Bologna to Florence

Francesco dropped us at the Bologna train station without incident, but we were crazy early, and so he suggested we might be able to change our tickets and arrive earlier.  So we go in, we find the ticket office and information desk, and I go in to ask about that.  And I immediately got yelled at by some official looking train dude.  Apparently one has to take a number.  Okay, but meanwhile, a different official looking train person is asking us what we need.  So I explain to her that we already have tickets, we just want to see if we can get an earlier train.  So she wants to see my tickets, so I show her the print out.  And she's all wound up about how that's not enough.  But I point out the confirmation number to her, and she agrees that is enough, but since it's the super save fare, we can't make changes.  Okay, no problem, but as usual, Lyle is not feeling confident in our travel plans by this point.

So we're now in a crowded train station, with more than an hour to kill.  So we start walking around, just getting away from the crowd, and we still have no idea which platform we'll need.  And Lyle is getting more and more wound up, but eventually we agree it's likely that we're on one of the high speed trains, and it's likely those platforms are clustered on the lower level, and it's likely they'll have something down that way to do, so we work our way there, and thank goodness for Lyle, find a little cafe to get cokes and cookies while we wait.

We were right, our train comes to the platform right where we're waiting, and we head down there, only to find out that it's 15 minutes delayed, which turns into more like 30, but we eventually get on the right train, on the right car.  Yay.  

But we're on the train with a bunch of Italian teenagers who are EXACTLY as loud and annoying as American teenagers, but they also smell like a wrestling team on their way back from a meet in a small minibus.  Gross.

The conductor never came by to ask for our tickets, likely because she judged the possibility of American tourists riding the train without tickets to not be worth the certainty of having to put up with obnoxious, stinky Italian teenagers.  

Luckily, it was only one stop, about a half an hour, and then we were in Florence and hopped off the train.  Florence has a taxi line that works the way one would expect, not like Bologna, and so we are happily checked into our hotel.  Definitely not as nice as Bologna or Venice, but a very acceptable corner room.

There's a shuttle from here down to the main tourist areas, and we will take that to meet our guide for tomorrow to begin seeing the major sites of Florence.

More tomorrow,

Marty and Lyle