Profile
Blog
Photos
Videos
Ok, so I haven't updated this in a few days. But the WiFi in Slovakia is terrible. But as I have hours to kill before heading back to UK tonight, I thought I'd take the opportunity to make one final entrance.
So in Venice there is a lack of things to do where we stayed. We discovered in the short time we were there that Italians are lazy. They close really early on Saturdays and just don't bother opening anything on a Sunday. Also Venice wasn't as expensive as everyone made it out to be, and it didn't really smell that bad, so i don't know where that has come from. I think we must have been in Venice for the hottest day of the year as well. Which is not great when most of Venice is built from reflective colours. Basically had my retinas burnt out by the glare of the sun. Overall Venice is a nice place.. its just very.. samey? And not a lot to do there. The three of us had a nice photo taken of us on a bridge overlooking a canal, and then James deleted it. Because he's a nob.
From Venice we travelled on a night train to Vienna, called 'The Vienna Express' and having paid 27 euros for it, I must admit I was expecting something comparable to the Hogwarts Express. Sadly, I was dissapointed. Instead we were provided with a carriage in which none of the toilets worked, there were no openable windows and the air con was broken. All of this in 40+ degrees. After 3 hours of lying in a puddle of my own sweat and having to stare at an odd Austrian middle aged woman in nothing but her bra and pants, the train pulled to a stop in a deserted Austrian station and were all made to get off the train and wait an hour before they replaced it with a carriage that did work. This happened at 1am. And just to top it all off, of course when we got back on the new train, there were no beds, this was just a carriage of seats, that would have cost 4 euros rather than 27. However the nice train conductor informed us that upon arrival in Vienna we could claim a refund. So we just got on with it, with the promise of 27 euros back following us into our dreams.
Of course nothing is ever that simple. When we arrived in Vienna, we marched into the ticket office and loudly demanded a refund for awful nights sleep. We were met with "No, you must go back to Italy to get the refund. This Italian ticket. We give no refund for Italy ticket." My first thought.. 'What an a*******'. We argued back, :But we've just come from Italy" "Were not going back to Italy" "Its an Austrian train" "The woman on the train..." and so on. However the 'a*******' bluntly refused. So like true brits we left, angry at the world and vowing to seek revenge. And then we saw some people who had been on our train complaining at another desk, so we joined them. Where we were told we must fill out a complaint form and the money would be transferred back into one of our accounts. We left half satisfied, knowing it was unlikely we'd ever see that money again, but we all know there is one HUGE complaint letter coming back to Vienna when I get home.
So, why were we back in Vienna, having already been once and been dissapointed? Well because we were actually on our way to Bratislava but we had to travel to Vienna on our way. Getting around Vienna is terrible. I could have been in a wheel chair and wheeled myself around the outsklirts of Vienna quicker than there public transport could. They have trains, trams, buses, metro and 'S-bahn' which I naturally assume stands for 's***' train. Anyway having eventually made it to Bratislava, we were pleasantly suprised that Bratislava is not quite the crack den we had been expecting. Still so hot we opted to not do much for the first day. We had a few drinks with the girls staying in our room, all from Worcester. They were the typical english trio of girls. One slightly attractive one, one who had a boyfriend of 5 years and one really loud confident fat one. Who luckily we were informed by her friends is aptly nicknamed the 'Michelin Man' back home. The following day we headed back to Vienna to the worlds oldest zoo with the promise of Pandas and other such exotic creatures. We were not let down. The best zoo I've ever been to. A large array of animals and some really cool enclosures that you could walk through. Obviously within reason, like you couldnt walk through the lion cage, but you could walk through the bird enclosures and the sloth area. The best expereince, walking through the bat enclosure and having the strange creatures whizzing past every inch of your body. Well it was enjoyable until one shat on me.
Having stuck to our budgets pretty well, we came to last night wanting to out for a big final night and have a good meal today as the farewell to our trip, however having been raped by the zoo, we were all with less than 10 euros to survive on for today so we had a quiet one. Today we thought would be an nice easy relaxing day as we strolled around Bratislave seeing the sights and taking in the culture. However, it turns out there isn't really much to do in Bratislava and our tour concluded in the sandwich shop after 2 hours and then back in the hostel to use the Wifi so I could write this final entry.
Tonight we fly back after an enjoyable trip, something I'd recommend to others and quite a nice demo of what travelling is about. If there were 3 things I could say I had learnt, they'd be..
1) James is not good with the ladies...
2) Coming to Europe means you spend 3/4 of your time talking like a gay german as it seems to mimmick most European accents
3) Night trains should be avoided
I'm kidding, I've learnt a lot more, I've experienced different cultures, I've tried different foods and so on.
But yeah, definately recommend inter railing to others, but if I did it again, I'd bring more money.
Hope you've enjoyed keeping up to date with me. Thanks a lot for reading.
Love, yours truly, Jackarius Antoine Whaley xx
Ps - James fails with women. The three girls from our room concluded he was a virgin before myself or tom had even said anything about it.
- comments