SMOM and Seborga

Day 2 - Sat 13 Feb 2010

Zurich - Milan - Florence

Not a great nights sleep last night as my back is still hurting. The room was nice a warm so a managed to do a clothes wash and dry them out on the radiator. Up at 06:00 and checked out at 06:30, almost got charged a lot more than I was expecting on the credit card machine, but I spotted it and queried it before I entered my pin. Headed out into the darkness and boy is it cold!

Luckily it wasn't far to the station and my train was already on the departure board, and best of all it was waiting on the platform. I climbed aboard, and I must admit I wasn't that impressed with the Swiss idea of first class. The seat was small and uncomfortable and the leg room was poor. we left on time and headed off into the hills, trouble is the weather is very cloudy, so you can't see that much. There's plenty of snow on the ground.

After a few tunnels we break into sun light, but I must admit I'm not that impressed by this scenic journey. The guy in the seat opposite cracks open a can of beer as soon as we leave Zurich at 07:09, swiftly followed by purchasing another from the trolley.

Get to Milan about 20 minutes early! Just like Paris, it's a sunny but cold day and the station is even colder, so I head outside and have a picnic with the bits I'd bought in Zurich the night before. I kept the cheese cold by leaving it out on the window ledge overnight.

I head back into the station to locate the train which is at the platform, the train is very modern, but it stalls at the end of platform. We sit there for about 5 minutes before the reset button is pressed and we start off again. The countryside here is pretty flat and the line is straight so we're hacking along.

We get to Bologna and then head south through the mountains. As we enter the first tunnel the train stalls again!. 40 minutes later the reset button is pressed and we head off again! We get to Florence and I head off to see the Medici Chapel that is quite close to the station - the bad news is that it's closed. So I have a quick look around the connected church.

I pay my €8 and take the 462 steps to the top of the duomo, there are a lot of people on the steps and you have to stop to allow people going in the other direction to pass. You do get some great views of the paintings on the inside of the dome before heading up higher and out side to get views of the city.

After making it down, I head round the corner to my hotel only to find that they have a plumbing problem, and my room can't be used, so they booked me into another hotel. It's a bit further away from the Duomo and it doesn't have the roof top view. However they say I can come back and go up on the roof.

My new hotel is rather nice, and I have my own private toilet and shower. Took a half hour to recover and stretch my back out, I walk down through the centre to the Ponte Vecchio and up to the Piazzale Michelangelo with great views over the city just as the sun is setting. On the way down I stopped at a supermarket for some supplies and found a nice pizza joint right by the Uffizi. Full of Pizza and Tiramasu I head back to the warmth of the hotel and the temperature has really dropped now.