Day 20 - Florence

Throughout our trip so far, we have referred to our 8 days in Italy as our 'holiday within a holiday' where we envisaged ourselves breezing around Florence, Rome and Venice in the sun, soaking up the culture and eating food that would change our perspective on life. Lying in my bed tonight, after being awake for 37hrs, it would be correct to say it didn't exactly begin like that. In the slightest.

Yesterday afternoon, we couldn't find lockers for our bags in the station. This meant that we couldn't go to find Mozart's house and instead we had to stay round the station. We did shifts sitting with the bags, 2 with the bags and 2 off wandering around, until we could bare the heat no more. The glass walled station was just too much. We left the main station about 4ish and went to the station that the Florence train was leaving from. It was more like a subway station so we ended up sitting on a bench with our bags watching people run after trains, cooing over cute babies and having the odd smelly person sitting next to us. We enjoyed this people watching, we felt it was time well spent. And we got Magnum McFlurrys.

At 7.20pm we boarded our night train to Florence. After finding our seats, we discovered we were in a 6 seater cabin, with one man already in there and awkwardly sat in the middle of us (he also needed a wash, but I was told not to offer him deodorant). Despite this, we got settled and our 11hr journey began. The first hour or two were spent sorting out our travel diaries and the postcards we collected from every place, then Katie and I got restless. We decided to go find the food cart. What we didn't realise tho was how long the train was. 7 carriages later, we decided to give up and go back. On our way back, a man asked if I was Yugoslavian and then spoke to Katie in French. We think he wanted a sneaky fag on the train. We walked all the way down to the other end of the train just incase there was food down there. There was none. And I nearly opened the back door of the train by accident, so consequently we returned to the cabin with a horrific dose of the giggles. Our cabin friend was now trying to sleep so we ha to try and be quiet. This was also highly amusing as we have already learnt we cannot execute complete silence whilst on a train. As the journey progressed, we got hungry. This time, Dee and Katie went to look for food and discovered that we had walked right past it on our previous hunt. They brought Pringles and pretzels. The loudest snacks in the world. I don't know if anyone has ever tried to eat Pringles quietly before, but it just cannot be done.

The motion was then passed to turn off the cabin light and try to sleep. This was the beginning of the longest night of my life. I love my sleep and I am bloody good at it. If it was an Olympic sport, I'd be doing this trip with a gold medal around my neck. However, this train was impossible to sleep on. I had no sleep at all. I think I had completed around 28 sudoku's by the time cabin member number 6 joined the slumber party. He arrived quietly and was respectful of his sleeping cabin mates, but his girlfriend was determined to wake us up. Not even an attempt at a whisper as she flung the door open and gabbed away. I could have happily slid the door closed on her head. Repeatedly. She was seated in a different cabin and spent the rest of the journey appearing at the cabin door just to wave of blow kisses to her boyfriend, who she seemed to forget was now our cabin friend and therefore not allowed noisy contact with the outside world whilst we were trying to sleep. 6am could not come quick enough.

The train arrived at Florence and we were ready and waiting to get off. Boyfriend had managed to unwrap himself from girlfriends little finger to help us get our bags down, and we had squeezed past Italian Michael Jordan to get off the train, but we were now here. In Italy. This was it.

Well, after a McDonalds breakfast.

After a taxi ride and a trek across a bridge, we arrive at our hostel. Seeing as we were meant to be staying last night but had to cancel, we had a small hope that or room would be ready for us now. At 8am. Oh what fools we are! Of course we were going to have to run on empty until 2pm. Not even my best zombie impression, or the fact we were beginning to smell made the desk lady take pity on us. So we got the bus into the centre. I have never experienced anything like it. The bus was smaller than the ones at home and the sign said it could fit 113 people. Dee and I were clinging on to each other for dear life whilst being squished by hoards of people. With my lack of sleep and now shortened temper, I was proud that I lasted he journey.

We got to the Academie and joined he queue. I'd estimate we were in said queue or about 5 months but the girls reckon it was just over an hour an a half, sat on the street, in the sun, with no sleep. Oh I was a sight to behold. Once we got in, it was worth the wait. We mooches around the contemporary art and the exhibition of musical instruments and then went to find Michelangelo's David. At about 10ft tall, big Dave was rather impressive. The detail was unreal, and considering he is over 500years old, he's in pretty good shape. It was well worth the queue. We scooted around the rest of the gallery and went to find food before we collapsed. We ended up in a little restaurant by the Duomo. Oh my word. Italy is everything I wanted it to be. This was where the 'holiday within a holiday' began. For about 90mins we forgot we were sleep deprived and in need of showers, and we ate the most unbelievable pasta/colossal calzone in the whole entire world. I think I have found my spiritual home. I only took one picture today, and that is my cover picture for this blog. My desert was lemon sorbet. Now, I expected it to be a little scoop in a glass bowl. Oh how wrong I was! It was served in a real hollowed out lemon and I think it was made by sorbet angels. I was full of emotion.

Another cramped bus journey brought us back to our hostel. We got our room, I made my bed and fell straight asleep. I woke up about 2hrs ago to shower and plan tomorrow, and now I am ready to sleep again. Before we saw David, I will confess I was in a foul mood (which is completely out of character for me), but after seeing him and then eating that real Italian food, it hit me that I was now in the country I have wanted to visit for as long as I can remember, and no bad train ride is going to spoil this for me.

PS, mum, I apologise if my texts this morning worried you, I did not die on the streets of Florence due to lack of sleep.