Man, so much has happened in the last 24 hours, most of them so memorable that I want to write about them right away, but I better stick to the chronological order of things as I tend to forget events about as quickly as I experience them.
So I ended yesterday with Monday's Queen's Day events, when Ash and I had had a quick catch up with out Dutch friends who own an amazing woonboot on the Prinsengracht. We've already had some fun adventures on that boat in our lives, by the way, but that was before I blogged. Maybe I'll write about it another time when I don't have so many other exciting things to write about.
After that we really just very slowly walked around a very orange and festive Amsterdam, until about 3 pm when my feet were getting blisters and tired and Ash and I made our way back to my sister's to pack our stuff and take a tram and train back to Brabant. It had been an amazingly sunny and warm day and by this time I was very tired, very very tired, but I didn't manage to sleep in the train as it was full of noisy Queen's Day revellers and we had to change trains twice. By the time we reached Elsendorp with Mum it was nearly half past seven and we were all too tired and hungry to cook so we ate at the local pub, which has very decent food. Then it was packing the tired way.
Packing the tired way is very slowly and quite ineffectively. We flew Ryanair so we had to keep our bags under a specific weight: two check in bags under 15 kilos and two hand luggage under 10 - which were not allowed to have liquids (ie toiletries) in them, and we had two pairs of shoes that had to go in a hard case so they wouldn't get squashed, etc. It was like a mathematics question and it took us too long to figure out. There were things to print out, things to check on the web, some stuff in the dryer not to forget, a shower was also necessary and it wasn't until after 11 that we finally got to sleep. But not for long.
Six twenty am we are woken by thunder and rain, just before the alarm clock. We had to catch a 9.05 am flight to Pisa, which was fine, I dozed off a few times on the plane but not enough to feel any less tired. When we got to Pisa is was unfortunately quite grey. Or as the pilot put it: "A few degrees warmer than back home, but otherwise the same". We remembered where the train station was from our honeymoon and this time didn't need to line up at the ticket office in the arrivals hall, as we knew there's ticket machines at the station. Which often speak better English than people behind counters. It was quite full on the platform and when the train arrived I almost had to laugh: it was one carriage. One carriage with one double door in the middle, through which quite a lot of travellers had to squeeze, up four seriously steep steps, with luggage, which had to be placed in overhead racks. Even the heavy big ones. Yes. Welcome to Italy!
We made our connection to Florence in time, but this was also a very full train, and sleeping wasn't an option here either. When we got to Florence, I was hot and tired and hungry and consequently not in the best of moods. So when we got out of the station and my husband, who had taken charge of the organising on the trip, did not know where the hotel was or how to get there. This, I must say, did not go down too well with me. I am always extremely organised and look things up on the internet and google maps and save stuff to my phone so I know where to go. Not everybody is like that, though. Not everybody. But, we got to the hotel eventually, it wasn't too far from the station, and though it was a bit chillier than in Pisa, it wasn't raining like it was back home. By the time we got to our room, which was quite comfortable, I didn't know which I needed more: sleep, food or a panadol. Sleep won out, I lay down on the bed just for a moment and I was gone.
After a decent snooze we went out to find food. Unfortunately I had only brought the pair of All Star shoes I had worn the day before and it wasn't nice walking in them again with blisters, but I persevered. Ash had chosen a church not too far from our hotel to visit, the Santa Maria Novelle, which we found easily, though by this stage it had started raining a little. Lucky for us the piazza on which it was located had some great little food stalls because it was a public holiday and we found some cheap yummy things to eat. Then we visited the church, which was lovely. When we came out, it was pouring down. I was still tired and my blisters didn't enjoy the walking so we made our way back, and discovered the church's amazing ancient pharmacy and perfumery, which was very pretty, around the corner.
But this time, we had planned four days in Florence which meant we had time for the bike tour, and it was awesome. We were the only ones on the tour, so it was personalised and the guide was great fun. When I introduced myself as Florence he laughed and said 'Well, I'm New York!' and I quipped that my husband, who was in the toilet, was called Amsterdam. We set off on our bikes, in the lovely morning sun, and had a great tour, including a lovely gelato in front of Palazzo Piti. Omar, the guide, recommended many great spots to visit on our own which many of which we have since then.
He also recommended a place for coffee, where Ash and I had lunch after our tour, and we went back to the hotel to gather our things so we could move to our next accommodation - a lovely B&B in the Florentine hills south of the city.
Oooh, it's dinner time, we have to go. Will publish this now and try and finish the rest of the story later. Pasta awaits!
