and again there are 2 large churches within a stones throw of each other.   

That was it for the day, by the time I was back in Brussels it was early dinner.