Fri, 26 Sep 2003

author Liz	location Innsbruck, Tirol, Österreich
posted 20:42 CEST 29/09/2003	section Europe2002/Europe/Italia ( all photos )

Into Bologna ( 10 photos )
On Friday morning we left the hostel (yay!) and after a quick stop at the internet café, we headed towards Duomo. As we had all our bags with us, we took it in turns to go inside and have a look around while the other waited outside with the bags.
Wow. It was enormous and it looked so enormous inside because it was fairly plainly decorated, and had little furniture and so on to clutter it. Just huge soaring marble columns and a ceiling that seemed a long way away.
I had a bit of a look around, and admired the frescoes and the size of the cathedral and I was almost about to walk out of the exit when I spotted the inside of the huge dome. It was beautiful - covered in brightly coloured frescoes.
Back outside, we shouldered our bags and made our way to the train station, where we tried to get tickets to Bologna. Due to a transport strike, there was a sign saying we could purchase tickets on the train, so we went to our platform and boarded a train from Florence to Bologna.
The journey took about an hour and a half and maybe due to the strike, no conductor turned up so in the end we got our journey for free!
In Bologna there was chaos due to the strike, and people were standing around everywhere. We got out of the station and sat outside in the gardens to eat some of our bread. From there, we walked five or ten minutes up the road where we could catch a bus that would take us to the hostel, 4km away. Unfortunately, the buses were also affected by the strike, so we ended up waiting at the bus stop for an hour and a half. Finally buses started turning up, but not the one we needed. Feeling frustrated, we got on one that went vaguely in our direction. A few stops later, we saw the bus we needed infront of us. So we rushed off our bus to catch it. Poor Tim - his knees gave out and he nearly fell down the bus step. We missed our bus, but another one came soon after and took us right to the hostel.
So we made it to the hostel where we got beds and got chatting to a bloke from Leichardt.
We had planned to go into the city for dinner, but due to Tim's sore knee, we decided to have food at the hostel and then we watched a movie.

author Tim	location Firenze, Tuscany, Italia
posted 12:00 CEST 26/09/2003	section Europe2002/Site News ( all photos )

Quick Updates ( 10 photos )
Just a quick news flash as we haven't quite got the website fully up to date.
We are in Florence/Firenze right now, have been for two nights and are now leaving on a train, heading to Bolognia.
Longer term plans include heading up to Munich/München for Oktoberfest, then down through Switzerland, all via train.
We have had no more news on the van, only "we will call you when we hear something". As such, we aren't going to hang around, just do things as we see fit, trying to holiday without our home.
Big thanks to the many people who replied interested in our plight of head-gasket problems, with suggestions. The big thing we have learnt since is that it is a new head, not just the gasket. As such, we are basically paying for an entire new engine. It comes with a two year warranty on parts and labour, but yes it is costing us a lot.

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