So I ended yesterday with Monday's Queen's Day events, when Ash and I had had a quick catch up with out Dutch friends who own an amazing woonboot on the Prinsengracht. We've already had some fun adventures on that boat in our lives, by the way, but that was before I blogged. Maybe I'll write about it another time when I don't have so many other exciting things to write about.
After that we really just very slowly walked around a very orange and festive Amsterdam, until about 3 pm when my feet were getting blisters and tired and Ash and I made our way back to my sister's to pack our stuff and take a tram and train back to Brabant. It had been an amazingly sunny and warm day and by this time I was very tired, very very tired, but I didn't manage to sleep in the train as it was full of noisy Queen's Day revellers and we had to change trains twice. By the time we reached Elsendorp with Mum it was nearly half past seven and we were all too tired and hungry to cook so we ate at the local pub, which has very decent food. Then it was packing the tired way.
Packing the tired way is very slowly and quite ineffectively. We flew Ryanair so we had to keep our bags under a specific weight: two check in bags under 15 kilos and two hand luggage under 10 - which were not allowed to have liquids (ie toiletries) in them, and we had two pairs of shoes that had to go in a hard case so they wouldn't get squashed, etc. It was like a mathematics question and it took us too long to figure out. There were things to print out, things to check on the web, some stuff in the dryer not to forget, a shower was also necessary and it wasn't until after 11 that we finally got to sleep. But not for long.
Six twenty am we are woken by thunder and rain, just before the alarm clock. We had to catch a 9.05 am flight to Pisa, which was fine, I dozed off a few times on the plane but not enough to feel any less tired. When we got to Pisa is was unfortunately quite grey. Or as the pilot put it: "A few degrees warmer than back home, but otherwise the same". We remembered where the train station was from our honeymoon and this time didn't need to line up at the ticket office in the arrivals hall, as we knew there's ticket machines at the station. Which often speak better English than people behind counters. It was quite full on the platform and when the train arrived I almost had to laugh: it was one carriage. One carriage with one double door in the middle, through which quite a lot of travellers had to squeeze, up four seriously steep steps, with luggage, which had to be placed in overhead racks. Even the heavy big ones. Yes. Welcome to Italy!
We made our connection to Florence in time, but this was also a very full train, and sleeping wasn't an option here either. When we got to Florence, I was hot and tired and hungry and consequently not in the best of moods. So when we got out of the station and my husband, who had taken charge of the organising on the trip, did not know where the hotel was or how to get there. This, I must say, did not go down too well with me. I am always extremely organised and look things up on the internet and google maps and save stuff to my phone so I know where to go. Not everybody is like that, though. Not everybody. But, we got to the hotel eventually, it wasn't too far from the station, and though it was a bit chillier than in Pisa, it wasn't raining like it was back home. By the time we got to our room, which was quite comfortable, I didn't know which I needed more: sleep, food or a panadol. Sleep won out, I lay down on the bed just for a moment and I was gone.
After a decent snooze we went out to find food. Unfortunately I had only brought the pair of All Star shoes I had worn the day before and it wasn't nice walking in them again with blisters, but I persevered. Ash had chosen a church not too far from our hotel to visit, the Santa Maria Novelle, which we found easily, though by this stage it had started raining a little. Lucky for us the piazza on which it was located had some great little food stalls because it was a public holiday and we found some cheap yummy things to eat. Then we visited the church, which was lovely. When we came out, it was pouring down. I was still tired and my blisters didn't enjoy the walking so we made our way back, and discovered the church's amazing ancient pharmacy and perfumery, which was very pretty, around the corner.
When we got back to the hotel my shoes were soaked and my feet were sore, so we rested a little bit and I called my mum. After a while it seemed like it was starting to clear up outside so I used the blow dryer to dry my shoes as best as I could and we ventured out into a sunny, drying Florence. We found a nice quiet place for a plate of decent, cheap pasta and went for a short stroll around, finding another nice little church along the way.
I was very pleased, though, when we finally got to go to sleep that night.
In the morning it was sunny, and it promised to be a nice day. We were going to visit the duomo but decided to go for the bike tour instead, considering the sunny weather and my sore feet. When we got to the place that did the bike tours we were sad to find they no longer had the flags on their bikes like they did last time we were in Florence as they said I (heart) Florence, with a bike in the heart. We took the photo below last time, and I wish we had been able to take the tour then as we spent five hours walking around and as you might have figured out by now, I don't particularly like walking.
He also recommended a place for coffee, where Ash and I had lunch after our tour, and we went back to the hotel to gather our things so we could move to our next accommodation - a lovely B&B in the Florentine hills south of the city.
Oooh, it's dinner time, we have to go. Will publish this now and try and finish the rest of the story later. Pasta awaits!
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